How commitment to fellow customers affects the customer-firm relationship and customer citizenship behavior

Abstract

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to analyze how affective commitment to fellow customers influences a customer's affective commitment to the service provider and customer citizenship behavior (CCB). In addition, the paper seeks to examine the moderating role of a customer's calculative commitment to the service organization. Design/methodology/approach – The study used a large-scale survey among customers of a health club and a scenario-based experiment to test the hypotheses. Findings – Both empirical studies provide evidence that affective commitment to fellow customers has positive consequences for the customer-firm-relationship. The findings suggest that commitment to fellow customers and commitment to the service organization influence very specific facets of customer citizenship behavior. In addition, the study found preliminary support for the moderating role of calculative commitment. Affective commitment to fellow customers showed the strongest effect on affective commitment to the provider in customer-firm relationships characterized by high (versus low) calculative commitment. Practical implications – The results of this research have a number of managerial implications. This study suggests measures to strengthen customer-firm-relationships, e.g. generating intensive exchange among customers or attraction of consumer pairs. Providing customers with platforms of valuable relationships to multiplex ties can be a competitive advantage for service providers. Originality/value – This article is the first that highlights the role of other customers as a target of customer commitment and how this commitment affects both the customer's relationship to the service provider and his or her customer citizenship behavior. The present study therefore broadens our knowledge of how bonding among customers influences consumer behavior in service settings.

New perspectives on the role of customer satisfaction and commitment in promoting customer citizenship behaviours

“…Secondly, support is found of the relationship between customer satisfaction and customer citizenship behaviour and that between customer commitment and customer citizenship behaviour, as has been pointed out by previous scholars (Anaza & Zhao 2013:133;Chen et al 2010;Chiu et al 2015;Curth et al 2014;Groth 2005:13;Jones et al 2010:16, 17, 22;Paillé et al 2015;Patterson et al 2003;Ponnusamy & Ho 2015;Yi & Gong 2008:967). The importance of relationship quality in impacting on customer citizenship behaviour is further verified by this study.…”

“…Thirdly, while the potential impact of various forms of customer commitment on customer citizenship behaviour has been noted in the hypotheses section of this article, previous studies have concentrated largely on the direct effect between affective commitment and customer citizenship behaviour (Curth et al 2014;Liu & Mattila 2015). In the context of this study, customer commitment was measured from an overall perspective and consequently provides more insight into the matter.…”

“…Open Access commitment (Vesel & Zabkar 2010:1336 have often been examined as antecedents of customer citizenship behaviour (Chiu et al 2015;Curth, Uhrich & Benkenstein 2014;Paillé, Grima & Dufour 2015;Patterson et al 2003;Ponnusamy & Ho 2015). The predictive effect of these two factors on the citizenship behaviour of customers is explained by social exchange theory (Blau 1964).…”

Untitled

“…Thus, they are interested in the welfare of the organization and are willing to reciprocate efforts (i.e., citizenship behaviors) with respect to past benefits received (Bettencourt, 1997). Empirical evidence of previous research also supported that commitment leads to CCB (Bartikowski & Walsh, 2011;Bettencourt, 1997;Bove et al, 2009;Curth, Uhrich, & Benkenstein, 2014;Gruen, Summers, & Acito, 2000;Yi & Gong, 2008). Accordingly, we proposed the following hypotheses to examine the relationships between customer commitment and the four dimensions of CCB.…”

Consumer as member of organization – extending co-production perspective

“…Współcześnie w badaniach empirycznych coraz częściej przyjmuje się rozróż-nienie: 1) ZOK nakierowane na organizację oraz 2) ZOK nakierowane na konsumenta, sugerując odmienny charakter determinant dla każdego z nich (Bartikowski, Walsh, 2011;Curth, Uhrich, Benkenstein, 2014).…”