| In the background of digital economic,firm digital transformation problems have been paid high attention from government,industry and scholars.However,research on consumption issues for digital products is very lacking,compared with a large number of studies on the production area of corporate digital transformation strategies,organizational model,human resource management,resource integration,etc.Digital innovation is an important force for driving the firm’s digital transformation.It is defined as a process of creating and transforming the original market offerings,business processes,organization and business models by digital technology.As the core outcome of digital innovation,digital innovation products refer to innovative products or services for specific markets which are produced through digital technology.The most typical product type is the novel product carrying out of new combinations of digital and physical components,which have three core elements: digital components,physical components and connectivity componentsAlthough digital innovation product has been emphasized to be a significant part of digital innovation,surprisingly little attention has been given in research specializing in digital innovation products,the area is still in the infancy.Moreover,the literature on consumption problems of digital innovation products is very lacking,compared with the fact that there have been some discussions on concepts of digital innovation products,how to develop digital innovation products and how to improve new product performance.Also,almost no literature has been conducted to explore how consumers use digital innovation products,how to create value and what is the value result.In addition,another theoretical background in this research is the field of customer value.Customer value has been recognized as the core topic in marketing.In the past20 years,new theoretical perspectives discussing customer value have emerged,such as service-dominant logic,service logic,customer-dominant logic.Despite the theoretical focus is different,there is agreement on that value is created in the process of customer’s actual use,which means value is conceptualized as value-in-use.However,there have been some research gaps on consumer value-in-use.(1)Researches on value-in-use has so far been mainly conceptual,with very few empirical studies.(2)There is a lack of research on the actual process resulting in value-in-use especially for the process of creating value independently by customers.(3)There are also two research deficiencies on the outcome of value-in-use.First,related research still focuses on traditional products and service scenarios.Second,the exploration of the value outcome is still confined to traditional value dimensions and classification.Based on the research gaps in the above two fields,this article introduces the new research paradigm in sociology called practice theory to systematically and comprehensively study the topic of customer’s value-in-use of digital innovation product including the value creation process,value properties and mechanisms.On the one hand,the paper deeply analyzes the process of value creation for digital innovation products based on practice theory paradigm,which also means exploring the process about how digital innovation products are embedded into customer’s daily practices.On the other hand,the study investigates the outcome of value-in-use of digital innovation products,that is,what’s unique value attribute of value-in-use from digital innovation products,what is the underlying mechanism of value attribute.This article aims to bridge the gaps of digital innovation products,smart home,customer value,practice theory by systematically identifying how customer create value-in-use of digital innovation products,what are value properties of value-in-use from digital innovation products.Through three progressive studies,this paper provides robust and generalized findings.Study 1 is a case study which aims to construct a full model of value-in-use creation including the process of value creation,value attribute and forming mechanism.In study1,the study selects a typical digital innovation product of smart home as a research object,Xiaomi brand as a case.Study 2 develops a scale that measures value property following standard,rigorous scale development steps.Study 3 empirically tests the effects of customer’s practices on value properties and the mechanisms by the method of questionnaire survey.The findings are as follows.Firstly,this article deeply analyzes the process of value-in-use creation from digital innovation products.Base on practice theory,the above process reflects the process that digital innovation products are embedded in the daily practices of consumers.The process includes three stages,with stage 1 of consumer’s practice change,stage 2 of making connections among consumer’s practices,stage 3 of customer’s continuous practices development.The key to value creation in the stage 1 is the consumer’s "transformation of digital affordance".In smart home,digital affordance refers to the potentials for interactive behaviors that arise from the relationship between customers and smart devices.In the process of interactions,the elements of practice are reconfigured to make new meaning be transformed.There are three categories of interactions,including “direct interaction between people and smart device”,“indirect interaction between people and smart device” and “indirect interaction between people and people”.The core of value creation in the stage 2 is the consumer’s new connections between practices by using smart home devices.There are two kinds of connections which are “connections based on smart device connected ability” and “connections based on shared meaning”.The key to value creation in the stage 3 is the consumer’s "continuous practice engagement" for smart home devices.Since the use of smart devices can be dynamically changed,customers would maintain continuous and higher strength psychological and behavioral involvements for practices with smart home equipment,in order to continuously explore and try better and innovative usages.It is mainly manifested in "enhanced commitment" and "sharing in social media".Secondly,this paper finds three novel properties of value-in-use from usage of digital innovation products,which are “consequential”,“assemblage” and“transformative”.Consequential value means that value-in-use of digital innovation products is generated and changed according to the actual use of consumers.Also,value-in-use cannot be explicitly expected in advance.So,this attribute has two connotations which are "no expected value" and " dynamically changed value”.Consequential value mainly comes from interaction practices between customer and digital innovation products in stage 1.Assemblage refers to that value-in-use of consumers is composite and diverse.On the one hand,novel value-in-use is emerging from connections of practices.The whole of value-in-use are more than the sum of its parts’ value from independent practices.On the other hand,value-in-use from previous independent practices are aggregated.Assemblage mainly originates from connections of practices through using digital innovation products in stage 2.Transformative value is a social dimension of value-in-use creation that generates significant changes for greater well-being among customers when they continuously engage in smart home devices.There are three dimensions of transformative value which are “forwardlooking for a better future”,“enhancement of eudaimonic well-being” and “irreversible progress”.Transformative value is mainly from customer’s continuous practice engagement of using digital innovation products.Thirdly,this article finds and empirically examines the correspondence mechanisms of relationships between consumer practices and value properties,which are "symbolic interaction","connection bonus" and "crafting consumption".Symbolic interaction refers to the overall value and symbolic meaning constructed by customers when they interact with smart home device.It is manifested in the " object anthropomorphism" and "virtual accompany".Symbolic interaction is the underlying mechanism of the relationship between consumer’s interactive practice and consequential value.Connection bonus means benefits from connections of practices,reflecting in "new productivity" and "reduced costs and improved efficiency" for daily practice.Connection bonus is the mediator for the process underlying the effectiveness of connections of practices on the value property of assemblage.Crafting consumption refers to that the consumer typically brings skill,knowledge,judgement and passion to make significantly modifications for usage of smart home while being motivated by a desire for self-expression,appearing in "proactive skills investment" and "selfexpression".Crafting consumption plays the mediating role of the relationship between customer’s continuous practice engagement and transformative value.The findings in this paper make important theoretical contributions to bridge the research gaps of digital innovation products,customer value and practice theory.Firstly,there are theoretical contributions for digital innovation products.This paper complements the research of digital innovation products at least in three aspects,according to the gaps in this field mentioned above.(1)The article deeply analyzes the process of value-in-use creation from usage of digital innovation products.There remains a significant gap in understanding how digital innovation products are actually used by customers,however,the success or failure of digital innovation products depends fundamentally on whether and how they are used.This article explores the above process thoroughly,putting practice as the analysis unit.(2)This paper not only investigates how to use digital innovation products to enrich this field,more importantly,the case study provides in-depth analysis about how to create value-in-use from digital innovation products by customers.(3)This article introduces practice theory to conduct researches about consumption problems of digital innovation products.Extant research of customer’s attitude and willing about digital innovation products is still dominant by traditional individualist paradigms and structuralist paradigms,mainly discussing the influence factors of individual factors or technical factors.This paper offers a new perspective based on practice theory,suggesting that usage and value-in-use of digital innovation products are inherent in daily practices.So,the study analyzes the usage and the value creation process of digital innovation products based on the changes of customer’s practices.Secondly,there are theoretical contributions for customer value.This paper constructs the full model of customer’s value-in-use creation with usage of digital innovation products to address the mentioned research blanks in the field of customer value.(1)The paper provides thorough analysis about the process of value-in-use creation from usage of digital innovation products.(2)This article finds three novel properties of value-in-use from digital innovation products.(3)The study offers and empirically tests the correspondence mechanisms of relationships between consumer practice and value properties.Therefore,this article extends the theory of customer value at least in 2 levels.For the first level,this study systematically explores the consumer’s value-in-use creation process and results(value properties),especially for the research scenario of customer’s independent value creation which has so far received little attention.For the second level,this paper selects digital innovation products as research object with very little focus on the customer value field,but with extremely important implications for theory and practice.Thirdly,there are theoretical contributions for practice theory.In recent years,practice theory has been applied in marketing research increasingly.However,there are two gaps in extant researches.One the one hand,although prior literature has paid attentions in customer’s dynamic practice process,novel products’ effects on customer’s practice change is little-understood.Also,previous studies mainly discuss the scenario that customers are passively facing changes of practice elements,yet very little is known about what is the process of practice dynamicity when customers proactively purse new elements to improve practice.On the other hand,most contemporary theories of practice take products as relatively fixed and static material elements,there was a lack of discussion on the agency and dynamicity of material elements.Consequently,this study offers positive theoretical implications about marketing research based on practice theory at least in two aspects.(1)The paper explores the process that customer proactively chooses digital innovation products to improve life and create value.More importantly,this article selects smart home as research scenario adding a more proactive customer’s choice to replace traditional products to improve practices and achieve new meanings.(2)The article more deeply investigates the effects of material elements on customer’s practice to enrich this field.The paper takes digital innovation products as research object which fully considering the agency and dynamicity of material dimension,compared with studies only focusing on fixed effects of materials.This study systematically answers a series of questions about digital innovation products,such as how does customer actually use digital innovation,how are digital innovation products embedded in customer’s daily life,what are the properties of valuein-use from usage of digital innovation products,etc.These findings provide some significant practical implications on how to research,develop,design,market digital innovation products.Also,this study reveals the differences of value creation for digital innovation products and traditional products,fully emphasizing the strong agency role of consumers in the process of value creation.In concert with service logic and customer-dominant logic,value mainly takes place in the process of actual use in consumer’s life,which is the stage of customer’s independent value creation.It is key to play the role of value facilitator for firm and brand.The findings of customer’s practices and value in this research offer positive practical implications for firm and brand about how to effectively and efficiently create the conditions so value emerges in process of customer’s usage for digital innovation products. |
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