Reconceptualizing Customer Capital: A Strategy as Practice Approach

Abstract

Customer capital is a critical source of value for knowledge intensive service firms (KISFs). However, we lack a precise understanding of the nature of the customer-specific knowledge that undergirds customer capital and how specifically that knowledge confers value to KISFs. In this paper, we adopt a strategy as practice (SAP) approach to reconceptualize customer capital. Specifically, we delineate four modes of customer-knowing KISFs may cultivate, each of which confers value to the focal firm vis-à-vis informing local (i.e. account) and / or global (i.e., firm) strategizing. Further, using Whittington’s (2006) practice-praxis-practitioners framework, we elaborate a typology of customer capital. Our theorizing constitutes an initial step towards theorizing a more dynamic, multi-dimensional understanding of customer capital. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.