The service revolution and its marketing implications: service logic vs service-dominant logic

Abstract

Purpose – The purpose of this conceptual paper is to analyse the implications generated by a service perspective. Design/methodology/approach – A conceptual analysis of two approaches to understanding service perspectives, service logic (SL) and service-dominant logic (SDL), reveals direct and indirect marketing implications. Findings – The SDL is based on a metaphorical view of co-creation and value co-creation, in which the firm, customers and other actors participate in the process that leads to value for customers. The approach is firm-driven; the service provider drives value creation. The managerial implications are not service perspective-based, and co-creation may be imprisoned by its metaphor. In contrast, SL takes an analytical approach, with co-creation concepts that can significantly reinvent marketing from a service perspective. Value gets created in customer processes, and value creation is customer driven. Ten managerial SL principles derived from these analyses offer theoretical and practical conclusions with the potential to reinvent marketing. Research limitations/implications – The SDL can direct researchers’ and managers’ views towards complex value-generation processes. The SL can analyse this process on a managerial level, to derive customer-centric, service perspective-based opportunities to reinvent marketing. Practical implications – The analysis and principles help marketing break free from offering only value propositions and become an organisation-wide responsibility. Firms must organise service-influenced marketing and create a customer focus among all employees, beyond conventional marketing. Originality/value – A service perspective on business has key managerial implications and enables researchers and managers to find new, customer-centric, service-influenced marketing approaches.

Customer Roles in Self-Service Technology Encounters in a Tourism Context

“…The co-creator of value concept in the S-D Logic incorporates all aspects of customer involvement in the production (co-producer) and consumption of the service which creates value for the customer (Grönroos, 2006). However, the co-creator customer role has been deemed to be too vague, requiring further development and operationalization for specific service contexts (Grönroos & Gummerus, 2014;McColl-Kennedy et al, 2012). Therefore, this paper examines the literature on customer roles in service literature in order to refine the "co-creator of value" concept.…”

“…This process mostly takes place in the customer sphere (Grönroos & Gummerus, 2014) and may include face-to-face interactions with other customers (Parker & Ward, 2000) or online in social networks and communities (Grissemann & Stokburger-Sauer, 2012). Parker and Ward (2000) suggest that customer-to-customer interaction is becoming an important area of research with the rise of SSTs and the delivery of services in non-employee environments.…”

“…The S-D Logic broadly defines the role of the customer in service as a co-creator of value which is a rather vague concept and has attracted much discussion and refinement (Grönroos & Gummerus, 2014). A review of the relevant literature suggests that the customer as a cocreator may involve three roles, comprising a co-creator role in innovation (Roberts, Hughes, & Kertbo, 2013), a co-creator role in the delivery and customization of the service (Moeller et al, 2013), and a co-creator role whereby customer resources are applied to derive value in consuming a service (Grönroos & Gummerus, 2014). The co-creator of value concept in the S-D Logic incorporates all aspects of customer involvement in the production (co-producer) and consumption of the service which creates value for the customer (Grönroos, 2006).…”

Triadic Value Propositions: When It Takes More Than Two to Tango

“…As Grönroos and Gummerus (2014) observe though, SDL literature often is implicitly firm-centric, such that the provider appears to drive value creation because it seeks to create value propositions (Lusch and Webster 2011;Payne et al 2008;Vargo and Lusch 2004). As Ballantyne et al (2011, p. 205) point out, the original SDL view (e.g., Vargo and Lusch 2004) did not emphasize the reciprocal nature of value propositions; there is no evident reciprocity or flexibility if the provider simply puts forward a proposal.…”

Involving stakeholders towards service implementation. Co-designing change of practices using a visual language

“…This means that shaping service resources that are required for integration in value co-creation processes (see e.g. Vargo & Lusch, 2008;Grönroos & Gummerus, 2014) on a meso-level is a quest for an entire organisation. Secondly, service implementation involves organisational change because it influences roles and responsibilities of actors in an organisation (Lin et al, 2011;Overkamp and Holmlid, 2016).…”