Prompting additional purchases while providing service: does it offend the customer?

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to investigate consumers’ responses to unsolicited cross-selling of supplementary paid-for services made during delivery of a core service, and the contextual and personal variables moderating those responses. Design/methodology/approach Three formal experiments test the effect on participants’ responses of the perceived relevance of the supplementary service to the core service, personal psychological reactance, in the case of a high-relevance supplementary service, and self-monitoring, in scenarios in which a low-relevance supplementary service is proposed either in public or privately. Findings The experiments found that participants’ satisfaction ratings were reduced in response to cross-selling of a supplementary service that was of low relevance to the core service, and that satisfaction ratings if it was perceived to be of high relevance compared were not reduced despite the unsolicited attempt at cross-selling. However, the non-negative response to a high-relevance offer was limited to participants with a lower tendency to reactance. Furthermore, a high predisposition to self-monitoring evoked more positive judgments if a low-relevance supplementary service was proposed in public rather than privately. That of low self-monitors was no different in either case. Originality/value This paper examines the trade-off faced by a service provider between customer satisfaction and extra revenue from supplementary services, and explores conditions under which a provider can propose unsolicited supplementary services without offending customers.