Consumer (goal) satisfaction: A means‐ends chain approach

This study investigates the role that service attributes, customer subgoals, and goals play in forming the satisfaction judgment. Drawing on means‐ends chain theory, and on satisfaction research, satisfaction is conceptualized as the result of a process in which customers activate multiple comparative referents. In a pilot study, a paper‐and‐pencil laddering technique was used to collect attributes and goals connected to the satisfaction judgment. These elements were then used as items in a satisfaction survey of 200 customers. A mixture regression model revealed that both attribute‐related dimensions and goal‐related dimensions determine overall satisfaction, albeit not homogeneously among customers. Two customer segments were identified: Socializers, whose satisfaction is driven primarily by the goal of well‐being, and Achievers, whose satisfaction is generated mainly by the goal of efficiency. Two directed graphs describe the satisfaction path of the two groups of customers, illustrating how service attributes are connected to the satisfaction of lower‐order and higher‐order goals. © 2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

Goal interdependence and quality in services marketing

Service quality is considered an important competitive edge because it generates repeat sales, positive word of mouth, customer loyalty, and competitive product differentiation. This study examines the impact of a company's cooperative or competitive orientation and the service provider's warm or cold communication style on customer evaluation of service quality. Results from 83 participants in a simulated bank interview experiment indicate that when the bank communicated a cooperative orientation they perceived it as offering a higher-quality service than when it had competitive or individualistic goals. The warmth of the service personnel contributed to high-quality service, liking the bank representative, future confidence in dealing with the bank, satisfaction with the interview, and willingness to be interviewed by the bank representative in the future. These results were interpreted as suggesting that companies who can demonstrate a strong cooperative orientation toward customers and whose service providers demonstrate warmth will be considered to offer high-quality services. © 1995 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.     

Do Farmers' Market and Specialty Food Store Customers Differ in the Effects of Perceived Utilitarian and Hedonic Shopping Values?

This study explored differences in the effects of perceived utilitarian and hedonic shopping values on customer satisfaction for the two separate groups of the agricultural product marketing channel: farmers' markets and specialty food stores. Empirical data were collected from customers of agricultural product retailers located in Taiwan (N = 412). The results show that different agricultural product marketing channels provide different values to their customers. Farmers' market customers experience a greater hedonic value, and specialty food store customers experience a greater utilitarian value. In addition, the perceived utilitarian and hedonic shopping values of farmers' market customers are more highly positively associated with customer satisfaction than are those of specialty food store customers.     

Service Orientation: Its Impact on Business Performance in the Medical Service Industry

From the viewpoint of internal marketing, employees who are content in their job may be motivated to satisfy their customers better than ones who are not content. Another relevant premise is that the content employees, because of their work motivation, would eventually help improve the performance of their firm. To verify these relationships, some previous studies looked into the effects of organisational service orientation on employee's satisfaction. But only few of them investigated the mediating effects of variables such as service value and customer orientation for their role in linking service orientation to business performance. This study examines how an organisation's service orientation had an effect on its performance at hospitals. For this purpose, verification of the mediating role of service value perceived by employees as well as the role of customer orientation on the firm's performance was attempted. For this study, a total of 292 usable questionnaires were collected from hospital staffs located in metropolitan cities of Korea. The hypotheses concerning relationships among service orientation, service value, employee satisfaction and customer orientation were verified by covariance structural modelling, using SPSS 10.0 and AMOS 4.0 programs. The result is as follows. First, organisational service orientation had a positive effect on both employee satisfaction and service value perceived by hospital staff. Second, employee satisfaction had a positive impact on service value and customer orientation. Finally, service value as well as employee's customer orientation were found to exert positive influence on the medical firm's performance.     

On Closeness to the Customer in Industrial Markets

ABSTRACT

Recent years have witnessed a resurgence of academic and practitioner interest in the way companies interact with their customers. While there has been considerable scientific progress in the understanding of market orientation and buyer-seller relationships, limited attention has been given to the concept of closeness to the customer. Specifically, there has been no valid measure of the construct as a whole. This paper reports the development of a valid 28-item measure (called CLOSCUS) for assessing industrial firms' closeness to the customer. The development of the scale is based on a literature review, field interviews as well as statistical analyses of two independent samples from different sides of the buyer-seller dyad. Results indicate that seven factors underlie the 28 items. These are related to product, service, and process quality (two factors), flexibility in dealing with customers (one factor), and the way of interacting with customers (four factors), respectively. Based on the CLOSCUS scale, closeness to the customer is shown to impact on a customer's commitment, trust, and satisfaction. It is also demonstrated that closeness to the customer is both conceptually and empirically distinct from market orientation which contradicts some marketing researchers' prior statements. The paper concludes with some experiences from applications of the scale in a number of German companies.     

An Investigation of Trust,Satisfaction, and Commitment on Repurchase Intentions in Professional Services

Abstract

The predictive ability of trust, satisfaction, and commitment regarding a customer's intent to retain professional service providers is explored. Trust, in business relationships, is typically perceived as a consequent of satisfaction and experience. However, professional service customers may be unable to commence relationships without trusting their providers; thus, the stance that trust leads to commitment may not hold. Given the difficulty that professional service customers have regarding their ability to assess their providers' trustworthiness, customers may take trust for granted once the relationship begins. Regression analyses suggest that professional service customers utilize satisfaction and commitment, rather than trust, to determine repurchase intentions.     

Evidence Supporting the Importance of Brands in Marketing Computer Products

ABSTRACT

For convenience store (c-store) management to be truly customer-focused, they must listen to their customers and provide the products that meet customers' needs. This study investigates one aspect of c-store customer satisfaction, the product mix. The purpose of this paper is to investigate c-store customers' perceptions of product offerings to expand the c-store's product mix and in turn increase customer satisfaction. Fourteen products were examined. Of the fourteen, three were rated very likely to be purchased: postal services, home style meals, and a salad bar. Differences in preference were found between gender and marital status. Men and single customers had higher purchase intentions for the home style meals than women and married customers. Suggestions for future research are provided.     

The influence of emotions on customer's cognitive evaluations and satisfaction in a service failure and recovery context

The aim of this paper is to explore the relationship between customers' negative emotions after a failure, their cognitive evaluations of the recovery process, and the overall or cumulative satisfaction in a service context. Two different constructs measure a customer's cognitive evaluations of the recovery process: disconfirmation of expectations and perceived justice. The proposed model is tested on a sample of financial service customers who suffered some type of failure. The results indicate that emotions have an indirect effect on overall or cumulative satisfaction through cognitive evaluations.     

Effect of Customers' and Suppliers' Perceptions of the Market Orientation of Manufacturing Firms on Channel Relationships and Financial Performance

ABSTRACT

This study is designed to investigate the effect of customers' and suppliers' perceptions of the market orientation of manufacturing firms on customers' and suppliers' trust in, cooperative norms in, and satisfaction with the relationship with the manufacturing firm. The findings from a sample of 72 matched sets of suppliers, manufacturing firms and customers in industrial channels in the Netherlands reveal that the perceived market orientation of manufacturing firms engaged in channel partnerships has a positive influence on customers' and suppliers' levels of trust in, cooperative norms in, and satisfaction with the relationship. This study further investigates the effect of the customers' and suppliers' trust in, cooperative norms in, and satisfaction with the relationship on the financial performance of the manufacturing firm. The results reveal that customers' and suppliers' cooperative norms in the relationship positively influence the manufacturing firm's financial performance. Customer's and supplier's trust in and satisfaction with the relationship have no effect on the manufacturing firm's financial performance.     

Analysis of customers' satisfaction with baby products: The moderating role of brand image

The previous experience of customers is assessed by textual reviews and ratings to reflect their levels of satisfaction with the service or product. Online reviews and ratings have played a vital role to assess the performance of the services or the quality of goods. This research explores customers' levels of satisfaction with baby products on Amazon.com through text mining and survey-based methodologies. The moderating role of a brand image is also investigated on the relationship between customers' satisfaction and recommendations to others. Two sources of data were utilized, online reviews from the Amazon portal and responses of the participants on a large-scale survey. The research model is developed based on the factors that were extracted from the text mining approach. Following that, a questionnaire was distributed and the collected data were inspected using Partial Least Squares Structural Equations Modeling (PLS-SEM). The findings revealed that several dimensions have an influential effect on customers' experiences with baby products, among which are comfortableness, material quality, easy use, easy return, design, price, packaging, and size information. In addition, the moderating influence of the brand image on the hypothesis between customers' satisfaction and recommendations to others was significant. By deploying the two-phase methodology, baby product vendors can understand the influential variables in customers' experiences and their impacts on customers’ satisfaction more accurately.     

Do satisfied customers bad‐mouth innovative products?

For many years marketing academics have recommended, and practitioners have implemented, organization‐wide programs that measure customers' levels of satisfaction with a firm's offerings because it is believed that satisfied customers are both more likely to continue using a previously adopted product and less likely to engage in negative word‐of‐mouth communication. Given the ubiquity of product‐review forums resulting from today's increasing levels of e‐commerce, this paper pairs cause constructs from the diffusion literature with effect constructs from the satisfaction and services literatures to reconsider that perspective. Specifically, it examines the relationships bet‐ween six perceived innovation attributes known to influence a new product's diffusion process and two post‐adoption behaviors, satisfaction and negative word‐of‐mouth communication. The results quash previous assumptions that satisfaction mediates negative word‐of‐mouth communication and reveal that satisfied customers do speak ill of previously adopted products. Implications for both theory and practice are also presented. © 2010 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

Customers' Satisfaction Factors Regarding University Food Court Service

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to identify university customers' satisfaction levels regarding foods and services in the food court at Oklahoma State University. A survey of 276 customers was conducted regarding customer satisfaction levels of foods and services. Results indicated that food quality was found to be the most important factor contributing to customers' overall satisfaction. It is suggested that management should pay attention to the freshness, appearance, and nutrition of the food to increase the customers' satisfaction. Moreover, focusing on product differentiation by offering convenience packaged Asian, Mexican, and Italian cuisines may prove to be a potential variable contributing to customers' purchasing patterns.     

Goal achievement and satisfaction of joint venture partners

Joint venturing is recommended to avoid some of the obstacles to successful business venturing, such as capability limitations and organizational resistance. However, the high dissolution rates for joint ventures suggest a need to learn how to utilize this cooperative strategy more effectively. Two frequently reported problem areas in joint venturing are unrealistic corporate expectations and inadequate planning. Thus, this study sought to examine the impact of strategic intent on joint venture success as measured by partner goal achievement and satisfaction.A review of the literature on strategic goals and goal consensus suggested that two variables are likely to affect joint venture performance: the number of partner goals pursued and the overlap in partners' goals. The type of goals pursued may also affect performance; that is, some goals may be more achievable through joint venturing than are other goals.The purpose of this research was two-fold: (1) to empirically explore the relative importance of a variety of partner goals for their joint ventures, and (2) to determine if goal disparity, and the number and type of goals pursued affected joint venture success. This approach draws attention to the expectations of partners rather than to the venture itself, the traditional focus in entrepreneurship.The hypotheses and exploratory propositions were tested using data from U.S. firms involved in manufacturing joint ventures. A categorization of partner goals was developed through factor analysis, in which five categories of goals emerged: knowledge transfer, market power, financial performance, efficiency, and financial structure. Partners were found to have pursued multiple goals simultaneously, with knowledge transfer and market goals being most frequently rated as critically important. These findings suggest the need to expand traditional performance measures to account for the diverse and nonfinancial nature of partner goals.When examined separately, it was found that a large goal set facilitated partner goal achievement and satisfaction, and that an overlap in partners' goals promoted partner satisfaction. The large goal set was argued to be necessary in the volatile environments that are often attractive for joint venturing. A large goal set reflects adaptation to environmental change and facilitates prudent strategy selection by subjecting alternatives to multiple goal hurdles. The overlap in partners' goals reflects a meshing of individual partner goals and helps to minimize conflict, which could stall strategy development and drain resources. However, when an integrated model was developed from multiple regression findings, the overlap in partners' goals became a moderator variable. This model exposed the negative as well as the positive effects of the overlap in partners' goals.Analysis further suggested that the joint venture strategy may be better suited to achieving efficiency goals than financial goals. Possible explanations for the difficulty in achieving financial goals include: insufficient time (or short lifespan of the joint venture), the complex structure inherent in joint ventures, and the possibility of disagreement between the partners about how the financial goals should be achieved. On the other hand, efficiency goals, such as vertical integration and economies of scale, require expansion or extension of operations and thus fit well with the pooling of skills and resources that are characteristic of joint venturing. Further, both partners contribute to and gain from efficiency goals, unlike with market access or knowledge transfer goals where one firm contributes more than it gains or vice versa for that particular goal.Additional analysis revealed that the goal types explained more variance in partner goal achievement and satisfaction than did the size of goal sets or the extent of overlap in partners' goals. Taken in combination, the various aspects of partners' goals explained 26% of the variance in partner goal achievement and 38% of the variance in partner satisfaction. When partner goal achievement was included in the multiple regression model for partner satisfaction, the amount of explained variance increased to 69%. The results suggest that a partner firm may be able to significantly enhance its chances of judging a joint venture to be successful if its goals focus on efficiency rather than revenues and profits, if it has a relatively large goal set, and if it concentrates on achieving the set of stated goals.     

What the eye does not see,the mind cannot reject: Can call center location explain differences in customer evaluations?

Moving call centers offshore may be an effective way to increase service productivity by lowering costs, yet recent research suggests that customers associate offshore call centers with lower service quality. This study clarifies customer evaluations of call centers with a field study that examines how customer perceptions of a foreign accent, call center location, and the agent's customer orientation relate to nonmonetary performance outcomes. Multivariate analysis of data collected from more than 800 customers using call centers located in three countries suggests that neither accent detection nor call center location relates to customer satisfaction, trust, or word-of-mouth communication; only perceived customer orientation has an effect on these outcomes. These findings suggest offshore call center locations are not necessarily associated with lower performance outcomes and that service firms should place a higher priority on ensuring call center agents have a strong customer orientation, rather than on avoiding the use of call centers abroad.     

An Investigation of Antecedents for the Development of Customer Support Services in Manufacturing Companies

ABSTRACT

There is widespread agreement in the literature that customer satisfaction is an important driver of organizational performance. However, existing research has tended to focus on only a few variables which mediate the link between customer satisfaction and organizational performance (especially customer loyalty). The goal of this paper is to provide deeper insights into the outcomes of customer satisfaction by studying the link between customer satisfaction and price sensitivity, drawing upon different theoretical perspectives (i.e., transaction cost theory and equity theory). The study is based on a dyadic data set collected from salespeople and their customers across multiple manufacturing and services industries in a business-to-business context. Results indicate the presence of an inverse relationship between customer satisfaction and price sensitivity. Findings also indicate that the link under consideration is particularly strong in the case of high product/service specificity and product/service complexity.     

Where the eyes go,the body follows?: Understanding the impact of strategic orientation on corporate social performance

This research seeks to address two questions with respect to firm corporate social performance (CSP): (1) “do different strategic orientations have differential impacts on a firm's overall CSP?”; and, if so, (2) “is there an effect of a firm's strategic orientation on the types of CSP that a firm implements?” Using a unique dataset that combines survey data on firms' strategic orientations for 115 US-based firms with CSP data from MSCI-ESG, we empirically examine the impacts on CSP levels of four different firm strategic orientations: customer, competitor, interfunctional coordination, and shareholder. Our empirical analysis demonstrates that (1) firms with a stronger orientation toward customers have higher levels of CSP overall, and (2) when firms have a stronger customer orientation, we find that the firm has higher CSP levels in domains dedicated toward secondary stakeholders, while firms with a stronger shareholder orientation exhibit higher levels of CSP dedicated toward primary stakeholders.     

Product bundling strategies in Swedish markets: links to business orientation and perceived effects on consumer influence

Product bundling is an increasingly important marketing strategy within many industries, and consumer influence on companies' ranges of product bundles is, thus, becoming an important issue. The aim of this study was to investigate product bundling strategies consumers are exposed to by some selected companies in the Swedish automobile, travel and banking industries. Bundling strategies were considered in relation to business orientation as well as the consumer's potential to influence the product bundles offered by these companies. Fourteen qualitative telephone interviews were conducted with senior representatives from the three sectors. Interview respondents were selected in cooperation with their respective companies. Results underwent interpretative analysis, and the findings indicated that business orientation is linked to product bundling techniques and to the type of customer influence on product bundling. Consumers were exposed to mixed and complementary bundling strategies, and customers of companies that apply a market orientation were found to have greater opportunities to influence product bundles directly, whereas companies that apply a production‐oriented approach were less able to respond to their customers' wishes. Consumer influence on the product bundles of production‐oriented companies was found to be of a more indirect nature.     

Retaining customers in traditional retail financial services: interviewing 'les responsables'

This paper explores organizational concerns with retaining customers in traditional retailing of financial services. Managers, charged with retaining customers ('les responsables') in banks and building societies, are interviewed seeking their views on how their organizations retain customers. The study finds that there are a number of shared themes in the sample of informants, which are evolution/flux, customer information systems, a product/sales orientation, delivering financial services, staff and relationships with customers. Underlying these themes, however, appears some equivocation as these organizations try to retain customers when customer acquisition seems to be the thrust of their marketing.     

Understanding online product ratings: A customer satisfaction model

Online product ratings have become a major information source for customers, retailers, and manufacturers. Both practitioners and researchers predominantly interpret them as a reflection of product quality. We argue that they in fact represent the customer's satisfaction with the product. Accordingly, we present a customer satisfaction model of online product ratings which incorporates the customer's pre-purchase expectations and actual product performance as determinants of ratings. We validate our model by applying it to two datasets collected at the German website of Amazon.com. The results indicate that both factors have a significant influence on online product ratings, supporting the proposed interpretation of ratings.     

Competitiveness vis-à-vis service quality as drivers of customer loyalty mediated by perceptions of regulation and stability in steady and volatile markets

The purpose of this research is to investigate predictors of customer loyalty in order to identify alternatives to customer satisfaction with service quality, which has been traditionally accepted as the primary predictor of customer loyalty, particularly for services. A stratified sample of bank customers was surveyed to collect information on customer perceptions and behaviors in relation to satisfaction with service quality, competitiveness, risk, regulation, stability and loyalty. Partial least squares path modelling (PLSPM) was applied to develop loyalty models for a steady market (Australia) and a volatile market (Greece). This study's empirical findings support theoretical arguments for the inclusion of customer perceptions of competitiveness in loyalty modelling. Perceptions of regulation and stability intervene in the relationship between drivers of loyalty and loyalty itself. For bankers, the study emphasizes the need to move away from customer satisfaction with service quality to explain customer loyalty, towards focusing efforts on achieving relative superiority in competitiveness, namely competitive productivity and products. Profiling customers based on their perceptions of a bank's competitiveness can provide additional explanatory power beyond traditional satisfaction based loyalty models. Services marketing has focused on the service components, and there is no doubt about its crucial role. But given this focus, other factors, such as the actual product component, have been somewhat overlooked in services research. The study makes a unique contribution to understanding and modelling customer loyalty by demonstrating the importance of the inclusion of customer perceptions of other factors as appropriate to market conditions.