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Purpose: This study aims to examine the role of the servicescape in the customer experience management (CEM) of a themed amusement park following the COVID-19 pandemic. Considering the managers' and customers' perspectives, this study specifically addresses the following three research questions: first, What changes have occurred in the servicescape following the adoption of safety measures in the park in response to the COVID-19 pandemic? Second, What are the effects of these safety measures in relation to CEM? Third, What are the changes that could be maintained in the future to continue improving the customer experiential journey in the park? Design/methodology/approach: A single case study method was adopted. Gardaland Park was selected as the case for this study. Data were collected from several sources: in-depth interviews with managers of Gardaland Park, focus group interviews with customers, and the corporate website and documentary. Reflexive thematic analysis was used to examine the data. Findings: The findings reveal that safety measures affect the physical, social and digital (e- and smart) servicescape by influencing the aesthetic (reassurance), entertainment (relaxation), escapist (enjoyment and distraction) and educational (learning) experiences. Among the various changes implemented, the digital servicescape can be improved in the future when the pandemic is over by providing flexible solutions in relation to services at the park (e.g. virtual queuing) or on the website (e.g. dynamic booking). Practical implications: The findings provide park managers with practical advice about servicescape organization to facilitate offering safe and memorable customer experiences. Originality/value: To the best of the authors' knowledge, this is the first study to address the effects of safety measures on the servicescape and CEM in themed amusement parks after the COVID-19 pandemic. © 2023, Emerald Publishing Limited.
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Since COVID-19, people appreciate fully immersing themselves in nature. Bringing elements of nature into service spaces has been an important concern for marketers. Yet, there have been only a few studies addressing the impact of natural and biophilic aspects within servicescapes. This study investigated the effect of biophilic design on experiential values such as esthetics, escapism, economic value, and attitude toward hotels and the role of the hotel segment and its environmental beliefs regarding green behavior on the relationships. The results indicated that in a luxury hotel setting, the biophilic design engendered better esthetic perceptions, escapism, economic value, and attitude toward the hotel. At a midscale hotel, a non-biophilic design induced higher experiential values. In addition, customers' environmental beliefs had significant effects on experiential values. Results provided practical suggestions for hotel managers, marketers, and interior designers on how biophilic servicescapes can enhance a hotel's marketing effectiveness.
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This study investigates how physical and psychological distance from one's surroundings may influence one's perception of connectedness with the servicescape and, ultimately, perception of value. It also examines the effect of consumers' techno-psychological differences and interaction modes on this distance–closeness relationship. The researchers develop and test a conceptual framework of how personal cognitive traits and technological intervention may alter consumers' perceived connectedness to the servicescape and influence their perceived value in different service settings. Via a quasi-experiment design in three service scenarios, this research shows a synthetical effect of contactless technology in the distancing setting that may work more effectively on high self-efficiency customers to change their perceived closeness to the servicescape and further change their evaluation of the service. The findings reveal the practical implications of social distancing for different types of consumers in service encounters during or after the COVID-19 pandemic. © The Author(s) 2023.
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Purpose: Though many conceptual and empirical studies have been conducted on the servicescape, limited research has focused on how the COVID-19 pandemic has reshaped factors influencing the servicescape. This paper aims to propose an extension of Bitner's original conceptualization, including pandemic-induced physical and social constraints on servicescape in the form of crowding, consumer risk perception during the crisis and their impact on consumers' and employees' behavioral changes in retail and hospitality sectors. Design/methodology/approach: This paper critically reviewed the past and emerging servicescape and risk literature. It then examines and delineates the concepts of crowding, density and associated risk perceptions to offer an extended servicescape framework. Alongside, scales were proposed to measure the constructs and guidelines given to conduct future empirical studies. Findings: This paper discussed the major impact on servicescape during a pandemic situation, to what extent risk is perceived during consumption and the impact of crowding and store density on employee and customer behavioral responses. Research limitations/implications: This paper principally contributes by explicitly including specific risk dimensions and crowding and proposes the scales to measure consumers' understanding of pandemic-induced perceptions of risk, crowding and density within servicescapes for further empirical testing. Alongside this, the identification and concretization of different types of perceived risks under COVID-19 provide critical and useful marketing implications. Originality/value: This study identifies relevant risk dimensions, proposes crowding as an independent construct apart from servicescape physicality and proposes relevant measures for empirical verification. © 2023, Emerald Publishing Limited.
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Purpose: The COVID-19 pandemic has tremendously affected the hospitality industry. With the experiences of severe acute respiratory syndrome in 2003 and commitments to ensure guests' health and safety, many hotels in Asia have actively engaged in updating and implementing new service standards and measures. This study aims to investigate hotels' service standard changes, processes of management decisions and preparations for the future. Design/methodology/approach: Using grounded theory methodology, this research interviews 24 hotel managers from mainland China and Hong Kong. It examines the differences among hotels with different operation types, classifications and locations, and analyzes the service standards in physical and social services cape. Findings: Building on the service marketing and crisis management literature, this research provides a synthesis that reflects how hotels have coped with the COVID-19 crisis. It depicts the service standard update process during the COVID-19. Research limitations/implications: In line with the literature in disaster management, hotels experienced the outbreak, response and recovery phases of the crisis management procedure. However, given the severity and scope of the COVID-19 pandemic, undertaking particular processes is necessary at every procedure such as following local guidelines and updating local standard operating procedures (LSOPs). This research also expands the literature on the process of adopting new technology in hotels during crisis management. Practical implications: The paper suggests that hotel managers should update and use well-thought-out standards on the bases of available scientific evidence. For example, hotels should use LSOPs according to the local situations. Hotels are also suggested to exert additional efforts and attention in service innovation, guest experience and enhancing hospitableness. Originality/value: To the best of the authors' knowledge, this paper is one of the first efforts to investigate the impact of COVID-19 on hotel operations. It offers empirical evidence from hotel operators who worked against the crisis during the pandemic and provides valuable theoretical contribution to the hospitality service literature as well as managerial implications for hotel operators globally. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved)
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Global food service industry has tremendously been challenged due to evolving conditions of COVID 19 pandemic. Under new normal condition, servicescape gets greater sentience from potential customers in search of risk-free dining. This study aims at exploring the evolving servicescape of Sri Lankan restaurant industry. A series of in-depth interviews with restaurant operators were conducted and thematic analysis was used to analyse qualitative data. A wide gap between challenges and measures taken was evident. Regaining the faded customer trust and continuing operations under restrictions were threatening. The study recommends exclusive and realistic approaches to advance the evolving servicescape of restaurants. Copyright © 2022 Inderscience Enterprises Ltd.
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PurposeThis study aims to use mixed methods to create a new conceptual framework to understand the unique characteristics of virtual tourism experiences (VTE), which has not been systemically examined.Design/methodology/approachStudy 1 uses topic modeling with Latent Dirichlet Allocation to analyze 91,609 online reviews from the Airbnb Experience platform. Study 2 uses content analysis of open-ended qualitative responses from VTE customers. The two studies together are used to build a new conceptual model.FindingsBuilding upon the Stimulus–Organism–Response (S-O-R) model and the experience economy, results present a new conceptual model and identify VTE as unique in terms of Stimulus (education, entertainment, esthetics, escapism and connection), Organism (experiencing synchronicity, telepresence, participation and customization, emotion) and Response (evaluation and behavioral responses). Given the uniqueness of VTE, the new construct of the virtual servicescape is incorporated, recognizing the host, the focal customer and other customers, and the technology as the four main components.Practical implicationsThe proposed framework can be used to guide the design, development, and evaluation of VTE, including identifying the key considerations, engagement within the ecosystem and providing guidance to hosts and operators.Originality/valueTo the best of the authors' knowledge, this is the first study that systematically explores VTE and proposes the theoretical framework to comprehensively understand this new form of experience in sharing economy by combining the unique aspects of the stimulus, organism, response and virtual servicescape.
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Purpose: As physical evidence, servicescapes play a crucial role in tangibilizing service value. Since value creation and consumption are inseparable in many services, servicescapes also contribute significantly to consumer experiences. By reviewing the role of design factors on the physical and psychological safety of customers, particularly in different service contexts based on social factors, this paper aims to provide insights into how servicescape frameworks may be re-examined from a safety perspective. Design/methodology/approach: Based on a critical review of studies in multidisciplinary domains, including environmental psychology, community medicine, architecture and engineering, this paper proposes a conceptual model anchored in stimulus–organization–response (S-O-R) theory and presents related propositions for safer servicescape designs. Findings: The study reveals the need for re-evaluating current servicescape design frameworks by incorporating the concept of servicescape safety, discusses the significance of various interior factors and presents the moderating effects of social factors and service types on perceived safety. Originality/value: With no robust models currently available to evaluate the impact of servicescape designs on users' physical and psychological safety, this paper provides guidelines based on a multidisciplinary review of studies. A healthy and safe servicescape requires interdisciplinary investigations, the results of which will reshape future design approaches. © 2023, Emerald Publishing Limited.
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Along with changes in customer behavior that shifts from conventional shopping habits to online, the service industry is competing to provide online-based services, including online food delivery service providers in Indonesia. This study aims to determine the effect of e-servicescape on positive word-of-mouth through customer satisfaction. This study used quantitative, survey, and cross-sectional methods. The sample size consisted of 222 respondents collected using questionnaires (g-form) by purposive sampling. In this study, PLS-SEM used to examine validity, reliability, and hypotheses. The results indicated that e-servicescape had a positive and significant effect on word-of-mouth pass through customer satisfaction. Based on the results, further analysis conducted to determine its implication and the mediation type. © 2022 ACM.
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The pandemic has reshaped customer perceptions of the new normal with both the physical and social service environments. Surprisingly, however, how reshaped servicescape design affects customers, especially their value co-creation behaviors, has not been studied. Drawing on value co-creation and signaling theory, this research aims to examine the comprehensive effects of the physical servicescape (signages, partitions, and spatial density) and the social servicescape (other customer misbehavior) on customer citizenship behavior and revisit intention via the mediating roles of perceived competence, perceived ethicality, and other customer trust. This study conducts two between-subjects experimental design studies with both written and pictorial manipulations in restaurant and retail store contexts to increase generalizability for services marketing. Signages and other customer misbehavior promote customer citizenship behavior through perceived competence and ethicality while partition shows the mixed results on customer perceptions. This paper contributes to servicescape and customer citizenship literature by identifying how the servicescape affects customer citizenship behavior via customers' perception. The findings of this current study also offer practical guidance as to how firms can be more strategic in design choices.
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As COVID-19 spread throughout the world, the hospitality and tourism sectors were hard hit as no other industry. For this reason, the UNWTO developed the One Planet Vision as a response to a sustainable recovery of the tourism sector. At present, when people are starting to travel and stay at hotels again, it is important to analyze what their expectations are of hotels to move forward in the post-pandemic era. For instance, empirical research has been developed to examine people's sentiments toward servicescapes, and a comparative study is presented between 2020 and 2022. Findings contribute to the research by identifying new servicescape attributes during a health crisis. These also lead to practical implications by proposing a scale to evaluate customers' perceptions and to increase their wellbeing and resilience. The current research is one of the first studies to collaborate with the One Planet Vision by empirically proposing improvements in the servicescapes of hotels for a responsible recovery.
Subject(s)
Brachytherapy , COVID-19 , Humans , COVID-19/epidemiology , Pandemics/prevention & control , Empirical Research , IndustryABSTRACT
Since COVID-19, people appreciate fully immersing themselves in nature. Bringing elements of nature into service spaces has been an important concern for marketers. Yet, there have been only a few studies addressing the impact of natural and biophilic aspects within servicescapes. This study investigated the effect of biophilic design on experiential values such as esthetics, escapism, economic value, and attitude toward hotels and the role of the hotel segment and its environmental beliefs regarding green behavior on the relationships. The results indicated that in a luxury hotel setting, the biophilic design engendered better esthetic perceptions, escapism, economic value, and attitude toward the hotel. At a midscale hotel, a non-biophilic design induced higher experiential values. In addition, customers' environmental beliefs had significant effects on experiential values. Results provided practical suggestions for hotel managers, marketers, and interior designers on how biophilic servicescapes can enhance a hotel's marketing effectiveness.
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Purpose This study aims to construct a scale for measuring the spa hotel experiencescape in wellness tourism, clarify the mechanism through which wellness tourism experiencescape influences revisit intention and investigate the mediation roles of authenticity, memorability and organizational identification. Design/methodology/approach This study conducted content analysis of interviews, online reviews and relevant articles and used the concept of experiencescape to interpret spa hotels' experiential environment. The stimulus-organism-response (SOR) model was used as the basis for introducing authenticity, memorability, organizational identification and revisit intention to investigate how wellness tourism experiencescape affects tourists' behavior. In total, 488 valid questionnaires were collected at Taiwanese spa hotel clusters. Findings Four factors of spa hotel experiencescape were identified: health promotion treats, mental learning, unique travel experience and healthy diet. Existential authenticity-memorability and existential authenticity-organizational identification exerted full positive mediation effects in the relationship between wellness tourism experiencescape and revisit intention. Practical implications This study provides guidance on experience design for spa hotels. It promotes the consideration of existential authenticity in wellness tourism design. Originality/value The COVID-19 pandemic has raised awareness of wellness, drastically increasing the potential of the wellness tourism market. This study investigated the construction of wellness tourism experiencescape and its influence, and the findings can facilitate post-pandemic restoration of the wellness tourism industry. On the basis of SOR model, a chain mediation model was proposed to reveal the influence of wellness tourism experiencescape on revisit intention. Existential authenticity was discovered to play a crucial role in the relationship between wellness tourism experiencescape and revisit intention, which suggests that existential authenticity should be considered during service design and in marketing strategies for wellness tourism.
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In recent years, the development of China’s e-commerce live broadcasting industry has been developing rapidly. With the outbreak of COVID-19, Internet users have opened the shopping mode of live broadcast by e-commerce. As a more accurate and rapid way of content dissemination, e-commerce live broadcasting has built a new mode of communication between brands and consumers, narrowed the distance between consumers and goods during online shopping, and greatly improved the sales conversion rate. At this time, the research on the generation mechanism of consumer behavioral intention in e-commerce live broadcasting platform is very key. This paper introduces three dimensions: aesthetic appeal, functional layout and financial security, and constructs a research model of online service scenario on consumer behavioral intention in the context of e-commerce live broadcast. The empirical results show that the three dimensions of aesthetic appeal, functional layout and financial security have a positive impact on consumers’ behavior intention, and have a significant positive impact on consumers’ trust. Consumer trust has a significant positive impact on consumers’ behavior intention. This study takes the multi-dimensional e-commerce live broadcast e-servicescape as the starting point, provides more reliable basis for the study of consumer behavior will, and expands the application scope of e-servicescape. The research results have certain enlightenment to help the e-commerce live broadcasting platform accurately grasp the needs of users in the process of use and realize the conversion from platform use to purchase. © 2022, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.
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Purpose>This study aims to investigate the perception of smart tourism technologies (STTs) in creating museum tourism experiences and assess visitors’ intentions to test the impact, the extent and role that STTs play in museum service.Design/methodology/approach>The investigation was conducted through an online and on-site survey;data were collected in four different museums with 365 museum tourists in four countries. SmartPLS (version 3.3.3) was used to access the measurement and structural model based on path modelling and bootstrapping.Findings>STTs have a positive impact on creating a memorable tourism experience for museum visitors and are beneficial to revisit intention and positive recommendations. The impact is stronger than traditional services such as museum setting and staff service. STTs can be considered an independent new service to museums rather than complementing existing services. STTs negatively affect tourism’s experience at the communication stage.Originality/value>Previous studies have noted the growing attention to the museum visitor experience, but the combined impact of new elements, such as STTs, remains an unexplored area. This study addressed the research gap through an empirical investigation and offers guidelines to test museum visitors’ acceptance and fitness for the services provided by STTs. In addition, this study presents a new point of view on the roles that STTs take in museum service, which can be useful for further investigations.
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Purpose: The recent COVID-19 emergency has brought to light issues connected to physical work environment, particularly to offices and to its impact on service employees’ internal responses, behaviors and outcomes. As the topic is characterized by fragmented theoretical approaches as well as a lack in consolidated empirical research, this study aims at providing a clear understanding of the main – as well as the most recent – issues debated in academic literature today. Design/methodology/approach: The study is a systematic literature review. Specifically, 124 papers, retrieved by Scopus, Web of Science and EBSCOhost research databases, are here systematically analyzed. Findings: The main findings are connected to the prevalence of studies investigating employees’ satisfaction and productivity as main outcomes, the increasing attention by academics to new workplace designs, characterized by peculiar attributes such as flexibility and nonterritoriality, and finally, the lower interest in nonoffice working environments. Originality/value: The review sheds light on the current knowledge of the relation between physical work environment and service employees to identify the main issues debated in academic literature and make suggestions for further research. First, the need to explore aspects of the physical work environment and employees’ outcomes that have not been adequately studied. Second, the relevance to investigate the above relation in public sector. Moreover, the importance of careful planning of the physical and virtual work environment in the context of the COVID-19 emergency. © 2022, Emerald Publishing Limited.
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Purpose The pandemic has accelerated the use of virtual learning spaces and led to rethinking post-pandemic course delivery. However, it remains unclear whether students' online engagement in e-servicescapes can influence attachment to a place, i.e. a physical servicescape. This study conducted an exploratory study to inform place attachment and actor engagement literature in an online service context. Design/methodology/approach Quantitative survey design was used and 98 usable responses were collected from undergraduate and postgraduate students at a major New Zealand university during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. The questionnaire consisted of 23 items relating to three dimensions of online student engagement and 19 items referring to six dimensions of campus attachment. Findings Results of the exploratory study indicate that classmate community in online lectures, referring to student-student interactions, can positively influence five of the dimensions of campus attachment, including place identity, place dependence, affective attachment, social bonding and place memory, even though students are physically not on campus. However, it cannot influence place expectation. Moreover, instructor community (student-instructor interaction) and learning engagement (student-content interaction) in online lectures have insignificant impact on campus attachment. Research limitations/implications This study emphasises the social dimension when interacting in e-servicescapes. Person-based interactions are more influential than content-based interactions for student engagement. Educational service providers should integrate the e-servicescape and the physical servicescape by encouraging more student-student interactions to contribute to service ecosystem well-being at the micro, meso and macro levels. Originality/value This study indicates that customer-to-customer interaction serves to integrate customer engagement across the digital and physical realms for process-based services like education.
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Purpose: The COVID-19 pandemic has caused many consumers to pause and rethink the impacts of their consumption behavior. The purpose of this paper is to explore changes to consumers’ preferences and shopping behavior in retail using a sustainable consumption lens to understand the long-term effects of the pandemic on retail services. Design/methodology/approach: Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 30 participants to gain insights into shopping behaviors and preferences during the pandemic and to investigate changes in attitudes or behaviors toward sustainable consumption as a result of the pandemic. Data analysis involved an iterative inductive process and subsequent thematic analysis. Findings: The results reveal a strong move toward sustainable and conscious consumption with three key changes occurring as a result of the pandemic, including changes in consumers’ ethos, move to purpose-driven shopping and drive to buy local and support national. Practical implications: This paper reveals insights into consumer shopping behaviors and preferences that can potentially counter the collapse of “normal” marketplace activities in the face of the current global pandemic by providing a framework for how retail services can respond, reimagine and recover to move forward long term. Originality/value: This study uncovers the importance of services marketing in endorsing and promoting sustainable consumption by shaping subtle shifts in conscious consumption as a way to recover from a global pandemic and move to a “new” service marketplace. © 2022, Emerald Publishing Limited.
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Background Visitors’ experiences of modern exhibitions are various using five senses through physical servicescape and social servicescape of exhibitions, and they tend to write a lot of reviews. However, even though marketing is considered important in the field of exhibition, there are few attempts to analyze reviews from visitors as big data. This study tried to analyze the visitor’s reviews and identify which servicescape factors influence the visitor’s experience. Methods This study tried to identify which factors affect visitors’ exhibition experiences through review analysis by collecting 335 exhibitions data and 27,234 reviews crawled of the exhibitions ranked on the annual exhibition ranking pages provided by Interpark. Three methods of analyzing the reviews which used in this study were WordCloud, Topic modeling based on latent Dirichlet allocation (LDA), and the similarity measurement between words using the Word2vec model. Results As a result, fourteen influential factors were found: docent, audio guide, exhibition medium, visual beauty, visitors’ taste, the density of space, etc. Eleven of these factors were related to information delivery, exhibits, and exhibition environment among factors of servicescape provided by exhibitions. Conclusions This study analyzed visitors’ reviews to identify visitors’ experiences and presented a methodology to research exhibitions even in difficult situations like the COVID-19 pandemic. In addition, this study revealed important factors to be considered when planning and designing exhibitions in terms of the importance of exhibition operations, a waiting system for admission, and MD products, etc. Words extracted from this study can be useful resources to design an exhibition. Copyright: This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/bync/3.0/), which permits unrestricted educational and noncommercial use, provided the original work is properly cited.
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As restaurants are resuming normal operations, COVID-19 mitigation strategies are still in place. An effective COVID-19 mitigation protocol may facilitate a more successful rebound since consumers may perceive a lowered risk to purchase food from the restaurant with protocols in place. However, little is known regarding how consumers evaluate restaurants' present efforts to contain the transmission of COVID-19. By using a rigorous scale development procedure, this study creates a scale to measure restaurant consumers' perceptions of COVID-19 mitigation strategies (acronym: PHASE): Protective equipment/technology (P); Health and hygiene (H); Access of purchase/serving (A); Safety measure for customers (S); and Employee safety measure (E). The study further identifies the areas that need to be improved by using importance-performance analysis. Findings of this study provide guidelines for restaurant professionals to potentially reallocate their existing resources to refine their COVID-19 mitigation strategies and to better prepare for the future.