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Pricing is widely acknowledged as a market entry challenge for servitising companies. The purpose of this research is to ascertain the attributes that contribute to willingness to pay (WTP) for industrial services and suggest incorporating those attributes to a pricing model.

Three attributes (Quality of Service, Nearness of Service Provider and Brand Equity of Service Provider) were analyzed at three respective levels to ascertain their importance on WTP. Conventional conjoint analysis (CCA), using an orthogonal design, was the method used. The 346 respondents were decision-makers and top management professionals from various industries.

Brand Equity emerged as the most significant attribute contributing to WTP, having more than 45% importance – followed by the Quality and Nearness.

The scope of the study is limited to the industries and its Allies. However, the relative importance of the attributes may vary depending on the type of service.

The importance of attributes and their WTP preference helps future researchers create a pricing model involving these attributes. This helps service providers price their services rationally, thus succeeding in servitization.

Product life is extended because the manufacturers themselves are servicing it and also help recycle the product with their expertise. Servitization is also helpful for the Indian economy, as it is turning into a manufacturing economy.

This research investigates three attributes that contribute to WTP, in accordance with their level of contribution. It also provides a direction to establish an adequate pricing model for industrial services.

Low-income consumers’ perceptions of access and inclusion in financial services, remain underresearched. To fill this gap, the purpose of this study, is to investigate elements of low-income consumers’ informal and formal financial service experiences, from their personal experience.

Mixed methods using data collected from low-income consumers in Latin America, reveal a spectrum of consumer perceptions making up access, inclusion and social dependence within financial service experiences. Scales, grounded in the consumer experience, are developed, validated and used to test a model of consumers’ service inclusivity perceptions.

Service costs, information and documentation difficulty, convenience and social dynamics influence low-income consumers’ perceptions of financial service inclusivity.

Analysis reveals differentiation in the impact of aspects of low-income consumers’ experiences between formal and informal financial services. Working directly with this unique population exposes the nuance of their financial service experiences.

This research provides a more holistic perspective on low-income consumers’ financial service experience and provides contextually relevant scales with robust psychometric properties. Services marketers can use this research to inform design and evaluation of financial service offerings for low-income consumers.

This research contributes to study of the wellbeing of low-income consumers by providing understanding of their financial service experiences from their point-of-view and providing contextually-relevant, empirically validated tools for future inquiry.

The paper aims to investigate the practices facilitating the transformation of healthcare services, understanding the resulting outcomes in terms of well-being and uplifting changes. a systematic literature review (SLR) focusing on analyzing the healthcare sector under the transformative service research (TSR) theoretical domain is conducted to achieve this goal.

Employing a structured SLR developed based on the PRISMA protocol (Pickering and Byrne, 2014; Pickering et al., 2015) and using Scopus and WoS databases, the study identifies and analyzes 49 papers published between 2021 and 2022. Content analysis is used to classify and analyze the papers.

The SLR reveals four transformative practices (how) within the healthcare sector under the TSR domain, each linked to specific well-being outcomes (what). The analysis shows that both practices and outcomes are mainly patient-related. An integrative framework for transformative healthcare service is presented and critically examined to identify research gaps and define the trajectory for the future development of TSR in healthcare. In addition, managerial implications are provided to guide practitioners.

This research is among the first to analyze TSR literature in the context of healthcare. The study critically examines the TSR’s impact on the sector’s transformation, providing insights for future research and offering a roadmap for healthcare practitioners to facilitate uplifting changes.

The purpose of this study is to examine approaches used by university libraries to enhance the visibility and utilization of research support services (RSSs) among doctoral students and to assess the competencies of library staff in delivering research support services.

This study used qualitative design approach, purposively sampled 40 librarians (8 university librarians and 32 librarians) in charge of RSSs and use of structured interview.

The findings of this study revealed three major themes: offline and online strategies, the need for upskilling and professional development programs and proactive empowerment.

This study focused on research support services in chartered public universities in Kenya; private universities were not included.

The need to enhance library staff's ongoing professional development programs, increasing funding to university libraries and proactivity by the libraries to improve the provision and promotion of RSSs to doctoral students in Kenya.

There are limited existing literature in the Kenyan context. This study will fill a knowledge gap and contribute to the literature on academic libraries support and doctoral students experience in Kenyan context.

This study examines the dualities of digital services – that is, how customers’ favorite everyday digital services can positively and negatively contribute to their well-being. Thus, the study describes the meanings of favorite digital services as part of customers’ everyday lives and the types of well-being to which such services can contribute.

We used a qualitative research approach through semi-structured interviews conducted in 2021 to collect data from 14 young adults (22–31 years old) who actively used digital services in their daily lives.

Our findings revealed that customers’ favorite everyday digital services can contribute to their mental well-being, social well-being, and intellectual well-being. Within these three dimensions of well-being, we identified nine dualities of digital services that describe their positive and negative contributions: (1) digital escapism versus digital disruption, (2) digital relaxation versus digital stress, (3) digital empowerment versus digital subjugation, (4) digital augmentation versus digital emptiness, (5) digital socialization versus digital isolation, (6) digital togetherness versus digital exclusion, (7) digital self-expression versus digital pressure, (8) digital learning versus digital dependence, and (9) digital inspiration versus digital stagnation.

These findings suggest that everyday digital services have the potential to contribute to customer well-being in various aspects – both positively and negatively – accentuating the need for service providers to decipher the impacts of their offerings on well-being. Indeed, understanding the relationship between digital services and customer well-being can help companies tailor their services to customers’ needs. Companies that prioritize customer well-being not only benefit their customers but also create sustainable growth opportunities in the long run. Further, companies can use the derived information in service design to develop marketing strategies that emphasize the positive impacts of their digital services on customer well-being.

Although prior transformative service studies have investigated the well-being of multiple stakeholders, such studies have focused on services related to the physical and healthcare domains. Consequently, the role of everyday digital services as contributors to customer well-being is an under-researched topic. In addition, the concept of well-being and its various dimensions has received limited attention in previous service research. By investigating everyday digital services and their multidimensional contribution to customer well-being, this study broadens the perspective on well-being within TSR and aids in refining a more precise conceptualization.

This study aims to conduct performance and clustering analyses with the help of Digital Government Reference Library (DGRL) v16.6 database examining the role of emerging technologies (ETs) in public services delivery.

VOSviewer and SciMAT techniques were used for clustering and mapping the use of ETs in the public services delivery. Collecting documents from the DGRL v16.6 database, the paper uses text mining analysis for identifying key terms and trends in e-Government research regarding ETs and public services.

The analysis indicates that all ETs are strongly linked to each other, except for blockchain technologies (due to its disruptive nature), which indicate that ETs can be, therefore, seen as accumulative knowledge. In addition, on the whole, findings identify four stages in the evolution of ETs and their application to public services: the “electronic administration” stage, the “technological baseline” stage, the “managerial” stage and the “disruptive technological” stage.

The output of the present research will help to orient policymakers in the implementation and use of ETs, evaluating the influence of these technologies on public services.

The research helps researchers to track research trends and uncover new paths on ETs and its implementation in public services.

Recent research has focused on the need of implementing ETs for improving public services, which could help cities to improve the citizens’ quality of life in urban areas. This paper contributes to expanding the knowledge about ETs and its implementation in public services, identifying trends and networks in the research about these issues.

Contrary to want-based services, customer participation has got lesser attention in high-credence services like health care. Customer participation for patients with chronic illnesses could be life-threatening and goes beyond the service organization’s physical environment. Realizing the importance of transformative service research in health-care services, this study aims to propose and validate the conceptualization of customer participation for patients with chronic illnesses.

The study uses sequential exploratory research design with mixed method research. The first phase is a qualitative exploration of the nature and meaning of customer participation by synthesizing theory and insights from semi-structured interviews (N = 75) with doctors, patients and paramedical staff. Next, survey data (N = 690) of patients with chronic illnesses is used to validate the proposed conceptualization. Finally, nomological validity was also tested on an additional survey data set (N = 362) using SEM and FsQCA.

The findings reveal that health-care customer participation is a three-dimensional behavioral construct in which a customer can participate by sharing information, involving in decision-making and ensuring compliance. The study also demonstrates that customer participation is a critical driver of satisfaction with life and perceived control on illness.

The research provides policy guidelines for owners and operators of health-care organizations in developing frameworks for collecting participation data, which can be used in strategies for seeking customer participation.

The research conceptualizes and validates “customer participation” as a multidimensional higher-order construct for patients with chronic illnesses, rarely focused in services marketing and management research on health care.

This study addresses the gap in understanding text analytics within the service domain, focusing on new service development to provide insights into key research themes and trends in text analytics approaches to service development. It explores the benefits and challenges of implementing these approaches and identifies potential research opportunities for future service development. Importantly, this study offers insights to assist service providers to make data-driven decisions for developing new services and optimising existing ones.

This research introduces the hybrid thematic analysis with a systematic literature review (SLR-TA). It delves into the various aspects of text analytics in service development by analysing 124 research papers published from 2012 to 2023. This approach not only identifies key practical applications but also evaluates the benefits and difficulties of applying text analytics in this domain, thereby ensuring the reliability and validity of the findings.

The study highlights an increasing focus on text analytics within the service industry over the examined period. Using the SLR-TA approach, it identifies eight themes in previous studies and finds that “Service Quality” had the most research interest, comprising 42% of studies, while there was less emphasis on designing new services. The study categorises research into four types: Case, Concept, Tools and Implementation, with case studies comprising 68% of the total.

This study is groundbreaking in conducting a thorough and systematic analysis of a broad collection of articles. It provides a comprehensive view of text analytics approaches in the service sector, particularly in developing new services and service innovation. This study lays out distinct guidelines for future research and offers valuable insights to foster research recommendations.

This study assessed the technology readiness of library commons in selected universities in Ghana from the perspectives of both clients and service providers.

A sample survey research design was used to carry out the study, and the study consisted of quantitative and qualitative approaches. The data were collected from 157 of the 430 commons’ users and six library directors/commons librarians, using a questionnaire and an interview schedule respectively. The quantitative data were analysed using descriptive statistics and inferential analysis with SPSS Ver. 22, and structural equation modelling with AMOS Ver. 23.

The study found significant relationships between the availability of learning resources and users' experience, use and satisfaction with the commons. Additionally, there were significant relationships between the readiness of the commons, users' perceptions and their satisfaction levels. The library/commons managers identified key preparedness issues, including inadequate planning and poor space allocation. Furthermore, the study revealed negative feelings among library/commons managers, such as insecurity, resistance and low confidence.

The academic libraries in Ghana should evaluate their commons following the findings of this study, and use other readiness implementation tools to identify and address the gaps in their implementation of the commons.

This study was based on the opinions of the users and operators of the commons and focused primarily on technology-related factors. However, it is essential to evaluate other readiness factors, such as change and services, and institutional factors, using frameworks such as Hess and Ostrom’s (2005) Institutional Development Framework, to provide complementary results that can guide better implementation of the commons and improve the quality of services.

This paper seeks to deepen and improve our understanding of business ethics in services by developing a typology that reconciles and integrates disparate and often conflicting ideas and viewpoints while providing practical guidance for ethical decision-making.

The paper examines current theoretical approaches in ethics to provide an understanding of the ethical theories, how they have been applied and how they have evolved in businesses and marketing. It discusses conceptual issues related to ethical dilemmas and the available typologies.

Based on the axioms of the Triple-A Framework for Ethical Service Research, the Typology of Ethical Dilemmas in Services (TEDS) is proposed. The typology identifies three types of dilemmas based on four dimensions considering all service interactions guided by normative ethics (virtue, deontological and consequentialism).

The proposed DILEMMAS process illustrates the practical application of TEDS.

This paper extends the ethics and services literature by offering a novel theoretical and practical approach to addressing ethical dilemmas. TEDS is authentic, advances our knowledge and applies to all service organizations that aim to manage ethical dilemmas effectively.