A customer‐dominant logic of service

Abstract

Purpose: The paper seeks to introduce to a new perspective on the roles of customers and companies in creating value by outlining a customer‐based approach to service. The customer's logic is examined in‐depth as being the foundation of a customer‐dominant (CD) marketing and business logic. Design/methodology/approach: The authors argue that both the goods‐ and service‐dominant logic are provider‐dominant. Contrasting the provider‐dominant logic with CD logic, the paper examines the creation of service value from the perspectives of value‐in‐use, the customer's own context, and the customer's experience of service. Findings: Moving from a provider‐dominant logic to a CD logic uncovered five major challenges to service marketers: company involvement, company control in co‐creation, visibility of value creation, scope of customer experience, and character of customer experience. Research limitations/implications: The paper is exploratory. It presents and discusses a new perspective and suggests implications for research and practice. Practical implications: Awareness of the mechanisms of customer logic will provide businesses with new perspectives on the role of the company in their customers' lives. It is proposed that understanding the customer's logic should represent the starting‐point for the company's marketing and business logic. Originality/value: The paper increases the understanding of how the customer's logic underpins the CD business logic. By exploring consequences of applying a CD logic, further directions for theoretical and empirical research are suggested.