The Challenge of Co-Creation : Corporate Blogs and Collaborative Product Innovation

Purpose - Focusing the attention on firm-hosted online consumers communities, this paper will analyze the managerial challenges that companies have to face to leverage consumers’ creative talent involving them in innovative collaboration processes. Methodology approach - A detailed case history, whose reconstruction was based on non-participant observation. Findings – The paper clarifies some of the “soft” issues that firms have to manage when trying to support effective learning processes with their customers, focusing on the efforts that companies have to made in order to remove all the stumbling blocks that could prevent an ongoing and effective dialogue with their customers. Research implications – The paper suggests an interpretative model of pre-conditions needed to enact online collaborative product innovation, in particular focusing on: barriers to be removed and competences that firms need to develop, in order to promote, maintain and increase customer’s engagement in the exchange; benefits that have to be offered to customer in order to maintain the right level of motivation and participation. Practical implications: The paper specifies some of the main community management activities the firms should learn to governate in order to accrue the probability of their blogs’ success