Advertiser satisfaction with advertising agency creative product

Purpose – The purpose of the paper is to explore the satisfaction response in the context of an applied creative, business‐to‐business, professional service – that of advertiser satisfaction with agency creative services. Design/methodology/approach – The study is a based on a longitudinal questionnaire survey of advertising managers. Findings – The paper finds that the disconfirmation of expectations model, previously utilised largely in goods categories and in consumer services, can be successfully applied within advertising creative services. Research limitations/implications – Use of the key respondent method; the ability of managers to comply with the very specific conditions set out for choice of campaign; memory: the assumption that respondents could remember which campaign they had referred to in their initial questionnaire responses when completing the second questionnaire. Practical implications – Advertisers commit very large resources on the basis of their satisfaction with agency generated creative ideas, at a time when such product appears in a highly undeveloped, relatively intangible state. The study tests how satisfaction is formed in this context. Originality/value – The paper has an application of the disconfirmation‐based model of customer satisfaction to advertising creative product. The literature on advertising creative ideas as a product category (and to “applied creative” products in general) is very limited.