Say it’s fantastic or say nothing at all: Effects of feedback on consumers’ satisfaction with the outcome of co-production

Participation in co-production is essential for consumers to ensure successful service outcomes. To ensure a satisfying service outcome, service providers offer consumers feedback on their task performance. This study contributes to a better understanding on how positive face-to-face feedback can drive consumers’ satisfaction. More knowledge of how feedback from service employees drives consumers’ satisfaction will help the service industry design, customize, and deliver meaningful experience-based products. By drawing on the self-presentation theory, in two experiments, we tested how face-to-face feedback influences consumers’ satisfaction with the outcome of task performance. Our analysis showed that satisfaction with self-produced outcome was lower when participants were aware of others during co-production. Furthermore, participants’ were more satisfied when they received positive face-to-face feedback about the outcome of their own task performance than positive face-to-face feedback on the process underlying task performance.