Carmel Ann Herington

E‐retailing by banks: e‐service quality and its importance to customer satisfaction

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to explore the measurement of e‐service quality for e‐retail banking, the importance of e‐service quality dimensions to e‐retail bank customers, and the relationship between e‐service quality and customer satisfaction.Design/methodology/approach – Results are drawn from a self‐completed survey of a convenience sample of 200 Australian respondents who regularly use online banking facilities. Factor analysis and regression analysis are used to ascertain factor structure and determine the impact of e‐service quality dimensions on satisfaction.Findings – A four‐factor solution (E‐ServQual) represented by “personal needs”, “site organisation”, “user‐friendliness” and “efficiency” is found, with all factors rated as important. E‐ServQual is found to be a predictor of overall customer satisfaction with banking performance, but “efficiency” is not found to be predictive. Overall satisfaction is lower than overall e‐service quality.Research limitations/implications – The Aust...

Can banks improve customer relationships with high quality online services

Purpose – The purpose of this research is to explore the impact of online service quality on the level of customer delight and on the development of customer relationships.Design/methodology/approach – A self‐complete survey was used to collect data from a convenience sample of 200 Australian respondents who use online banking. Factor analysis and structural equation modelling were used to test the proposed model of relationships.Findings – Online service quality has no impact on customer delight, e‐trust or the development of stronger relationships with customers. It does have a relationship to e‐loyalty. However, the “efficiency” dimension of online service quality is related to e‐trust and also indirectly to relationship strength through e‐trust. The “personal need” and “site organization” dimensions of online service quality are related to e‐loyalty, with “personal needs” exhibiting the strongest impact. Customer delight has no relationship to online service quality, nor e‐trust, relationship strength...

Multiple stakeholders and multiple city brand meanings

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to explore whether multiple stakeholders imbue a single or multiple meanings to a city brand.Design/methodology/approach – The branding literature hints at multiple stakeholders but most studies take a single stakeholder perspective. A two‐stage quantitative study was used to examine similarities and differences between two stakeholder groups. The context for the study is city branding.Findings – The evidence suggests that different external stakeholders do have different brand meanings associated to a city brand. Each stakeholder group applies their own filter to interpret the meaning of the city brand. Essentially, a new conceptualisation of the city brand is provided.Research limitations/implications – Although the samples are reasonably large, it is important to apply the framework to other city brands to test for generalisability. Future research might also test the filter concept in the more general context of corporate branding.Practical implications – Organis...

The Determinants of Loyalty in Hotels

The hotel industry is a large industry contributing substantially to global economies and providing employment for many million people worldwide. Given the size and economic significance of the industry, it is important to understand the aspects of business performance that persuade customers to become repeat purchasers, and to exhibit behavioral loyalty. Despite the significance of the industry, there has been little research to investigate the antecedents of, and influences on, behavioral loyalty. The major global hotel corporations place considerable emphasis on the brand for marketing but there has been little research found that has investigated the role of the brand in determining behavioral loyalty in hotels. This article provides an evaluation of the linkages between service quality, perceived value, customer satisfaction and behavioral loyalty. The impact of brand trust and brand attitude is added to the model and provides new understanding on the interactions between the constructs within a service sector context. Findings indicate that service quality, mediated by customer satisfaction is the largest determinant, but that brand trust, mediated by brand attitude, is a significant moderator of behavioral loyalty.

Multicultural influences on group learning: a qualitative higher education study

Although the literature examining the usefulness of group projects is extensive, the link between cooperative learning, group performance and skills transfer in multicultural contexts remains unclear. Focus groups were conducted with a sample of 107 international and domestic postgraduate and undergraduate marketing students to investigate this link. Results confirm that group work facilitates the development of interpersonal skills, cross‐cultural collaboration and higher‐level learning. While there is the promise of transfer of learning to other situations, group learning effectiveness appears conditional on instructors preparing, coaching and debriefing students as to the expected benefits associated with participation in group projects throughout the semester. In addition, limited differences were observed between how international and domestic students responded to group activities, although this may (in part) be due to subtle differences in preconceived attitudes to group learning activities from the outset.

Internal relationships: Linking practitioner literature and relationship marketing theory

Purpose – Practitioners argue that the way they treat their employees has an impact on firm success. However, they frequently do not equate this with relationship building. On the other hand, the academic relationship marketing literature does highlight internal relationships as having an important impact on external customer relationships. However, this relationship suffers from a lack of academic empirical evidence. Neither seems to recognize the knowledge of the other leading to incongruence between marketing theory and practice. The purpose of this paper is to bring the two literature streams together demonstrating that the practitioners are talking about, and practising, relationship marketing. Design/methodology/approach – Exploration and comparison of the academic and practitioner literature bases to elaborate on the value of relationship building within organizations. Findings – Competitive advantage can be attained through development of a relationship‐building culture which includes building relationships inside the organization as well as customer relationships. In fact, successful customer relationships rely on successful internal relationships. Research implications/implications – A broad research agenda is outlined for understanding the nature of internal relationships and their impact on a firms success. Practical implications – Organizational success can be gained through building strong internal relationships and the development of a relationship‐building organizational culture. Originality/value – Links practitioner cases and reflections to the concept of relationship marketing, demonstrating further how relationship marketing activities provide a competitive advantage.

The Impact of consumption vision and emotion on the tourism consumer’s decision behavior

Planning or deciding where to vacation may rely on nonrational thought and be influenced by imaginative processes such as creating visions of oneself in future consumption experiences together with associated emotions. This study examined the influence of pictorial and textual stimuli on dimensions of consumer consumption vision. It also tested whether elaborate and quality consumption visionary responses to print advertising, mediated by emotional responses, result in heightened product interest and expedited purchase decisions. Two hundred and sixty community members participated in the study measuring consumption vision, emotions, and decision making by responding to simulated advertising material. Pictures together with concrete words influenced consumption vision elaboration, whereas instructions to imagine alone versus concrete words influenced consumption vision quality. A series of standard regression analyses tested these propositions and confirmed emotion as a mediating variable for consumption vision and vacation purchase decisions.

Factors influencing governance choice and human resource management within services franchising networks

This research provides a better understanding of the factors driving the choice of governance structures and human resource management (HRM) practices within services franchising arrangements. A qualitative multiple case study approach was favoured so as to obtain a clearer picture of the main issues and parameters. Nineteen franchisors using predominantly pure franchising, predominantly pure company-owned, plural, and predominantly multiple unit growth strategies were interviewed. Major contrasts have been identified, suggesting that system size, industry maturity and the nature of market demand impacts upon the choice of system governance structure. Generally, less mature and smaller networks rely upon predominantly single unit franchising strategies and less sophisticated HRM practices to foster local market innovation, build brand value and support rapid unit growth, while predominantly company owned strategies are favoured in environments of low competition and minimal demand uncertainty. In comparison, more mature systems use hybridised franchising forms and sophisticated HRM strategies to accommodate the competing demands of local market innovation, systemwide adaptation and system uniformity.

Measuring firm-employee relationship strength

Abstract Vargo and Lusch (2004), in their award-winning Journal of Marketing article, have called for a paradigmatic shift in marketing to a service-dominant logic. This paper discusses research findings of the Marketing Performance Centre (MPC) into service firm marketing practices and performance and reflects on how sources of advantage should be assessed in a service-dominant, relational and co-created value context.

Implementing the marketing concept in travel organizations: the important moderating influence of perceived organizational support.

The objective of the research underlying this article is to investigate the moderating effect of perceived organizational support (POS) between market orientation and the perceived ability of frontline employees to adequately serve customers. The ability to serve customers is paramount for frontline service staff in the travel industry and this is the first investigation into the impact that a market orientation has on this ability, and the first to examine the relationship between market orientation and POS. An online self-complete survey was used to collect data from 504 frontline travel consultants. Results indicate that a market orientation is important for enabling employees to better service customers and that this relationship is moderated by POS. Therefore, it is recommended that travel firms consider developing a market orientation and demonstrate a commitment to promoting employee development and well-being. Should employees not perceive that their contributions are valued, they may not feel sufficiently equipped to assist in the provision of quality service delivery outcomes to customers and may be less likely to exhibit ongoing loyalty to the firm.