Engaging Customers in Value Co-creation: The Emergence of Customer Readiness

Abstract

Customer input is increasingly recognized as important in achieving service supremacy. As such, more and more service providers launch various service offerings with the intent to engage customers in value co-creation. However, despite the importance of the customer in value co-creation, how to garner customer input and/or motivate them to participate still remains unclear. To address this gap, we investigate the customer's role and propose a concept "customer readiness for co-creation" (CRC) to demonstrate customer preparation to engage in cooperative behavior with a supplier¡¦s initiatives in value co-creation. Additionally, we identify some antecedents and control variables to enrich the framework of CRC. We then use tourism as our research context and obtain 344 valid responses from an internet-based survey. The results, first, show that CRC emerges as a key concept in explaining customer intention to participate in value co-creation. Second, CRC stands as a key contributor to increased value for both customers and suppliers. Third, relationship strength is found to enhance the effect of CRC on the supplier's value from co-creation (customer feedback). Finally, we provide discussion, limitations, and suggestions for future work.