[Sit, Merrilees and Birch, 2003]. As a result, retailer concern with patronage and repatronage is now an important topic of marketing research [Machleit, Meyer and Eroglu, 2005].While considerable research has focused on patronage of retail stores, less is known about consumer intentions towards patronage of a specific shopping centre and factors that may influence repatronage. Prior research has demonstrated that store image has a significant role to play in consumers' patronage decisions [Oppewal and Timmermans, 1997]; thus it may be assumed that the image of a shopping centre may also impact on consumers' decisions of where to shop. However, while considerable work has been done on the role of store and even shopping mall image on consumer patronage [Finn and Louviere, 1996;Wakefield and Baker, 1998;Sit, Merrilees and Birch, 2003] there is, to date, very little research examining the image of the regional shopping centre, as a more holistic entity, in determining consumers' patronage decisions. This is important because understanding more about what attracts consumers to a specific shopping centre, followed by effective management of consumer evaluation, should lead to increased repatronage intentions.Consumers have many different choices of shopping locations, however. Regional shopping centres in particular play a key role in the future of the modern economy [Finn and Louviere, 4 1996;Phillips and Swaffin-Smith, 2004]. Since shopping has been identified as the primary purpose for the majority of visits to town and city centres [Warnaby and Davies, 1997] having the correct retail offer and facilities to entice visitors into a regional centre results in increased spending, greater employment opportunities and hence local economic regeneration.Furthermore, regional centres have been struggling to attract and keep local customers that may otherwise 'outshop' or patronise competing shopping areas [Kirkup and Rafiq, 1999;Whyatt, 2004;Williams, Hubbard, Clark and Berkeley, 2001].Regional shopping centres represent more than a shopping mall in this instance. For the purposes of this paper, they include shopping areas with a wide range of shopping facilities within larger geographical regions, such as town or city centres. They contain a mixture of traditional high streets, commercial shopping malls and smaller shopping precincts, and incorporate features which are either privately owned (merchandise, buildings, signs) or publicly owned (roads, car parks and amenities) [Bell, 1999]. Perhaps a major difference is that whilst specific retailers and shopping malls have a long history of co-ordinating their advertising and promotion efforts, regional shopping centres have only recently begun to market themselves in terms of image creation and maintenance [Kirkup and Rafiq, 1999;Kupke, 2004;Warnaby and Medway, 2004].The majority of research in this field has concentrated on shoppers' responses at the individual store or, at most, the shopping mall level; this study focuses on a relatively untouched area of research...
Service encounter quality is an area of growing interest to researchers and managers alike, yet little is known about the effects of face-to-face service encounter quality within a business-tobusiness setting. In this paper, a psychometrically sound measure of such service encounter quality is proposed, and consequences of this construct are empirically assessed. Both a literature review and a dyadic in-depth interview approach were used to develop a conceptual framework and a pool of items to capture service encounter quality. A mail survey of customers was undertaken, and a response rate of 36% was obtained. Data analysis was conducted via confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation modeling. Findings reveal a four-factor structure of service encounter quality, encompassing professionalism, civility, friendliness and competence dimensions. Service encounter quality was found to be directly related to customer satisfaction and service quality perceptions, and indirectly to loyalty. The importance of these findings for practitioners and for future research on service encounter quality is discussed.
International audienceOnline communities of consumption (OCCs) represent highly diverse groups of consumers whose interests are not always aligned. Social control in OCCs aims to effectively manage problems arising from this heterogeneity. Extant literature on social control in OCCs is fragmented as some studies focus on the principles of social control, while others focus on the implementation. Moreover, the domain is undertheorized. This article integrates the disparate literature on social control in OCCs providing a first unified conceptualization of the topic. The authors conceptualize social control as a system, or configuration, of moderation practices. Moderation practices are executed during interactions operating under different governance structures (market, hierarchy, and clan) and serving different purposes (interaction initiation, maintenance, and termination). From this conceptualization, important areas of future research emerge and research questions are developed. The framework also serves as a community management tool for OCC managers, enabling the diagnosis of social control problems and the elaboration of strategies and tactics to address them
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.
hi@scite.ai
10624 S. Eastern Ave., Ste. A-614
Henderson, NV 89052, USA
Copyright © 2024 scite LLC. All rights reserved.
Made with 💙 for researchers
Part of the Research Solutions Family.