Establishment of a performance-evaluation model for service quality in the banking industry

The study addresses the problem of service quality in the banking industry by modifying an importance–satisfaction (I–S) model in order to develop an integrated performance-measurement model for the banking industry, which would enable the priority of items for improvement to be determined. An importance and satisfaction questionnaire has been provided to determine which items do not fall into the appropriate performance-control zone of the performance-control matrix of the model. The performance-control matrix index provided enables the value of certain improvement objectives to be calculated. Finally, quality loss function is then adopted to rank the improvement objectives in terms of priority. A case study of a Taiwanese bank is then presented to demonstrate the applicability of the model in practice. The study thus presents a complete assessment model that helps managers to identify items for improvement, while simultaneously promoting cost and time efficiencies in service processes.     

Approaches to managing co-production for the co-creation of value in a museum setting: when authenticity matters

ABSTRACT

This qualitatively-based empirical research explored the strategies used by two museums to manage their roles in co-production as well as how they manage, motivate and guide visitors through the process of co-production. We also gained insights into how visitors responded to these strategies. Our findings suggest that the two museums employ different strategies to co-produce the consumption experience and that their strategies were linked to the nature of authenticity that is apparent in the museums. Strategies included explicitly controlling the visitor experience through empowering visitors to design their own visitor experience. The success of these strategies relied on the two museums recognising the situational variables of the context of consumption and adopting appropriate strategies that enabled them and the visitors to leverage the value of the visitor experience. The findings from this study suggest that further research should be undertaken on how authenticity might be integrated into a service-dominant logic paradigm and service strategies aimed at enhancing the co-creation of value.     

Internet Based Benchmarking

We discuss the design of interactive, internet based benchmarking using parametric (statistical) as well as non-parametric (DEA) models. The user receives benchmarks and improvement potentials. The user is also given the possibility to search different efficiency frontiers and hereby to explore alternative improvement strategies. Implementations of both a parametric and a non-parametric model are presented.     

Development of methodology for classification of user experience (UX) in online customer review

In e-commerce, customer feedback has become an essential source of insight into a product or service's user experience (UX). The study of UX helps to integrate customers' potential needs into the product's design. Because customer reviews in e-commerce are not structured and categorized, it is necessary to analyze UX based on customer opinions systematically. This study tries to structure UX in a product's positive/negative context through a neural network-based self-organizing map (SOM). As a result of analyzing 10,482 reviews on wireless earbuds in BestBuy, an electronic product e-commerce platform, it was confirmed that it is a suitable method for categorizing user experiences between reviews and deriving important factors. In particular, the difference in core UX elements by positive/negative context of the product was verified based on the star rating. The results of this study are expected to contribute to product improvement and business improvement that reflect customer needs by companies or designers who design products for end-users.     

A construction of consumer cognitive structures and their implications in furniture shopping decisions: a means-end chain approach

The main purpose of this study is to construct a hierarchical value map (HVM) based on an investigation of how consumers in Taiwan link attributes of furniture and home accessories stores with particular consequences, and how these consequences satisfy their personal values. Further, this study compares differences in consumer HVMs in terms of gender, as well as across different chain stores. This study used the means-end chain approach and laddering technique to interview 40 consumers of furniture and home accessories stores in Taiwan. We obtained six ladders regarding furniture and home accessories store consumption. From these ladders, this study found three critical store attributes (function, facility convenience, and price), four consequences that consumers care most about (shopping ease, comfort and pleasure, practicality, and integrated design), and three dominant values that consumers wish to achieve (warm family, pleasurable life, and security). The findings of this study can be used as a basis for market segmentation and the development of retail service marketing strategies.     

Exploring information technology success of Augmented Reality Retail Applications in retail food chain

Augmented reality retail applications (ARRAs) have emerged as rapidly developing innovative and futuristic retail innovation used in both physical store and online shops to improve the retail settings and customer experience. So, the objective of this research was to identify predictors of user benefits of ARRA in the retail food chain. By integrating the theory of information system success model, this study proposes a model to investigate the mediating effect of two values: (1) user satisfaction and (2) user continuance intention between quality perspective as explanatory variables (system, service, and information quality) and user benefits as the outcome variable. Both the mediating factors are found positively playing mediating roles among all proposed relationships. This paper provides valuable course of action for retailers and marketers on assessing customers satisfaction and using ARRA to create marketing strategies effectively.     

Understanding the user satisfaction and loyalty of customer service chatbots

The artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot is emerging as a significant corporate customer-facing application, potentially increasin customer service efficiency while reducing costs. However, little work has sought to assess the quality of service they provide consumers. This study applies the e-service quality by incorporating conversational AI quality to predict users' satisfaction and loyalty to customer service chatbots. The proposed model was empirically evaluated using survey data collected from 219 users responding about their perceptions of customer service chatbots. The findings indicate that AI chatbot service recovery quality and AI chatbot conversational quality significantly influence user satisfaction. On the other hand, core AI chatbot service quality and satisfaction significantly influenced chatbot user loyalty. This study contributes to researchers and practitioners by proposing and evaluating a more comprehensive chatbot e-service quality that combines both fundamental (core service and service recovery qualities) and human-like (conversational quality) aspects of e-service. The results are of value in devising future AI chatbot services and related strategies.     

Can users embed their user experience in user-generated images? Evidence from JD.com

Nowadays, massive user-generated images (UGIs) are posted online to convey users' experiences with specific brands or products. Thus, this visual information is precious, as it conveys users' actual and subjective feelings about brands and products. Because of the unprecedented quantity of images and the heterogeneity of their content, it is quite challenging for brand marketers and retailers to probe into subjective user experience in large-scale UGIs. To address this gap, this study aims to identify the connection between user experience and different image semantic features (i.e. centrality and richness) by using deep learning models. By employing objective data (8963 images) from JD.com and using deep learning algorithms (faster R-CNN), we found that users with positive user experience prefer to generate high-centrality and high-richness pictures. Our study enriches the relevant literature and provides valuable practical implications for brand marketers and e-commerce retailers. Based on findings of this work, relevant stakeholders can understand their users’ experience better from objective UGIs and devise corresponding recommendation and service strategies.     

The investigation on dimensions of e-satisfaction for online shoes retailing

Purpose—Online retailing has become a standard component in companies' multi-channel structure. This trend also involves an increasing number of experience attribute dominated products, which traditionally rely on brick-and-mortar retailers. These manufacturers have started to open their own online retail stores. This study identifies the key determinants of e-satisfaction at different stages of shoes online shopping process.Design/methodology/approach—We collect consumers' reviews about their online shopping experiences from online review websites. We use both qualitative and quantitative approaches to analyze the dataset, and investigate the complete process of consumers' e-tailing experiences.Findings—this research identifies the two key factors driving e-satisfaction of purchasing experience attribute dominated products online: product selection and customer service. In particular, our findings show that product selection is critical for e-satisfaction in the pre-purchase stage, and that customer service is more important in the post-purchase stage. Lastly, the study finds that manufacturers' websites often receive more negative reviews because of their poor service recovery strategies in the post-purchase period.Research limitations/implications—This study emphasizes the importance of adopting a dynamic approach by considering various stages of the consumer's online shopping experience. This study focuses on one specific experience good; the shoe industry.Practical implications—The results of this study are invaluable to firms interested in providing experience attribute dominated products online. Our findings indicate that product selection and especially post-purchase service are critical for a successful e-tailing.Originality/value—This paper emphasizes the importance of taking a dynamic view to investigate consumer's e-tailing experience. We adopt both qualitative and quantitative approaches in our study.     

Critical Success Factors of Service Orientation in Information Systems Engineering

Service orientation has been a major buzz-word in recent years. While the buzz is on a decline, organizations are slowly, but steadily moving towards service oriented designs. However, service orientation turns out to be as much of a managerial challenge as of a technical one. The most important complexity drivers in the service oriented design of information systems seem to be (a) inconsistent design goals of stakeholders and (b) the pursuit of exhaustive service orientation coverage. This research focuses on the following two questions: (1) What are the characteristics of successful implementations of service oriented information systems, and (2) what are the critical success factors influencing, driving and/or, determining these characteristics? Data of an empirical analysis is used to test a set of cause-effect relationship hypotheses based on nine latent variables. In the core of this model we differentiate the variables “overall service orientation infrastructure success” and “service orientation project success”. The hypothesized interrelationships between the nine variables lead to a causal model which is proven to hold.     

Joint service,pricing and advertising strategies with tourists’ green tourism experience in a tourism supply chain

We consider the supply chain in the tourism industry, in which tourists are susceptible to the tourists' green tourism experience when they make purchase decisions for a green tourism product. Our research considers a green tourism supply chain (GTSC) consisting of one scenic spot (SS) and one travel agency (TA), and studies the joint green tourism service, pricing and advertising problem of the SS and the TA. We establish Stackelberg differential game models between the SS and the TA in the centralized, decentralized and revenue-sharing scenarios, and apply Pontryagin's maximum principle to obtain the dynamic equilibrium solutions of the GTSC members. Based on the three different scenarios, we analyze influences of the tourists' green tourism experience concern level, the wholesale ticket price and the sharing ratio on the optimal decisions and performances of the GTSC. This paper is the first quantitative research to study the green tourism service effort, pricing and advertising strategies of the GTSC members and design GTSC improvement contract with considering the green tourism experience. Our results provide management insights for the SS and the TA to manage GTSC under the green tourism preferences and the green tourism experience of tourists.     

An innovative service quality evaluation and improvement model

Importance-performance analysis (IPA) is a popular approach used by firms to focus resources on crucial attributes, reduce expenditure on non-critical ones and develop improvement and innovation strategies accordingly. However, IPA develops quality improvement plans based on inaccurate assumptions about the independence between importance and performance and lacks clear measurement standards, which may lead to inappropriate recommendations. IPA also does not account for desired versus adequate service. Therefore, this study proposes an innovative framework that integrates the advantages of IPA, the zone of tolerance concept, and Kano’s model. A case study conducted in a wealth management department in the banking industry demonstrates the effectiveness of the proposed methodology. The results indicate that the proposed approach recommends optimal service strategies to managers and outperforms traditional IPA.     

Empathy with influencers? The impact of the sensory advertising experience on user behavioral responses

Short-form video influencer advertising offers new opportunities for user sensory experience to promote advertising effectiveness and induce positive user responses. This unique means of influencer-generated advertising via short-form videos has not yet been investigated. This study builds on the reciprocity norm of social exchange theory to investigate relationships among ad sensory stimuli (i.e., the sensory advertising experience), the efficacy of influencer advertising (i.e., empathy and altruistic motive), and user behavioral responses (i.e., ad avoidance intention, ad engagement, and purchase intention). It also seeks to shed light on the critical role of perceived influencer effort in these relationships. An empirical study using data from TikTok (Douyin) users and results indicate that sensory advertising experience positively affects user behavioral responses through the serial mediation of empathy and altruistic motive. Additionally, perceived influencer effort is found to be a crucial moderator of the effect of sensory advertising experience on user empathy, which further influences user behavioral responses. The findings provide insight into the persuasion effect and mechanism of short-form video influencer advertising and offer suggestions for advertising campaign designers.     

The nature and extent of service user involvement in critical care research and quality improvement: A scoping review of the literature

The importance of involving patients and the public in health care research is globally recognized, but how best to do this in critical care is unclear. The aim of this first published review was to explore the extent and nature of evidence on service user involvement in critical care research and quality improvement. Using the scoping review framework described by Arksey and O'Malley ( 2005 ), a team of service user and critical care researchers searched eleven online databases, reviewed relevant web sites, conducted forward and backward citation searching and contacted subject experts. Extracted data were subjected to a narrative synthesis based on the objectives of the review. Findings from a broad range of evidence support that involvement is becoming more commonplace and that experiences are generally positive. Data extracted from 34 publications identify that involvement is most commonly reported at the level of consultation or participation in project teams, however, the extent to which involvement impacts on projects output remains unclear. Key barriers and facilitators relate to the challenge of recruiting a diverse group of service users, dealing with power hierarchies, being adaptable and effective consideration of the resource requirements. More research is required to identify the most effective methods to support the opportunity for involvement and more thorough reporting of service user involvement practices is strongly recommended.     

Platform quality factors influencing content providers’ loyalty

This study investigates what platform quality factors affect the contents of the loyalty of content providers to support the continued expansion and sustainability of online platforms. It analyses empirically the influence of platform quality on the satisfaction with and loyalty to the service as well as on the platform's ability to secure content providers from a survey of 222 platform users. It confirms five significant findings for platform quality and user loyalty. First, all five factors of SERVQUAL have meaningful effects on platform user satisfaction. Second, factors affecting service quality differ by gender. Third, while male users regard platform technology as most critical, female users are more concerned about platform events and interests. Fourth, female users care more about customer responses than male users do; however, the user interface is the most critical aspect for both genders. Finally, platform quality has a significant impact on satisfaction and loyalty among content providers. It identifies the importance of platform service quality as a factor to increase user (content providers) loyalty on the platform. And it also investigates differences according to user gender by subdividing platform service users and indicates how service quality effects can change according to user characteristics.     

Service failure and recovery in using technology-based self-service: effects on user attributions and satisfaction

This study examines service failure and recovery in using technology-based self-service (TBSS) systems to determine the effects of a variety of relevant factors on negative customer/user attributions to the service provider, to employees who try to help in recovery, and to the technology itself, as well as the effects on customer/user satisfaction with the failure/recovery experience. The findings show that immediate recovery of TBSS failures reduces negative attributions and increases customer/user satisfaction with the experience, as does a low-anxiety environment around the kiosk. Technology error (as opposed to user error) decreases user satisfaction. Employee assistance decreases negative attributions to the employee but increases negative attribution to the technology. Some interactions were found among the experimental factors that are also meaningful.     

Waiting for service: modelling the effectiveness of service interventions

Most service businesses tend to experience unwelcome delays in service delivery that often generate strong negative impacts from customers. In response, managers develop and implement service intervention strategies, such as providing length and reason of a delay, both of which have been reported to have positive impacts on customers. However, the results from studies investigating such interventions are mixed. Accordingly, it is hypothesised that these effects may be contingent upon certain situations. This research project has investigated the wait situation using an experimental design. A 2 × 2 × 2 factorial design was first created using a restaurant scenario for the stimulus material and an online web site was used to collect data from 130 respondents. Our findings indicate a significant moderating effect of level of service use and degree of goal attractiveness on the effectiveness of providing duration and cause information. More importantly, we found that under certain conditions a service intervention may be counterproductive to the intended strategy. This finding suggests that managers need to be wary of developing and executing expensive service recovery strategies without due regard to the customer segment being targeted.     

服务主导逻辑下的农产品电商供应链商业模式创新研究

农产品电商近年来发展迅速，但整体的市场渗透率不高，消费者对农产品电商的信任程度和感知体验均有待提升，很多电商企业处于亏损经营状态。传统的以产品为核心的运作及流程改进无法有效解决当前农产品电商存在的问题。在新消费趋势下，需要以服务为核心实施农产品电商供应链创新。为此，文章深入探讨了服务主导逻辑下的农产品电商供应链模式创新问题。研究发现，为了适应消费升级的需求，农产品电商供应链应由产品供应链转变为服务供应链，基于服务理念创新供应链模式。服务主导逻辑下农产品电商供应链的核心要素包括重视过程和体验、顾客参与和价值共创、服务导向。基于服务主导逻辑的农产品电商供应链模式创新包含三个层次，分别为基于整合解决方案的创新、基于服务场景的创新、基于服务生态系统的创新。     

The manifestation of luxury value dimensions in brand engagement in self-concept

This research investigates what consumers in democratized luxury markets value when purchasing luxury items. Nonetheless, these consumers have a limited budget and can not always buy luxury items, yet they are drawn back to these luxury brands. Thus, we use brand engagement in self-concept (BESC) to explain the relationship between these consumers and luxury brands within democratized luxury markets. A conceptualized model of three luxury value dimensions (experiential, symbolic, and functional) is proposed, and 488 cases were gathered through a phone survey. The data were analyzed using partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM). The results show that the most critical drivers of consumers' luxury purchase intention (LPI) are hedonism, escapism, conspicuousness, quality, and usability in democratized luxury markets. Also, BESC can unify luxury value dimensions into an integrated whole and mediate the relationship between them and LPI.     

Conceptual analysis and implementation of an integrated CRM system for service providers

Customer relationship management (CRM) has become a critical issue in services management. Ensuring customer satisfaction and maintaining long-term relationships with customers have become essential for survival amongst competitive service industries. However, few studies have attempted to integrate all relevant factors in a comprehensive model of CRM implementation. The current study addresses this need by proposing a conceptually integrated five-phase model that incorporates elements of CRM, the service-delivery process and customer satisfaction (represented by the extended American Customer Satisfaction Index (ASCI) model). This integrated model of CRM is assessed in an empirical study of 63 leading Taiwanese service firms distributed amongst eight service industries. The implementation levels of various phases of CRM are assessed in a range of service industries by means of a questionnaire survey and in-depth interviews. The results of this empirical study reveal the strengths and weaknesses of various industries in their implementation of CRM. These results also represent a useful benchmarking reference for service organisations that have lower implementation levels in some CRM practices.