مقاله سال ۲۰۱۶

Try to imagine a service encounter between customers and employees, but in which none of them would be allowed to use any kind of language. This thought comes across as unnatural or even impossible, and hence all of our service marketing theories and models implicitly or explicitly assume a dominant role of language. Emerging logics such as service logic (Grönroos & Voima, 2013), service-dominant logic (Vargo & Lusch, 2016) and customer-dominant logic (Heinonen & Strandvik, 2015) all conceptualize an interaction between a customer and a service provider. Even in a world where self-service technology (e.g. Blut, Wang, & Schoefer, forthcoming) and smart services (e.g. Wünderlich, von Wangenheim, & Bitner, 2013) are gaining importance, language still represents an essential component (either implicit or explicit) in any interaction.

Despite its importance, research on the use of in services remains relatively scarce. Holmqvist and Grönroos (2012) identifies a paradox: while the dyadic nature of service makes an understanding of language use far more important than in advertising or in product settings, the bulk of the research on language in marketing developed in the latter two areas. Globalization, in addition to the fact that many countries in the world are inherently multilingual, frequently cause customers and service providers not to share the same native language (Comrie, 2011; Duchêne, 2009). Studies providing empirical examinations of consumers’ language preferences in service encounters however are limited. These studies typically focus on outlining the situations in which customers expect to be served in their native language (e.g., Goethals, 2015, 2016; Holmqvist, 2011; Holmqvist & Van Vaerenbergh, 2013), understanding customer reactions to being served with an accent (Mai & Hoffman, 2014; Wang, Arndt, Singh, Biernat, & Liu, 2013), or understanding customer reactions to language divergence, that is, being served in a second language (Van Vaerenbergh & Holmqvist, 2013, 2014).

These studies focus explicitly on customer evaluations of spoken interactions during service encounters. While this represents an important focus on language in service research, we contend that this might represent a too narrow conceptualization of how language influences services in three ways. First, as Holmqvist and Grönroos (2012) suggest, service providers need to manage language issues before, during, and after the customer engages in an interaction with the service provider. Given the increased focus on understanding and managing the customer experience across the entire customer journey (Lemon & Verhoef, 2016), understanding how language influences customers’ service experience across various touch points becomes imperative. Second, the current focus on spoken interactions might yield a too narrow set of language issues in services, as language can also refer to written language and body language, among others (Yule, 2014). Third, current research mainly focuses on customer reactions to language issues in services. Services, however, need to be managed as integrated systems in which employees and the organizational context also play a valuable role (Schneider & Bowen, 1995).