Proximity in marketing: An integrating theoretical framework and research agenda

Abstract

Academics and practitioners increasingly focus on the concept of proximity, but the growing literature features a confusing diversity of approaches. This article offers a macro-analytical and conceptually unified vision of proximity. Based on an in-depth analysis of literature, this integrative synthesis offers a fourfold contribution: characterize and classify approaches to proximity, understand the place occupied by proximity in theoretical models in marketing, consider the managerial interest of proximity, and develop propositions for continued research into proximity topics.

The role of proximity in omnichannel customer experience: a service logic perspective

“…According to the literature, proximity fosters the development of trust (Darke et al. , 2016; Srivastava and Singh, 2010), commitment, loyalty, and satisfaction (Lenglet and Mencarelli, 2020), purchase intentions (Huyghe et al. , 2017), positive word-of-mouth (Gao et al.…”

“…It follows that the understanding of the omnichannel customer experience need to be improved; this could be done by adopting different perspectives and theoretical lenses that could shed a different light on omnichannel and its dynamics. Important research gaps remain, in particular with respect to the conceptual association of omnichannel vis-a-vis other theoretical entities such as the service logic (Gr€ onroos, 1982(Gr€ onroos, , 2004(Gr€ onroos, , 2006Vargo and Lusch, 2004, 2008a, b, 2009Gummesson and Mele, 2010;Gummesson and Gr€ onroos, 2012;Gr€ onroos and Voima, 2013;Vargo, 2009) and the concept of proximity (Trope and Liberman, 2010;Bar-Anan et al, 2007;Lenglet and Mencarelli, 2020) that all share an interactionist perspective.…”

“…, Gasparin et al (2022), De Keyser et al (2020), Gao and Huang (2021), Gao et al (2021a, b), Hickman et al (2020), Le and Nguyen (2020), Quach et al (2020), Rodriguez-Torrico et al (2020), Shi et al (2020) Psychological distance Spatial, temporal, social and hypothetical distance Bar-Anan et al (2007), DidiAlaoui and Cova (2021),Lenglet and Mencarelli (2020),Maglio et al (2013,Trope and Liberman (2010) …”

“Should I give it away or sell it?” A strategic perspective on consumers’ redistribution of their unused objects

“…In marketing, studies have instead mobilized closeness to examine a large set of issues, such as consumer-retailer relationships (Schultz et al, 2016), social interactions with sales personnel (Bove & Johnson, 2001), or C2C interactions (Dubois et al, 2016), and defined it as the short spatial, social, or psychological distance between the two entities (for a review, see Lenglet & Mencarelli, 2020). In particular, we show that access and relational closeness (Schultz et al, 2016) with the recipients of disposed objects play a central role.…”

Psychological distance as a working tool for managers

“…Digitalization is revolutionizing shopping behaviors (Forsythe and Shi, 2003;Grewal et al, 2020a;Novak et al, 2003;Yoo and Donthu, 2001) by facilitating transactions (Grewal et al, 2020b) and offering new experiences to the consumer (Petit et al, 2019). At stake in this phenomenon is the ability to offer value to the consumer through new technologies, such as connected objects (Hoffman and Novak, 2018;Novak and Hoffman, 2019), robots (Belk, 2016;Goudey and Bonin, 2016), artificial intelligence (Davenport et al, 2020), and social networks (Borah et al, 2020;Kim et al, 2016), while preserving proximity with the individual (Lenglet and Mencarelli, 2020). However, with digital technology, and in particular the Internet, consumers experience psychological distance insofar as they are very often spatially and temporally distant from the offering proposed.…”