Special Issue of the Tourism Management Perspectives
Consumer Experience Management and Customer Journeys in Tourism, Hospitality and Events
Special Issue Editors:
Dr. Babak Taheri (Heriot-Watt University, UK)
Dr. Girish Prayag (University of Canterbury, New Zealand)
Dr. Birgit Muskat (Deakin University, Australia)
Deadline submission of abstract (up to 750 words): 31st January 2019
Introduction and Rationale
Relationship building remains at the core of customer-firm interactions. It is therefore of no surprise that managers have a vested interest in designing and managing both service encounters and service interactions (Lemon & Verhoef, 2016). Understanding consumer experience during service encounters is vital for organizations to survive and compete more effectively (Lemon & Verhoef, 2016; Voorhees et al., 2017). Research investigating experiences can take both a process-or outcome-based perspectives (Lin & Kuo, 2016) and recent studies argue that the major challenge in developing an exceptional customer experience lies in creating a connection among different touchpoints within the customer journey to achieve positive outcomes (cf. Edelman & Singer, 2015; Lemon & Verhoef, 2016; Rawson, Duncan, & Jones, 2013; Voorhees et al., 2017). Lemon and Verhoef (2016, p.6) define customer experience “as a customer’s journey with a firm over time during the purchase cycle across multiple touchpoints”. Within this cycle, there can also be interactions with multiple actors in multiple directions(C2B, B2C and C2C).Thus, service designers and marketers should offer mesmerizing, interactive, open-ended and compelling journey to their customer in order to achieve economic and relational values (Edelman & Singer, 2015; Taheri, Coelho, Sousa, & Evanschitzky, 2017).
It is well accepted that customer experience can be viewed from multiple perspectives including customer, firm, or co-creation (Chandler & Lusch, 2015). However, the complexity of customer journeys in multichannel decision-making settings such as tourism, hospitality and leisure (Anderl, Becker, Von Wangenheim, & Schumann, 2016; Barwitz & Maas, 2018; Kranzbuhler, Kleijnen, Morgan, & Teerling, 2017; Mahrous & Hassan, 2017) has led to a lack of theorization and empirical evaluation of both customer expriences and customer journeys in the field of tourism studies. A recent review of the consumer experience literature by Adhikari and Bhattacharya (2016) highlights several conceptual and empirical deficiencies. For example, the multidimensional nature of customer experiences has led tourism and hospitality researchers to focus primarily on the cognitive and affective dimensions (Mody Suess & Lehto,2018; Servidio & Ruffolo, 2016), with few studies examining the social dimensions (Rajaobelina, 2018). Researchers sometimes have used customer satisfaction and service quality measurements as proxies for evaluating customer experience (Adhikari & Bhattacharya, 2016). Interestingly, there are service organizations that are using ‘engaging stories’ from their customer interactions to improve their service design and offerings by managing both service touchpoints and the customer experience (Følstad & Kvale, 2018; Homburg, Jozic, & Kuehnl, 2017). Yet, the tourism and hospitality literature remains thin on the factors that contribute to the successful management of customer journeys and customer experience.
Thus, the aim of this special issue is to encourage new theoretical and empirical developments on customer experience management and customer journeys in the tourism and hospitality field. This special issue seeks both conceptual and empirical studies, from either firm, customer or co-creation perspectives that advance our knowledge and understanding of touchpoints in the customer journey as well as holistic perspectives of customer experience. In particular articles that examine not only business to customer interactions but also customer to customer interactions at different touchpoints are encouraged. We also encourage studies that use a range of methodologies including qualitative (e.g., mobile ethnography, case studies), quantitative (e.g., modelling approaches) and mixed methods.
Topics along the following areas are highly welcome, though other relevant areas will be considered:
– Conceptualizations of customer experience and consumer journey in tourism, hospitality and events
– Organisational/enabler perspectives of customer journeys and customer experience management strategies and practices
– Cognitive, emotional, sensory, social and spiritual dimensions of customer experiences
– Applications of emerging frameworks to understand consumer journeys and touchpoints in
tourism, hospitality and events experiences
– Issues and opportunities in consumer journey mapping in tourism, hospitality and events
experiences
– Managing service design, service encounters and customer experience in tourism,
hospitality and events
– Open innovation, co-creation and customer engagement approaches in experience design
– Key drivers and consequences of customer experience (face-to-face and virtual
perspectives)
– Application of service encounter 2.0 and role of technology in tourism, hospitality or event
experiences
– Influence of social media interaction on specific customer touchpoints in tourism, hospitality
or event experiences
– Exploring consumer journeys in multichannel decision-making in tourism, hospitality or event
experiences
– Role of customer touchpoints in smart tourism destinations and experiences
Key Dates
● Submission of abstract (up to 750 words): 31st January 2019
● Notification of abstract acceptance: 25th February 2019
● Submission of full paper: 10th June 2019
● Peer review report: 31st July 2019
● Author to revise and resubmit based on peer review report: 16th September 2019
● Notification of full paper acceptance: 30th September 2019
Any queries prior to abstract submission can also be sent to girish.prayag@canterbury.ac.nz or b.muskat@deakin.edu.au
References:
Anderl, E., Becker, I., Von Wangenheim, F., & Schumann, J. H. (2016). Mapping the customer journey: Lessons learned from graph-based online attribution modeling. International Journal of Research in Marketing, 33, 457-474.
Barwitz, N., & Maas, P. (2018). Understanding the Omnichannel Customer Journey: Determinants of Interaction Choice. Journal of Interactive Marketing, 43, 116–133.
Edelman, D. C., & Singer, M. (2015). Competing on Customer Journeys. Harvard Business Review, 88-100.
Følstad, A., & Kvale, K. (2018). Customer journeys: a systematic literature review. Journal of Service Theory and Practice, 28(2), 196-227.
Homburg, C., Jozic, D., & Kuehnl, C. (2017). Customer experience management: toward implementing an evolving marketing concept. Journal of Academy of Marketing Science, 45, 377-401.
Kranzbuhler, A-M., Klejinen, M.H.P., Morgan, R.E., & Teerling, M. (2017). The Multilevel Nature of Customer Experience Research: An Integrative Review and Research Agenda. International Journal of Management Reviews, 1-24.
Adhikari, A., & Bhattacharya, S. (2016). Appraisal of literature on customer experience in tourism sector:
review and framework. Current Issues in Tourism, 19(4), 296-321.
Chandler, J. D., & Lusch, R. F. (2015). Service systems: a broadened framework and research agenda
on value propositions, engagement, and service experience.Journal of Service
Research, 18(1), 6-22.
Lemon, K. N., & Verhoef, P. C. (2016). Understanding Customer Experience Throughout the Customer Journey. Journal of Marketing, 80, 69-96.
Rawson, A., Duncan, E., & Jones, C. (2013). The truth about customer experience. Harvard Business Review, 91(9), 90-98.
Servidio, R., & Ruffolo, I. (2016). Exploring the relationship between emotions and memorable tourism experiences through narratives. Tourism Management Perspectives, 20, 151-160.
Taheri, B., Coelho, F. J., Sousa, C. M. P., & Evanschitzky, H. (2017). Mood regulation, customer participation, and customer value creation in hospitality services. International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management 29(12), 3063-3081.
Voorhees, C. M., Fombelle, P. W., Gregoire, Y., Bone, S., Gustafsson, A., Sousa, R., & Walkowiak, T. (2017). Service encounters, experiences and the customer journey: Defining the field and a call to expand our lens. Journal of Business Research, 79, 269-280.
