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The purpose of this paper is to suggest that the effects of service quality (SQ) on outcome variables may shift over time. However, scant attention has been paid to capturing that shift. The current study uses the theory of relationship dynamics to capture the rate and direction of change in the effects of SQ attributes on customer satisfaction (CS) and emotional attachment (EA). For this purpose, the study takes CS-velocity and EA-velocity as dynamic outcomes of SQ.

A sample of 306 restaurant consumers responded to a structured questionnaire at three points in time. Confirmatory factor analysis was carried out, followed by analysis of the data through latent growth curve modeling using MPlus (Version 8.1).

SQ attributes positively affect CS and EA, but these effects diminish over time, as SQ attributes negatively influence CS-velocity and EA-velocity. In addition, the study demonstrates that dynamic elements strongly impact behavioral intentions (BI).

The study enables service and relationship marketing managers to better understand the role of SQ attributes in maintaining longitudinal satisfaction, attachment and BI. The insights from this longitudinal investigation help managers to formulate long-term service management and relationship management strategies.

This study is the first attempt to examine SQ’s dynamic outcomes using longitudinal panel data. It is the first study to introduce EA-velocity as a dynamic construct of EA and the first to examine the relationships of CS-velocity and EA-velocity with BI.

Customer satisfaction (CS) and customer-company identification (CCI) are two important relational constructs and play a complementary role in the service-profit chain. Drawing from the theory of relationship dynamics, the purpose of this paper is to define CS velocity and CCI velocity as the rate and direction of change in CS and CCI, respectively. A comparison of the relative effects of CCI velocity and CS velocity on customer loyalty is done through a latent growth curve modeling approach.

A conceptual model is developed and empirically tested based on four waves of a longitudinal survey of 213 restaurant customers.

The results show that both CCI velocity and CS velocity have positive effects on customer loyalty. More importantly, the effects of CCI velocity on customer loyalty over time are stronger than those of CS velocity. The moderation analysis further shows that the higher the frequency of visits to the service firm, the stronger the effects of relationship velocity on customer loyalty.

The results provide new insights for service marketing managers by suggesting that, to benefit the long-term effectiveness of relationship investments, service firms should shift the priority from increasing CS to engendering CCI.

This paper contributes to the theory of relationship dynamics by conceptualizing new constructs of CS velocity and CCI velocity and by empirically comparing their relative effects on customer loyalty over time.

Sales organizations embrace technological innovation. However, salespeople’s willingness to use new technology influences a firm’s return on investment, representing a significant concern for the organization. These concerns highlight tensions regarding the tradeoffs associated with technology implementations. The purpose of this study is to offer insights that help reduce the complexities of sales technology (ST) by exploring the changing dynamics of contemporary business relationships.

This paper synthesizes the ST literature using the service ecosystem perspective to propose the sales techno-ecosystem (STE) framework, providing new insights into organizational decision-making related to the ongoing digital transformation of sales tasks.

This synthesis of the ST literature with the service ecosystem seeks to clarify the impact of technology within the evolving nature of buyer–seller relationships by providing four unique perspectives.

Perspective 1 reviews the sales-service ecosystem framework and develops the theoretical underpinnings and relevant terminologies. Perspective 2 summarizes critical aspects of the ST literature and provides foundations for future research in the STE. Perspective 3 offers a more granular view, explicating roles and contexts prevalent in buyer–seller–technology interactions. Perspective 4 provides a set of tenets and advances research questions related to each tenet.

The culmination of these four perspectives is the introduction of five key tenants designed to help guide strategy and research.

The paper advances Hartmann et al. (2018) service ecosystem paradigm by explicating critical aspects of its ST domain to generate insights for theory and practice.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the transformation of the perspective applied to distribution structures in the late 1900s. This change implied that the previous focus on channel management by a channel captain was abandoned because of changes in the business reality. This perspective was replaced by models and concepts featuring collaboration and joint coordination between actors and relationships embedded in networks.

Changes of perspectives on phenomena are assumed to occur through the dynamic interplay between business reality, the conceptualisation of this reality and the managerial recommendations derived from this conceptualisation. The study is based on a thorough longitudinal literature review.

Shifts of perspectives occur when there is an increasing mismatch between the current business reality and mainstream conceptualisations. In this transformation, new constructs are required to illustrate new aspects of the business reality, exemplified in the study by interaction and networks. Some established concepts lose their significance, illustrated by the channel captain. Others may be re-interpreted, as is the case with the power concept. The study also shows that “forgotten” conceptualisations can be re-wakened, exemplified by the view of distribution structures as network constellations. In turn, these changes in the conceptualisation of distribution impact the managerial recommendations.

To the best of the author’s knowledge, there are no previous studies analysing how the perspective on a certain phenomenon changes through the dynamic interplay between business reality, conceptualisations and managerial recommendations.

Assuming that supplier knowledge can either strengthen the partnership by nurturing the commitment and trust between partners or allow the buyer to be more calculative, this study aims to propose two types of knowledge sharing in supplier relationship – a type benefiting the partnership and another privately benefiting only one partner.

Using structural equation modeling and a surveyed dataset from 352 buyer–supplier partnerships, this study tested the research model of dual mechanism, where two types of knowledge sharing co-exist and have opposite effects on partnership longevity.

This study found that the two types of knowledge sharing create divergent effects on partnership continuation. For a buyer firm developing supplier knowledge, its supplier firm reciprocates by sharing knowledge with the buyer. While relation-specific knowledge promotes partnership longevity through developing trust, institutionalized knowledge hampers partnership longevity.

Findings overall indicate that knowledge plays a more instrumental role in sharing knowledge in a buyer–supplier relationship, and alternative forces simultaneously work in the partnership. Although this study explicates two mediating mechanisms for the effect of supplier knowledge, there remain many unknown aspects of the effect.

From the buyer’s perspective, it is possible its institutionalized knowledge can facilitate its relationship with a current supply chain partner so that it can gain more benefits from the relationship. From the supplier’s perspective, caution should be exercised in selecting the type of knowledge to share.

This study may have a broad impact on public policy by theorizing and testing why some partnerships last longer/shorter than others in association with the dynamics of the relationship initiated by one’s relational knowledge and the other’s knowledge sharing.

What this study contributes to involves the theorizing and testing the effects of the dual mechanism of knowledge sharing on partnership longevity. This study provides an example of a private investment in knowledge that is reciprocated with each type of knowledge – benefiting the partner and also benefiting the focal buyer firm.

Drawing from the theory of relationship dynamics, the purpose of this paper is to investigate how the relationship life cycle moderates the link between relationship quality and customer value co-creation. As customer-firm relationships pass through different stages (exploration, buildup, maturity, and decline) characterized by distinct customer behaviors, this study proposes a dynamic conceptual framework.

A questionnaire was administered in financial services firms. The final valid sample comprised 2,000 individuals. Subjective customer information from the questionnaire was combined with objective data that the financial entity provided.

The results demonstrate that the relationship life cycle plays a key moderating role, revealing that, in the buildup and maturity stages, the influence of relationship quality on customer value co-creation is stronger than in the decline stage. However, for customers in the exploration stage, relationship quality does not lead to customer value co-creation behaviors.

As customer relationship stages are constantly evolving, this study provides companies with additional interesting tools to personalize business strategies and to adapt marketing investments to the specific situation of customers.

To the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study to consider how the relationship life cycle influences the strength with which relationship quality promotes customer value co-creation.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the effect of service quality and relationship quality on customer loyalty in different stages of the relationship life cycle in online banking services.

A total of 651 Iranian online banking customers participated in the research by completing questionnaires. The research hypotheses were tested using structural modeling technique.

The results showed that the relationship quality on customer loyalty in online banking services is affected by the relationship life cycle. The results also showed that online service quality, in the form of Utilitarian quality and Hedonic quality, has a positive effect both directly and indirectly on customer loyalty through online relationship quality.

In this paper, the relationship dynamics was achieved through adding the relationship life cycle variable to the model. However, the study was a cross-sectional research and different results might be obtained if data was collected longitudinally.

In an online banking service, the role of relationship quality in the prediction of customer loyalty is reduced as the relationship ages. Therefore, marketers need to consider other marketing actions to continue their relationship with the customer in the long run.

This paper examines customer loyalty to online banking services from dynamic perspective by introducing relationship life cycle as a moderating variable for the first time. Therefore, the main contribution of this paper is to develop the relationship marketing literature in the field of relationship dynamics and to challenge the effectiveness of relationship marketing in the long run.

The purpose of this study is to examine role stress over the course of an alliance between supply chains. This study examines ambiguity as antecedent to multiple organisational outcomes.

This study subsequently uses a time series design that uses a close replication of the authors’ initial study. The design affords the opportunity to examine the dynamics associated with the evolution of the alliance.

This study recognises that the relationships developed by collaborating firms are enacted by downstream entrepreneurs in the supply chain, yet this observation is rarely incorporated into interfirm research. The authors illustrate that the alliances have a significant downstream influence on operations at the retail level.

This longitudinal research has the potential to reduce common method variance and enhance causal inference. The second limitation concerns the simultaneous collection of the predictor and criterion variables. The third limitation is the use of single informants as the primary vehicle for the analysis of the theoretical model when prior research indicates that multiple informants offer enhanced reliability and validity.

The findings contribute to the management theory of business entrepreneurship and strategic alliances and research on supply chains.

This study underscores the need to examine alliances via time series. Research that attempts to generalise from data collected at a single point in time is unlikely to be able to capture the dynamics associated with the development of a joint venture and offers limited opportunity to make inferences about the causal order of relationships. The model based on longitudinal data reveals that the stage of an alliance influences the level of vertical control and ambiguity and the effect of control on role ambiguity.

Contemporary scholars contend that the buyer–seller relationship is dynamic in nature, so it grows, matures and declines over time. However, most studies that adopt the dynamic perspective debates its conceptualization and how dynamic effects are captured. This scholarly discourse has led to multiple dynamic perspectives and resulted in fragmented and scattered literature on the subject. This study aims to synthesize the large body of research on dynamic perspectives in a systematic way.

This paper follows a systematic review approach to extract and review 192 research articles from four electronic databases: Web of Science, EBSCOhost Business, ScienceDirect and Emerald. Based on the inclusion criteria that the articles examine time-dependent relationship development in light of a generalizable dynamic perspective, 61 articles were selected for the final examination and reporting.

This review reveals that most research on the buyer–seller dynamic relationship follows at least one of four perspectives: the relationship lifecycle, relationship age, relationship velocity and the asymmetric–dynamic perspective. Each perspective offers a distinct conceptualization of relationship development and has certain advantages that enable researchers to capture information about relationships’ growth trajectory in a unique manner.

Firms need a set of diverse strategies for their customers, depending on the state of the relationships’ development, as strategies that pay off at initial levels may fail at later stages. This study helps managers select an appropriate dynamic perspective that best aligns with their customers’ stage of relationship development so they can devise customized relationship-management strategies.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this article is the first attempt to organize the discourse of a large body of research on dynamic perspectives, and therefore it helps academicians and practitioners to choose the dynamic perspective that best suits their objectives and research settings. This review documents key research areas that have been overlooked and highlights opportunities for future research.

Promoting customer–company identification (CCI) has become a crucial relationship marketing strategy for service firms. The purpose of this study is to examine how customers’ perceptions of service quality and corporate social responsibility (CSR) affect CCI over time. More importantly, a comparative analysis is conducted to compare the long-term effectiveness of service quality versus CSR in forming CCI.

A conceptual framework is developed and then empirically examined using latent growth curve modeling. The study data were collected from restaurant customers in Taiwan in four waves of 213 repeated measures.

The results of this study show that customers’ perceptions of both service quality and CSR affect CCI. Particularly, the results of this study indicate that compared with service quality, customers’ perceived CSR has a stronger effect in the promotion of CCI over time.

This study offers a new insight for service marketing practitioners who are planning and implementing strategies for enhancing CCI. The findings suggest that relationship investments are more effective over the long term when service firms shift their investment priority over time from achieving high service quality to increasing consumers’ belief in the firm’s commitment to CSR.

Though previous research has explored the various drivers of CCI, longitudinal examinations are surprisingly scarce in this context. Using latent growth curve modeling, this study examines how CCI antecedents influence changes in CCI over time. More importantly, this study reveals that CSR has a stronger long-term impact on CCI than service quality.