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.