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Measuring e-service quality and its importance to customer satisfaction and loyalty: an empirical study in a telecom setting

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Abstract

The important influence of e-service quality (e-SQ) on customer satisfaction and loyalty has been demonstrated in many contexts, but has not been examined in telecom settings yet. The current study aimed to construct a measurement scale for e-SQ in telecom settings, as well as to investigate the relationship between e-SQ, customer satisfaction, and customer loyalty. In this study, we analyzed self-reports from 9249 respondents (74.55% were male) between the ages of 19 and 45. A scale consisting of five user experinece dimensions (functional completeness, performance, interface and interaction quality, content and information, support or service) was developed to measure e-SQ in the telecom industry. The scale was proven reliable and valid. The analysis confirmed a positive relationship between e-SQ, customer satisfaction and loyalty. In addition, e-SQ was found to be a core predictor of customer satisfaction and customer loyalty. Moreover, customer satisfaction emerged as the strongest predictor of customer loyalty.

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Acknowledgements

This study was supported financially by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC, 71640034 and 71571006) and the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (YWF-18-BJ-J-53).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Economics and Management, Beihang University, Beijing, People’s Republic of China

    Ronggang Zhou, Xiaorui Wang, Yuhan Shi & Renqian Zhang

  2. Beijing Advanced Innovation Center for Big Data and Brain Computing, Beihang University, Beijing, People’s Republic of China

    Ronggang Zhou

  3. China Mobile Research Institute, Beijing, People’s Republic of China

    Leyuan Zhang & Haiyan Guo

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Correspondence to Ronggang Zhou.

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Zhou, R., Wang, X., Shi, Y. et al. Measuring e-service quality and its importance to customer satisfaction and loyalty: an empirical study in a telecom setting. Electron Commer Res 19, 477–499 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10660-018-9301-3

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