Drawing on social exchange theory (SET), this research explores customer engagement (CE) as a firm-initiated resource. Based on interviews with 41 managers from 34 companies, a five-facet, strategic customer engagement marketing (CEM) decision making framework emerges. CE Conceptualization differentiates between behavioral and psychological engagement. CE Target refers to who is engaged with the firm through CE (end-users or intermediaries such as retailers or distributors). CE Domain distinguishes between online and offline contexts. CE Experiential Routes differentiates absorption (controlled by the firm) from appropriation (controlled or transformed by the customer). Finally, CE Value demarcates customer interactional value from customer multiplier value. The decision options identified for each facet are interrelated and firms are advised to follow an integrative approach to CEM. However, acknowledging SET’s emphasis on cost-benefit ratios and opportunity costs, suggestions for potential moderators to the CEM framework are provided.

Introduction

Engagement has been recognized as an important and meaningful concept in organizational behavior, marketing, social psychology, and education. For example, Kahn (1990) investigates the effects of engaged employees, and Fredricks, Blumenfeld, and Paris (2004) describe how students engage with schools. Academic and managerial interest in customer engagement (CE) is considerable (Hollebeek, Srivastava, & Chen, 2017), increasing (Roy, Balaji, Soutar, Lassar, & Roy, 2018), and expected to persist (Beckers, van Doorn, & Verhoef, 2018). Marketing practitioners expect increased brand equity, sales, and profits from truly engaged customers. For example, a recent study from Rosetta Consulting (2014) shows that highly engaged consumers spend 60% more in each transaction, make 90% more frequent purchases, and are four times more likely to advocate for the brand. Marketing academics emphasize CE’s potential to develop relationships with customers beyond monetary transactions (Venkatesan, 2017) and achieve sustainable competitive advantage (Kumar & Pansari, 2016). Extant research has made important contributions through defining CE (e.g., Brodie, Hollebeek, Jurić, & Ilić, ۲۰۱۱; Hollebeek, 2011a; Mollen & Wilson, 2010; van Doorn et al., 2010; Vivek, Beatty, & Morgan, 2012) and investigating its valence and dimensions (e.g., Dessart, Veloutsou, & Morgan-Thomas, 2016; Hollebeek, Glynn, & Brodie, 2014; van Doorn et al., 2010; Vivek, Beatty, Dalela, & Morgan, 2014). However, two issues have not been addressed sufficiently by the extant literature. First, while prior research examines the psychological mechanisms that drive CE (compare, e.g., Harmeling, Moffett, Arnold, & Carlson, 2017; Pansari & Kumar, 2017), CE as a strategic company resource remains unexplored. Second, existing interpretative research investigating CE from a managerial perspective that incorporates the “voice of the firm” is rare (for exceptions, see Hollebeek, 2016; Hollebeek et al., 2017; Vivek et al., 2012), and managerial implications are predominantly deduced from consumer-based research. Viewing CE as a firm-initiated resource is important because organizations typically take the initiative to engage the customer (Vivek et al., 2012), and firms should proactively manage the CE experience (Calder, Hollebeek, & Malthouse, 2018; Lemon & Verhoef, 2016; van Doorn et al., 2010).