Customer Engagement Formation During Acquisition
(A2020-62684)

AUTHORS

David Harman, University of St. Thomas; Mike Porter, University of St. Thomas

KEYWORDS

customer engagement; customer acquisition; recency

ABSTRACT

Customer engagement is important to managers as an explanation for how non-transactional marketing efforts can have a positive impact on a firm's bottom line. Understanding how customer engagement is developed and cultivated is important for marketing managers in order to grow the engagement of their customers. Our study addresses the formation of engagement during the customer acquisition process. We find that a positive acquisition experience leads to positive customer engagement in terms of measures of lifetime value and influence value. We also find a strong recency effect in that the last interaction of the service encounter has the strongest impact on customer engagement.