1. Ko de Ruyter, Professor and Chair, Marketing Department, Maastricht University The Marketing-Finance Interface: A Relational Exchange Perspective

2. No school for old men

During the past two decades strong focus on the marketing of services, specifically financial services

Tracing back the origins of the MF interface; The Marketing-Finance: A Relational Exchange Perspective, Journal of Business Research (2000)

Wall street vs. Main street

Marketing managers: Procedural Fairness (+)

Finance managers: Interfunctional Rivalry (-)

Both: Mutual Resource dependence

The Marketing-Finance Interface: A Relational Exchange Perspective

3. 2004 New Kid on the Block:

JBR paper A Marketing-Finance approach towards industrial channel contract relationships: a model and application

4. We fast forward to 2008:Research on the Formation of Online Investors Self-Efficacy 5. Current Trend

Online consumers are active co-producers of financial services

Not only trust the bank, but also trust themselves

Confidence or self-efficacy is based on increasing variety of information sources

As a result self-efficacy updating is a dynamic process

We suspect that different patterns will exist!

6. Service Providers Educate Customers

Bank of America: tools and independent research to help you choose the right investments

Alex: Alex Academy

ABN-AMRO:TradeGlobe Academy, TradeBox

7. Managerial Problem: How can customers adapt to their new service role?

Online investment induces self-defeating behaviors such as excessive trading because of overconfidence

This is particularly problematic because:

• customers tend to attribute service failures more to the firm than to themselves,

• share these bad experiences effortlessly with online peers,

• and can seamlessly switch to a competitors web site

8. Research Questions

How can novice investors be successful online?

Does investors self-efficacy matter?

How is self-efficacy formed during pre-purchase information search?

9. Research Design

Computerized survey using online investment context

Respondents were asked to invest a predetermined sum of money in stocks

Respondents were asked to look at three websites; a firm, expert, and peer information source of which source evaluations and self-efficacy were recorded

10. Example: Third-Party Web Site 11. Research Findings

Highly efficacious consumers:

achieve higher profits

have higher usage intentions

Perceive higher service value

12. Research Findings

Information source credibility and argument quality increase self-efficacy

Consumers differentiate among information sources and weigh associated evaluations differently

Focus on third-party credibility and firm argument quality. Surprisingly, peer source is less relevant.

13. Research Findings

Amount of search doesnotaffect self-efficacy

Consumers engagement impacts effect of source evaluations

14. Research Findings

Multiple investor segments exist based on response to information:

• Segment 1 (n = 89): increases self-efficacy during search

• Segment 2 (n = 146): maintains self-efficacy

• Segment 3 (n = 22): decreases self-efficacy

15. Research Findings

Increasing segment: inexperienced, spends high effort, obtains high profits ( 61.27 after 2 months)

Maintaining segment: experienced, little less effort, medium performance ( 52.09)

Decreasing segment: experienced, low effort, low performance ( 1.29), less motivation than other groups

16. Implications

Control investors information search by partnering with and linking to credible external information providers

Provide high quality information:authenticity, consistency, clarity of content and style, and an explicit and transparent service recovery strategy

Increase customers engagement by incorporating interactive user forums, real-time updates, customizable home pages, and virtual agents

17. Implications

Inexperienced investors make up for lack of experience by spending high effort

This strategy pays off for novices compared to experienced investors

A minority of investors is unmotivated and performs poorly

18. Implications: What to do with underperforming customers?

Convince customers that spending high effort on information evaluation and investment decision pays off

Set realistic service expectations; customer makes own success

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