Author(s): Intekhab (Ian) Alam and Ishaq Bhatti M
The extant literature on customer interaction in new service development is robust. Yet, this research base focuses mostly on the new service projects completed in Europe and North America. Lately, the issue of customer interaction is attracting attention in the countries with sizable ethnic minority customers. Therefore, the purpose of this research is to investigate the process of interaction with the ethnic minority customers in developing new financial services. In addition, this is cross-national research, in which we compare the new service development process used in India, an emerging country with sizable ethnic minority population and Australia, a developed country with growing ethnic population. To collect data, we used multiple case study methodology in which we interviewed both service managers and customers of 26 financial service firms in each country. The findings suggest that the minority customers are an important and growing market niche and therefore, a service firm needs to interact with them to obtain key input and information. Our findings inform the managers of the importance of minority customers and the need for new services targeted exclusively at them.