Suchergebnisse

The value of treating customer satisfaction (CS) as a marketing objective began to be questioned in the 1990s. Achieving customer delight (CD) was the suggested alternative. However, CD is used for a distinct response and for an upper zone of positive nonlinear response to CS. This research investigates these two perspectives by examining the linearity of how CS influences behavioral intentions while controlling for CD measured as a distinct response. Unique data, crossing online retailers with respondents, confirm CD and CS are distinct responses that both determine behavioral intentions. CD has a positive quadratic effect; contrary to the zone of delight conceptualization, CS has a negative cubic effect. This suggests that CD is a service performance metric that needs to be monitored and managed just as much as CS. Once CS is above average, resources should be used to increase CD rather than CS.

AbstractResearch on the effects of e‐service quality dimensions on customer satisfaction and behavioural intentions has used cross‐sectional data from customer surveys. To draw managerial implications, such research assumes that model parameters estimated across service provider customers apply also to the service providers. The current study collects e‐service data that fully cross respondents with retailer websites. These crossed data are then used to compare the modelled effects of quality dimensions estimated on the confounded data with those estimated across customers and those estimated across websites. The results provide evidence of considerable inconsistency, suggesting that managers should not rely on conclusions drawn from an analysis of variation across customers. Copyright © 2010 ASAC. Published by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Service managers require precise enough measures of service performance to make particular decisions. Generalizability theory (G-theory) has begun to be used to design service assessment studies for decision making. However, initial applications address a limited range of decisions and may underestimate the amount of data needed for decision making if the variance due to the hidden-occasions (time-of-observation) facet is substantial. This study uses test-retest mystery shopping data to investigate the variance due to the main and interaction effects of test occasions and the consequences of ignoring them for different managerial decisions. Accounting for the hidden-occasions facet reveals a need to collect more than twice as many data when benchmarking services and over 10 times as many data to segment service assessors on the basis of their evaluative responses. Thus, accounting for variation due to occasions is crucial for G-theory applications to deliver assessment data of the required quality.

The 1990s saw a questioning of the value of merely satisfying customers and instead focused attention on the importance of customer delight. In a key contribution, Oliver, Rust, and Varki (1997) developed a structural model of the antecedents and consequences of customer delight, acting in parallel with satisfaction, that was generally supported for two entertainment services. However, the effect of delight on intention was significant for symphony ticket purchasers but not for theme park patrons. This article first replicates their path analysis for more mundane visits to consumer Web sites. Then it takes advantage of a larger sample and additional measures to address construct measurement issues and to determine whether customer delight is something more than a nonlinear effect of satisfaction on intention.

With increased attention being paid to retail performance, a considerable amount of academic work has been devoted to the assessment of retail services. This work has moved beyond an initial reliance on classical test theory methods to the more managerially relevant perspective provided by generalizability theory and begun to compare the quality of data provided by customers with that collected by mystery shoppers. However, initial work on mystery shopping is limited to the evaluation of individual retail outlets, not retail chains, and to convenience-goods retailers, where personal selling is of only minor importance. This article examines the psychometric quality of mystery shopping data for retail chains and durable-goods retailers. At issue are whether more visits are required to evaluate retail chains than individual stores and whether the more extended period of sales interaction characteristic of durable retailing increases or reduces the number of shopper visits needed to make reliable decisions when evaluating retailers.

The marketplace has been defined by the interaction between consumers and brands, which has been recognized by the majority of marketing literatures with the exception of the measurement literature. Measurement researchers in marketing have been continuously working on improving the quality of measurement of marketing constructs by applying psychometric theories from the early Classical Test Theory to later generations such as Generalizability Theory and Item Response Theory. But only main effects (normally consumers, sometimes brands) have been focused on, and interactions between them are either ignored or treated as measurement error. This is surprising, given the voluminous literature in other areas of marketing (e.g., marketing segmentation, customer lifetime value, and customer relationship management) that build their entire frameworks on the interpretation and usage of this interaction. In the current research, we propose a new Many Faceted Item Response Theory model to fill this gap in measurement literature. Two sets of indexes describe consumers (and brands); individual main effects (and brand main effects) and brand-specific individual effects (or individual-specific brand effects). Soft drink brand equity data were used for the empirical examination.

In marketing, there are many important multidimensional constructs, such as service quality, market orientation, and consumer-based brand equity (CBBE). Survey methods and multidimensional scales are used to measure these constructs. But the survey responses collected for these constructs are also dual-faceted. Except for consumers, the other facet (such as services, firms or brands) is involved too. Assessment of multidimensional marketing scales (such as SERVQUAL and MARKOR) has relied on confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) and structural equation modeling (SEM), which may not give accurate and unbiased evidence about the estimates and dimensionality across both facets. The authors introduce a hierarchical extension of many facet item response theory (MFIRT) to empirically investigate the causal relationships between a construct and its dimensions for scales that generate dual-faceted data. CBBE data for soft drink brands are used in an empirical study, which demonstrates the method and finds CBBE best modeled as formative from its dimensions along the consumer facet.

AbstractWest Edmonton Mall packages retail stores, a hotel, recreation and entertainment facilities, restaurants, and theme parks into a unique integrated consumer environment. This paper examines this development against suggested criteria for identifying a new retailing institution, and concludes the answer hinges on whether it attracts combined‐purpose visits. A survey is used to compare area residents' purposes when visiting West Edmonton Mall and nearby regional malls, and to examine their perceptions of the malls. The results suggest a new retailing institution, here called a mega‐multi‐mall, has been born.RésuméLe West Edmonton Mall regroupe dans un complexe commercial intëgrë magasins de dëtail, hötel, installations de loisirs et de spectacles, restaurants et parc d'attractions. L'article ëtudie ce complexe en fonction de critëres donnës de dëfinition d'une nouvelle institution de vente au dëtail. En fait, il tente de dëterminer sile complexe attire une clientële qui se dëplace pour faire plusieurs courses ou sorties ä la fois. Il se fonde sur les rësultats d'un sondage pour comparer les buts qui poussent les rësidents de la rëgion ä se rendre au West Edmonton Mall et aux autres centres commerciaux avoisinants et pour analyser la perception qu'ils ont de ces centres; il en conclut ä la naissance d'une nouvelle forme d'ëtablissement commercial, qu'il appelle ≪ mëga‐multi‐mail ≫.

Introduction and overview -- Demand and supply -- Markets -- Consumer behaviour -- Production and cost -- Revenue, profit, risk, and managerial decisions -- Market structure, theory of the firm, and industrial organization -- Perfect competition and monopoly -- Monopolistic competition and oligopoly -- Pricing and market segmentation -- Advertising -- Labour markets -- Government intervention -- International trade