A1 Refereed original research article in a scientific journal
How to nudge industrial customers to accept free-to-fee service price switches?
Authors: Keränen, Joona; Salonen, Anna; Terho, Harri; Munnukka, Juha
Publisher: Elsevier BV
Publication year: 2026
Journal: Industrial Marketing Management
Volume: 134
First page : 186
Last page: 197
ISSN: 0019-8501
eISSN: 1873-2062
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.indmarman.2026.01.008
Publication's open availability at the time of reporting: Open Access
Publication channel's open availability : Partially Open Access publication channel
Web address : https://doi.org/10.1016/j.indmarman.2026.01.008
Self-archived copy’s web address: https://research.utu.fi/converis/portal/detail/Publication/523414152
Self-archived copy's licence: CC BY
Self-archived copy's version: Publisher`s PDF
Capturing value from service provision is a persistent challenge for many firms. Sometimes, business-to-business (B2B) suppliers offer services for free to increase customer adoption at the early stages of servitization or to boost product sales. If customers initially receive services for free, managing the switch from free-to-fee at later stages is difficult. To address this managerial challenge, we examine how sellers of digital industrial services can use behavioral nudges to increase customer acceptance of a free-to-fee price switch. Using a scenario-based experiment with 386 industrial buyers, we test the effects of three choice architectures—motive justification, social influence-focused information provision, and loss versus gain framing—on customer willingness to switch. Our findings indicate that these nudges increase acceptance, but their effects range from small to medium and occur only among attentive audiences. The study contributes to both theory and practice by demonstrating that cognitive biases and decision-making heuristics play a role in B2B service pricing. Although nudges should not be viewed as a universal solution for behavioral change, their simplicity and low implementation costs make them a practical tool for managers. We encourage future research to critically examine the boundary conditions that influence nudge effectiveness across diverse B2B decision-making situations.
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Funding information in the publication:
The authors gratefully acknowledge the Foundation for Economic Education (grant number 230387) in supporting the financing of data collection. The funding source had no involvement in conducting, preparing, or publishing the research reported herein.