Linking Perceived Electronic Service Quality and Service Loyalty on the Dimensional Level: An Aspect of Multi-Channel Services
Year: 2007
Type: article
Study design: Observational Study
Abstract: As the online buyer's shopping patterns evolve using multiple channels in receiving and consuming products and services, electronic retailers are offering value-added services that facilitate and support the online shopping transaction and experience.Several eretailers adopted the strategy of logistical integration to offer their shoppers the ability to access physical outlets/touch-points to pickup and return their online purchase.Such deployment of physical outlets/touch-points to facilitate and support online transaction has been widely recognized as an important feature.Yet, it is not known how online shoppers perceive e-service quality in the presence of logistics integration services.More importantly, electronic markets are very competitive environments where the competitor is just a click away.Therefore, understanding the service loyalty in the context of virtual stores is essential for e-retailers' survival.Several studies have found that superior eservice quality improves loyalty.However, most of these studies measured e-service quality and customer loyalty unidimensionally.The primary objective of this research is three-fold: (i) identifying the key dimensions of e-service quality; (ii) identifying the dimensions of e-service loyalty; (iii) examining the effects of the identified dimensions of e-service quality on the various types of customer loyalty. An empirical study resulted in developing three scales; the E-service-Qual scale for measuring e-service quality, the Int-Logis-Qual scale for measuring logistical integration quality and the E-loyalty scale for measuring customer loyalty.Our investigation revealed that assurance and reliability are the most important factors influencing both 'preference loyalty' and 'loyalty under increased pricing'.Another striking finding is that responsiveness is the only factor that significantly affects 'complaining behavior'.More importantly, we have found that facilitating online shopping by offering offline-pickup and offline-returns services improve securing the loyalty of existing customers.Both offline-returns and offlinepickup influence significantly 'preference loyalty', while offline-returns quality affects 'loyalty under increased pricing' indirectly mediated by the perception of assurance.
Author: Samar I. Swaid
Language: English
Subfield: Marketing
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W23285189