Customer involvement in new service development : a theoretical review of academic studies related to customer participation in new service development processes

Abstract

This paper discusses customer involvement in service innovations. It gives a theoretical review of existing academic studies focused on service innovations and customer participation in new service development processes. It aims to develop a model of customer influence on market outcomes through customer involvement in different stages of new service development process. This influence is suggested to be indirect and modified by a number of service success factors. The goal of the research is to give a better understanding of customer roles in new service development processes and their influence on certain market outcomes. The model presents a number of hypotheses that are derived from the existing academic studies and need to be tested empirically. After validation the model could be used as a tool to describe and valuate customer participation in service innovations.