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Intangibility has long been studied in marketing, especially its physical aspect. This paper seeks to verify whether a branding strategy is efficient in reducing the risk perceived by customers.

A sample of university students answered the measurements considering both perspectives (brands and product categories). The paper uses a three‐dimensional approach of intangibility and explores its relationships with evaluation difficulty (ED) and perceived risk (PR). These relationships were tested in two different perspectives: brands and product categories.

Two analyses were made to test the hypotheses which were generally supported. Several relationships between the variables were found, but three should be highlighted. First, it was shown that brands are more mentally intangible than product categories, which may lead to a difficulty to evaluate. Second, it was found that evaluation difficulty increases the perceived risk in the product category perspective. Third, it was found that higher involvement generates a stronger relationship between evaluation difficulty and perceived risk for the product category perspective.

Theoretical and managerial implications to the literature are discussed along with examples of how managers could use the findings.

The research incorporates prior knowledge and involvement as moderating variables of the proposed framework and reinforces their relevance to the field. The results not only show the importance of branding, but also support the argument of considering evaluation difficulty in future research.

The marketing literature suggests that product intangibility is positively associated with perceived risk and the intangibility construct encompasses three dimensions: physical intangibility, mental intangibility, and generality. The purpose of this research is to test which dimension of the intangibility construct is the most correlated with perceived risk. A survey was conducted and structural equation modeling analyses were used to test the proposed model. Results show that the mental dimension of intangibility accounts for more variance in the perceived risk construct than the other two dimensions, even when knowledge and involvement are included as moderators. Hence, the challenge for marketers might not be so much to reduce risk by physically tangibilizing goods and services, as has been advised for the past two decades, as rather to mentally tangibilize their offerings.

Following the tenets of resource-based view, the present study aims to investigate the effect of creative corporate culture according to the competing values framework model at the level of corporate intangibility and its respective repercussions on performance.

The sample included 117 non-USA foreign firms traded on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE), which issued annual financial reports between 2009 and 2014 using the 20-F form. To meet the study objectives, in addition to the descriptive and comparative analyses, the authors performed regression analyses with panel data, estimating generalized least-squares, two-stage least-squares and ordinary least-squares.

Creative culture had a negative effect on the level of intangibility and corporate performance, while the level of intangibility did not appear to influence corporate performance. When combined, creative culture and intangibility had a potentially negative effect on corporate results. In conclusion, creative corporate culture had a negative effect on performance, even in firms with higher levels of intangibility, characterized by elements like experimentation and innovation.

Although the study hypotheses were eventually rejected, the analyses are relevant to both the academic setting and the market because of the organizational and institutional aspects evaluated, especially in relation to intangibility and creative culture and in view of the unique cross-cultural approach adopted. Within the corporate setting, the study provides a spectrum of stakeholders with tools to identify the profile of foreign firms traded on the NYSE.

Service scholars have questioned the usefulness of the concept of tangibility/intangibility as a characteristic of services for two reasons: first, it is ambiguous and does not differentiate between services and goods; and second, because all offerings, despite their characteristics, render service to customers. Consequently, scholars have suggested discarding the concept altogether. The purpose of this paper is to subject the concept to critical evaluation and argue that tangibility/intangibility is useful, because it influences consumers' experiences with offerings. In this paper, the authors argue that it is necessary to re‐conceptualise tangibility/intangibility to overcome the previous critique.

The authors draw upon empirical research from the service marketing and psychology literature in order to advance knowledge on the nature of tangibility/intangibility and its influence on the formation of consumer experiences.

It is proposed that tangibility/intangibility should be investigated from a consumer perspective, rather than an inherent characteristic in offerings. Also, it is shown that the concept is relevant for understanding consumer experience formation at different stages of the purchase process.

The paper provides propositions on the conceptualization of tangibility/intangibility and its relationship with pre‐, ongoing use and post‐purchase consumer experiences. The authors call for caution in dismissing tangibility/intangibility as a concept in the service marketing literature.

This paper aims to explore the association between intangibility and perceived risk using a sample of North American households. This relationship is explored within two purchase environments, namely online and offline. The authors also investigated the moderating effects of privacy, system security and general security concerns when purchasing in an online environment.

The survey was delivered to 156 households in a small town in the Midwest and collected upon completion.

The perception of risk is increased when two negatively loaded pieces of information are processed simultaneously (i.e. product intangibility and privacy concern). Furthermore, system security was identified as the most relevant concern in e‐commerce.

The representativeness of the sample is limited. Theoretical and managerial implications are discussed.

The results provide interesting insights about the generalizability of previous findings based on student samples, and show the importance of privacy concerns, system security concerns, general security concerns for those purchasing in online environments.

The internet has made it possible to diffuse totally digitized products on a very large scale. The newspaper business is one of the sectors that has been most affected by this technological revolution. Given such products’ uneven commercial success, an analysis of the literature suggests that these mixed results could be explained by the digitized nature of the product combined with a price judged too high. Both these elements reduce the perceived global value of the digital support compared with the print version on paper. To test this proposition, the authors have constructed an experimental design, manipulating the format (digital newspaper vs. print newspaper) and the price (high vs low). The results show that newspaper digitization significantly reduces perceived global value for the consumer compared with the print format. The authors also show that the perceived intangibility of the product exerts a more complex effect on perceived global value: this effect depends on both the nature of the intangibility (mental vs physical) and the cost and benefit analysis.

An experimental study was conducted with two factors: digitalization (print vs digital format) and price (low vs high). The authors carried out a mixed-factor variance analysis and follow Preacher and Hayes procedure to test the hypothesis. A sample of 387 undergraduate students was interviewed in laboratory.

The results show that newspaper digitization significantly reduces (i.e. destroys) perceived global value for the consumer (i.e. it destroys value), compared to the print format. The reuslts also show that the perceived intangibility of the product exerts a more complex effect on perceived global value: this effect depends at the same time on the nature of the intangibility (mental vs physical) and the account taken of costs and benefits.

One major result is the fact that digitizing newspaper strongly destroys its perceived global value for the consumer, compared to the physical alternative. To explain this phenomenon, the product’s perceived intangibility had been considered, as well as how this is related to the perceived costs and benefits. It appears that it has an overall direct negative effect on perceived value; therefore, the more a newspaper format is perceived as physically intangible, the more its perceived global value decreases. Results shows that this loss of value can be counteracted in two different ways, through the indirect effects of costs and benefits.

Investigates the concept of product intangibility, considers its implications for marketing, and examines the way in which managers view intangibility and cope with its marketing consequences. Draws on existing literature and results of interviews with managers in service industries across a broad range. Provides evidence which strongly suggests that product intangibility has a profound effect on the marketing of services. Suggests, also, that there is a lack of guidance for service managers in relation to tackling the problems and making use of the opportunities created by intangible products. Proposes that marketing needs to address these problems by suitably adapting existing tools and providing new concepts to explain and manage intangibility correctly.

Among the areas which need to be addressed in service quality research is the nature of consumer expectations across the range of intangibility. Previous research has compared consumers’ service quality expectations across services, but different groups of subjects were evaluated for each different service. The problem with using different subjects for each service is that the subject’s demographic characteristics may be responsible for the significant differences in expectations of quality. This research uses a controlled, repeated measures design where subjects were each asked to evaluate three services, varying in their degree of intangibility, over a ten week period. This made it possible to look at service quality expectations without risking the problem that demographics would account for most of the differences in the data. A classification matrix for services based strictly on the feature of intangibility is proposed. The managerial implications of this simplified classification scheme for services are discussed.

Intangibility is one of the distinctive characteristics of service. However, the literature also highlights “tangibles” as one of the basic service quality dimensions. Investigates the importance of tangibles and intangibles in perceptions of service quality as assessed by both customers and service providers. Selects four service industries to reflect a range from high to low levels of tangible components and degree of intangibility in both service process and output. Based on 400 telephone interviews with consumers, shows that the level of tangible components has a positive impact on the perceived importance of the tangible dimension in service quality. However, the second phase of this research, involving a qualitative study with managers in the studied industries, shows that the tangibles dimension is relatively neglected in service industries with high tangible involvement. Presents a model of tangibility and intangibility to aid managers in understanding customers’ perceptions, and to stimulate further research.

This research aims to investigate how backstage visibility affects intangibility and perceived risk at the pre-purchase stage and how service credence moderates the effect of backstage visibility on intangibility and perceived risk. It also focuses on the effect of backstage visibility on perceived service quality and value at the post-purchase stage and the moderating role of the service contact level.

This research tests the causal relationships between backstage visibility and customers’ service evaluations through two experimental studies.

Study 1 shows that customers who are exposed to backstage cues perceive less pre-purchase risk in the service than those who are not exposed. Pictures plus text information are more effective than text illustrations alone for risk reduction. This risk reduction effect is stronger for high-credence than for low-credence services and is partially mediated by the perceived intangibility of the service. Study 2 reveals that customers with access to backstage cues perceive higher service quality and higher overall value from service experiences. The value increase is more significant for high-contact than for low-contact services.

Future research could apply different methods to different data sources to provide further insight about backstage visibility.

The findings of this research suggest that allowing customers to view some backstage activities before purchase helps tangibilize the service, achieve more effective communication with customers and create more positive service experiences.