Education, Educational Services and their Quality

Abstract

Rich information facilitates consumer buying judgment and decision-making, and therefore enhances marketing communication effectiveness. Drawing on the information richness theory, this study attempts to address how valence of electronic word-of-mouth (eWOM), product type and consumer knowledge will yield different levels of eWOM richness perception for experience goods versus search goods. The results based on a three-way experimental study with 156 valid responses suggest that negative eWOM has a stronger effect in producing eWOM information richness than does positive eWOM, and such effect is more pronounced for a leisure farm tour (experience goods) than for digital camera (search goods). The tendency that negative eWOM will provide richer information for the leisure farm tour is more evident for high-knowledge consumers than for low-knowledge consumers. The study's results caution against the aggravated harm of negative eWOM incurred from the dissatisfactory experience of a leisure farm tour. The managerial implications for the practitioners are provided.

Conceptual Model of Integrated Agrotourism Marketing

“…Technological developments make tourists can spread information about the consumption of products through eWOM (51). eWOM is a review posted by experience consumers on the web (52).…”

“…eWOM can attract more tourists than traditional channels because of the assumption that eWOM contains up-to-date, easily accessible, and reliable information (29). Negative eWOM has a greater influence than positive eWOM because negative information is more interesting, clear, trustworthy and can form an impression so that negative eWOM can influence consumer purchasing decisions more than positive eWOM (51,53). One specific form of eWOM is an online know-how forum that enables the exchange of information and reduces the asymmetry of information between producers and consumers (54).…”

Prospects for innovations in marketing of economic educational services in Ukraine

“…Rai, Raguraman, Veerappan (Rai et al, 2013) considered a strategy for meeting customer needs. Immaisi analyzed the marketing of educational services for export (Immaisi, 2014), Al-Dulaimi (2016) considared an attempt to solve the issue of the quality of educational services at institutions of higher education. Išoratė, Steiblienė, Mečėjienė (Išoratė et al, 2014) studied the theoretical aspect of professional competences, and also conducted a study of the professional competencies of graduates among employers to improve the quality of higher education.…”

Asymmetric Persuasive Effects of Gain- and Loss-related Messages in Electronic Word of Mouth

“…In the context of product evaluation, Skowronski and Carlston (1989) suggested that consumers put more weight to negative rather than positive information in forming their judgments. More recently, Liao et al (2015) provided evidence that negative eWOM has a stronger effect in generating information richness than positive eWOM. Other studies supporting negativity bias include Homer and Yoon (1992), Park and Lee (2009) and Richins (1983).…”