Gratitude expression in the sharing economy: a perspective of interactive marketing communication between peer service providers and consumers

Purpose The motivation of value co-creation among the multi-actor in sharing economy was an important topic in interactive marketing communication research. This study investigated how customer gratitude expression leads to value co-creation of PSPs in the sharing economy, and also investigates the moderating effect of platform benevolent climate. Design/methodology/approach A three-wave field survey (Study 1) and two experiments (Studies 2 and 3) were given to respondents with sharing economy practitioners. Findings First, customer gratitude expression positively influenced PSP's perceived meaningful work, which in turn enhanced their value co-creation intention. Second, PSP's perceived platform benevolent climate moderated the relationship between customer gratitude expression and PSP's perceived meaningful work. Originality/value Prior research discussed PSPs' value co-creation intention mainly from the perspective of platforms and PSPs, but few considered customer-PSP interaction perspective. This study revealed how customer gratitude expression influences PSP's value co-creation intention in highly interactive digital business context, examined the boundary condition of gratitude expression, and extended the application scenarios of social information processing theory.