• Keynote @ Michigan Ross Tech Business Innovation Forum

    I keynoted @ Michigan Ross Tech Business Innovation Forum–great speakers & insights. Kudos to Professors Ravi Anupindi and M.S. Krishnan of Michigan Ross for organizing a nice event. Thanks to speakers, Chris Bosco (Accenture), Mike Minelli (24/7),  Dan Newman, Sriram (Michigan Ross), Thomais Zaremba (Ford), Michael Osment (Taubman), and Dennis Maloney (Domino’s) for their fascinating views on omnichannel marketing.

    http://www.bus.umich.edu/Conferences/Technology-and-Business-Innovation-Forum/Schedule.aspx

  • Are Multichannel Customers Really More Valuable? The Moderating Role of Product Category Characteristics

    Kushwaha and Shankar 2013

    by Tarun Kushwaha and Venkatesh Shankar

    The article is forthcoming in Journal of Marketing.

    How does the monetary value of customer purchases vary by customer preference for purchase channels (e.g., traditional, electronic, multichannel) and product category? The authors develop a conceptual model and hypotheses on the moderating effects of two key product category characteristics—the utilitarian versus hedonic nature of the product category and perceived risk—on the channel preference–monetary value relationship. They test the hypotheses on a unique large-scale, empirically generalizable data set in the retailing context. Contrary to conventional wisdom that all multichannel customers are more valuable than single-channel customers, the results show that multichannel customers are the most valuable segment only for hedonic product categories. The findings reveal that traditional channel customers of low-risk categories provide higher monetary value than other customers. Moreover, for utilitarian product categories perceived as high (low) risk, web-only (catalog- or store-only) shoppers constitute the most valuable segment. The findings offer managers guidelines for targeting and migrating different types of customers for different product categories through different channels.

  • Keys Issues in Multichannel Customer Management: Current Knowledge and Future Directions

    Neslin Shankar JIM 2009

    by Scott A. Neslin and Venkatesh Shankar

    This article was published in the Journal of Interactive Marketing, 23 (2009), 70-81.

    Multichannel customer management is “the design, deployment, and evaluation of channels to enhance customer value through effective customer acquisition, retention, and development” (Neslin et al. 2006).  Channels typically include the store, the Web, catalog, sales force, third party agency, call center and the like.  In recent years, multichannel marketing has grown tremendously and is anticipated to grow even further. While we have developed a good understanding certain issues such as the relative value of a multichannel customer over a single channel customer, several research and managerial questions still remain. We offer an overview of these emerging issues, present our future outlook, and suggest important avenues for future research.

  • Challenges and Opportunities in Multichannel Customer Management

    Neslin et al. JSR 2006

    by Scott A. Neslin, Dhruv Grewal, Robert Leghorn, Venkatesh Shankar, Marije L. Teerling, Jacquelyn S. Thomas, and Peter C. Verhoef

    This article was published in Journal of Service Research, 9 (November 2006), 95-112.

    Multichannel customer management is the design, deployment, coordination, and evaluation of channels through which firms and customers interact, with the goal of enhancing customer value through effective customer acquisition, retention, and development.  The authors identify five major challenges practitioners must address to manage the multichannel environment more effectively: (1) data integration, (2) understanding consumer behavior, (3) channel evaluation, (4) allocation of resources across channels, and (5) coordination of channel strategies. The authors also propose a framework that shows the linkages among these challenges, and provides a means to conceptualize the field of multichannel customer management.  A review of academic research reveals that this field has experienced significant research growth, but the growth has not been distributed evenly across the five major challenges.  The authors discuss what has been learned to date, and identify emerging generalizations as appropriate.  They conclude with a summary of where the research-generated knowledge base stands on several issues pertaining to the five challenges.