Ruth Bolton

Ruth N. Bolton is Emerita Professor of Marketing at the W.P. Carey School of Business, Arizona State University. She is the recipient of the 2016 American Marketing Association / Irwin / McGraw-Hill Distinguished Marketing Educator Award and the 2007 recipient of the Christopher Lovelock Career Contributions to Services Award. Both awards are given to only a select few marketing academics; they recognize distinguished service and sustained outstanding contributions to the field of marketing. 

Dr. Boltoh is the author of "Service Excellence: Creating Customer Experiences that Build Relationships", published in 2016 by Business Expert Press. She has served as 2019-2021 President of the Sheth Foundation, a member the 2019-2021 Working Board of Responsible Research in Business and Management, 2009-11 Executive Director of the Marketing Science Institute and 2002-2005 Editor of the Journal of Marketing.

Dr. Bolton studies how organizations can improve business performance over time by creating, maintaining and enhancing relationships with customers. Her recent research has focused on the customer experience, multi-channel management and high technology, interactive services sold in global business-to-business markets. She previously held academic positions at Vanderbilt University, the University of Oklahoma, Harvard University, University of Maryland, and the University of Alberta. She also spent eight years with Verizon, working on projects in the telecommunications and information services industries.  Dr. Bolton's earlier published articles investigate how organizations' service and pricing strategies influence customer satisfaction, loyalty and revenues. She has extensive experience with survey research design, as well as the econometric analysis of large-scale, integrative data bases.  Her research is typically conducted in partnership with businesses, such as the Marriott Corporation, Hewlett-Packard and Schneider National Inc.  She has also participated in executive education programs around the world.

Dr. Bolton has published articles in the Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Marketing, Journal of Marketing Research, Journal of Service Research, Management Science, Marketing Science, and other leading journals.  She previously served as editor of the Journal of Marketing (2002-2005) and Area Editor of the Journal of Marketing Research (2005-2007), as well as serving on the Editorial Review Boards of other leading marketing journals. She has also served on the Board of Trustees of the Marketing Science Institute, the Board of Directors of the American Marketing Association and the Board of Directors of the Sheth Foundation. She received her B.Comm., with honors, from Queen's University (Canada), and her M.Sc. and Ph.D. from Carnegie-Mellon University.