The age-effect on co-creation

: the impact of age on non-participating consumers’ perception of the innovation ability of a firm that co-create products with consumers

Abstract

In the interest of developing products that meet customers’ needs in a superior way, companies are increasingly involving consumers in their innovation process. Scholars acknowledge this novel concept of creating value and have begun investigating the effects of co-creation on non-participating consumers - those who do not participate in the product creation. However, little is known about how non-participating consumers’ age affects the perception of firms that co-create, even though segmenting customers based on age is often carried out by companies. First, we demonstrate that non-participating consumers prefer firms that co-create with consumers over firms that use professional designers. Two important moderators of the co-creation effect are identified; consumers’ prior familiarity with co-creation and consumers’ perceived similarity with the co-creators. Second, this study reveals that consumers’ age has important implications for managers. We demonstrate that younger consumers should be targeted with co-created products, because younger consumers are immune to the effect of the two moderators, and will prefer firms that co-create regardless of prior familiarity and perceived similarity

Date of Award	26 Jul 2017
Original language	English
Awarding Institution	Universidade Católica Portuguesa
Supervisor	Cláudia Isabel de Sousa Costa (Supervisor)