How much customer collaboration is too much? Implications for user entrepreneurship and product performance

Purpose Research in the business-to-business (B2B) and user entrepreneurship literature agrees that “user-driven” perspectives allow entrepreneurs to develop innovative products superior to conventional products. Other researchers argue that such “user-driven” products have limited success and limited impact in certain markets (e.g. niche and industrial markets). This study aims to understand the extent to which user input or co-creation becomes critical in determining product performance. Design/methodology/approach The key informant approach is used for data collection. Data were collected using a survey instrument via an online panel. Existing scales are used to measure all the focal constructs. Partial least square-based structural equation modeling was used to check for the psychometric properties of the scales and test the hypotheses. Findings The results indicate that user entrepreneurship is significantly related to firm collaboration efforts and customer collaboration efforts in the B2B market. Both firm collaboration efforts and customer collaboration efforts are significantly related to product performance and mediate the relationship between user entrepreneurship and product performance. Also, findings show that there is an “n” relationship between firm collaboration efforts and product performance. Originality/value This study supports the concerns raised by researchers about the dark side of value co-creation and highlights that value co-creation can impede product performance when user entrepreneurs lay too much emphasis on the collaboration processes.