Exploring platform dynamic roles through customer engagement behaviors: a conceptual perspective

Purpose: The study aims to provide an integrative understanding of how diverse customer engagement behaviors (CEBs) contribute to the development and dynamic roles of platforms as ecosystems. Platforms, as ecosystems, must attract and engage a heterogeneous base of end users whose diverse behavioral outcomes drive value creation across extended networks of firms (Eisingerich et al., 2019; Hanson et al., 2019). These networks are drawn to platforms through varied facets of CEBs, which enhance platforms' capability to extend their service offerings and fulfill multiple stakeholders' requirements. However, an integrative understanding of how the multiplicities of behavioral outcomes from CEBs contribute to the developmental trajectory of platform roles remains limited (Kozinets et al., 2021; Warren et al., 2021; Chen et al., 2023). Design / methodology / approach: Using a demand-side perspective and microfoundational approach, the study conceptualizes a typology of CEBs (connecting, advocating, reinforcing, and crowdsending behaviors) and develops an integrative framework linking these behavioral outcomes to the dynamic roles of platforms. Findings: The study reveals how CEBs foster platforms' transition into dynamic roles beyond transaction facilitation, enabling value co-creation among customers, platform owners, and participating firms. It offers a theoretical explanation of how these behaviors influence platform emergence and evolution as ecosystems. Research limitations / (practical, social, etc.) implications: The study provides valuable insights for managers and policymakers. For managers, it highlights strategies to scale customer engagement behaviors and design dynamic platform roles that foster these behaviors, thereby enhancing engagement and maintaining competitiveness. It emphasizes the importance of designing, leveraging, and orchestrating platform ecosystems to maximize value cocreation among stakeholders. For policymakers, the findings inform the development of forwardlooking regulations that address market challenges arising from unique customer behaviors within platform ecosystems, ensuring sustainable and equitable platform growth ecosystems. The study primarily conceptualizes and develops frameworks; empirical validation is needed to further test and refine the proposed typologies and insights. Page 113 of 265 Proceedings of the 9th Naples Forum on Service – June, 9-12 2025, Sorrento, Italy Originality / value: This research adds to the platform dynamics and customer engagement literature by developing a novel typology of CEBs and linking their behavioral outcomes to the emergence and evolution of platforms as ecosystems. It also highlights the increasing role of customers as proactive contributors to platform value co-creation.