Journal of Services Marketing

A framework for encouraging retail customer feedback

Kevin Celuch Nadine M. Robinson Anna M. Walsh
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 A framework for encouraging retail customer
feedback
Kevin Celuch
Department of Economics and Marketing, University of Southern Indiana, Evansville, Indiana, USA
Nadine M. Robinson
Department of Business and Economics, Algoma University, Sault Ste. Marie, Canada, and
Anna M. Walsh
Department of Marketing, Grand Valley State University, Allendale, Michigan, USA

Abstract
Purpose – The purpose of this study is to examine antecedents of the under researched area of customer feedback in a retail context with feedback
defined as positive and negative comments as well as suggestions for product/service improvements. A market-oriented firm listens to customers
and puts their feedback into practice. Research on customer engagement, which includes customer feedback, has recently surged. The preponderance
of feedback research to date has been focused on customer complaint behavior which is negatively valenced. Much less attention has been paid
to customer feedback (including sharing positive information, thoughts and suggestions for new ideas, in addition to negative information) even
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though it has great value for companies. This research addresses this gap by integrating literature on customer orientation and engagement and
relationship marketing antecedents (social benefits) and outcomes (commitment) to better understand what retailers can do to encourage customer
feedback through relationships with frontline employees.
Design/methodology/approach – This study employs a cross-sectional, single retailer approach surveying 864 customers who have varying
relationships to a coffee house.
Findings – Conditional process analysis was used to test the hypothesized mediating and moderating relationships. Results were consistent with
predictions, showing that retail employee customer-oriented behavior is mediated by customer social benefit perceptions to influence feedback.
Further, social benefit perceptions will interact with the level of customer continuance commitment to impact feedback. Specifically, the impact of
social benefits will be stronger when commitment to the retailer is higher.
Originality/value – This research has academic and practical implications by increasing our understanding of an underrepresented and valuable
aspect of engagement – customer feedback. Specifically, it addresses a key marketing research priority set forth in a 2010 JSR special issue, calling
for more work contributing to this topic. Also, this research implies managers have the ability to influence the amount of feedback that they receive
by encouraging certain employee behaviors.
Keywords Customer engagement, Commitment, Customer feedback, Retailer-customer relationships, Social benefits
Paper type Research paper

Introduction: why feedback? (Verhoef et al., 2010). Related literature on engagement often
includes customer-to-customer behavior such as word-of-
On the customer side, genuine engagement extends the boundary of the
organization’s culture to include the customer as a member who shares in mouth (WOM) and advocacy. In contrast to customer-
both the commercial and psychological life of the organization. to-customer communication, the engagement literature
Understanding how to create engaged customers is needed for theory and devotes much less attention to customer-to-business
research. (Ostrom et al., 2010, p. 10).
communication such as customer feedback (Verhoef et al.,
Verhoef et al. (2010) cite that the Marketing Science Institute 2010 left feedback out of their conceptual model).
considers customer engagement as one of the top priorities for Researchers have argued that advocacy is one of the most
research today, and it was the topic of a Journal of Service important outcomes of building customer engagement (Walz
Research special issue 2010, but customer engagement is still and Celuch, 2010; Christopher et al., 1991). Advocacy
in its infancy as a research stream, with most of the work involves the promotion or defense of a company, product or
largely conceptual. Customer engagement is conceived as all brand by a customer to another customer (Bendapudi and
non-transactional customer behaviors that can affect a firm Berry, 1997). Advocacy helps extend a firm’s promotional
budget and is therefore an important non-transactional
customer behavior to understand. However, a case can be
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on made that customer feedback (both positive and negative) is
Emerald Insight at: www.emeraldinsight.com/0887-6045.htm no less important, and may be more important given that
advocacy mainly affects the promotional budget, whereas

Journal of Services Marketing

29/4 (2015) 280 –292 Received 18 February 2014
© Emerald Group Publishing Limited [ISSN 0887-6045] Revised 22 September 2014
[DOI 10.1108/JSM-02-2014-0062] Accepted 21 October 2014

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 A framework for encouraging retail customer feedback Journal of Services Marketing
Kevin Celuch, Nadine M. Robinson and Anna M. Walsh Volume 29 · Number 4 · 2015 · 280 –292

feedback can provide insight into what a company is doing consumer cynicism is reducing the amount of formal criticism
right and wrong in terms of any of the marketing mix including but possibly increasing the informal Goodman (2006).
people and processes (Robinson, 2011). In the hierarchy of While the body of complaint research has made an
valued customer behavior, while satisfied and repeat undeniable contribution to our understanding of consumer
customers are “good” and customers who promote and behavior, we note that many dissatisfied customers do not
defend your brand may be “better”; customers who provide complain – less than 10 per cent in the service sector (Tschol,
feedback to improve or create future value for the organization 1994) – and that complaining only addresses negatively
which bolsters its competitive advantage may be the “best” valenced feedback. Indeed, Crie (2003) notes that, overall,
(Robinson, 2011). Empirical work in the area of customer work in the area does not provide retailers and manufacturers
engagement has not explained a large amount of variance in with enough of an appreciation for the complexity of feedback
the feedback construct particularly when compared to leading to an effective way to respond.
advocacy behavior research (Walz and Celuch, 2010; Celuch While recent conceptions of customer engagement have
et al., 2011). Clearly, the notion of customer participation in recognized the importance of customer feedback (negative,
value creation as part of a dynamic service-adjustment process positive and neutral information) as a broader concept than
is integral to the service-dominant logic perspective (Tronvoll, complaint behavior, customer feedback has long been
2012), hence, the necessity for further research on the highlighted for its pivotal role in firms’ market orientation
antecedents of feedback defined as positive and negative efforts. A market orientation implies that an organization is
comments, as well as suggestions for product/service aware of itself and its environment, takes in information,
improvements. disseminates it and acts on it (Jaworski and Kohli, 1993). A
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Historically, the majority of feedback research has focused market-oriented organization can only be called such when it
on customer complaining behavior. In this research, is customer-oriented – aware of and obtaining information
complaints are viewed as a possible outcome of dissatisfaction. from its customers, disseminating their information internally
Two categories of complaint behaviors were forwarded by and using it to better satisfy their needs and build deeper
Hirschman (1970) include exiting and voice. Singh’s (1990) relationships with them. Feedback allows an organization to
typology of complaint behavior focuses on three voice options: do the following:
voicing publically, privately or to a third party. Only one of the ● examine if/how it is satisfying its customers (Soderlund,
categories, voicing publically points to customer feedback. 1998; Voss et al., 2004);
However, while this category includes voicing to the ● gauge customer perceptions (Sampson, 1998);
organization, the nature of the unsolicited or solicited ● learn what the customers want and need (Voss et al.,
feedback would only be negatively valenced. 2004); and
Over the past 50 years, a number of variables have been ● discover what they know (Kumar and Bhagwat, 2010).
examined to explain customer complaining behavior. The four As such, feedback makes up part of the customer orientation
main purposes for complaining cited in consumer complaint that is critical to market-oriented firms and has the potential to
literature are: to obtain restitution, to vent anger, to help extend or create future value for the receiving organization and
improve the service or for altruistic reasons (Lovelock et al., its customers.
2008). Gender has been linked to voice in several studies, with The very embodiment of a market orientation is when
women using voice more (Heung and Lam, 2003; Keng et al., employees consistently exhibit customer-oriented behaviors
1995; Kolodinsky, 1995; Volkov et al., 2005). Fox (2008), (Brady and Cronin, 2001). This is particularly critical in
however, found no gender effect on private or public service environments characterized by intangibility and
complaining behavior, but that “age, attitude toward inseparability where employee behavior is one of the most
complaining, and perceived consumer effectiveness are all conspicuously experienced facets of the service (Mahajan
positively related to public complaining behaviors, but not et al., 1994; Webster, 1988). The service literature is strong
private complaining behaviors”. Hernandez and Fugate with its pronouncement that frontline employees largely
(2004) found that Mexican men generally reported determine customer perceptions of their service experience
complaining to stores more than women. Ngai et al. (2007) (Brady and Cronin, 2001; Babin and Boles, 1998). Further,
never point to a gender impact on complaint behavior, only Tax et al. (1998) implicate frontline employees as a critical
discussing the impact of age and education. component in complaint handling strategies aimed at
With respect to personality or cultural traits, Richins (1983) managing customer relationships in service industries as
found a positive relationship between extraversion and frontline employees received 65 per cent of all types of
complaint propensity. Market mavens (Feick and Price, 1987) complaints in their study.
have been found to complain more (Slama et al., 1993) and Given the importance of bilateral communication in
seeking redress propensity was found to be strongly related to effective relationships (Dwyer et al., 1987; Anderson and
the likelihood of complaining (Chebat et al., 2005). Liu and Narus, 1990; Mohr and Spekman, 1994), customer feedback
McClure (2001) found that customers in a collectivist culture plays a vital role for market-oriented firms in creating engaged
are less likely to engage in voice complaints but are more likely customers. Therefore, it follows that there is an important
to engage in private complaints than those in an individualistic opportunity to contribute to the engagement literature by
culture. addressing the gap in understanding the antecedents of
Inconvenience and doubtful payoff are considered two of customer-to-business feedback. The objective of this paper is
the major barriers to complaining (Lovelock et al., 2008). to understand how frontline employee behaviors work through
There is a stream of research that suggests that growing relational concepts to impact customer feedback. Specifically,

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 A framework for encouraging retail customer feedback Journal of Services Marketing
Kevin Celuch, Nadine M. Robinson and Anna M. Walsh Volume 29 · Number 4 · 2015 · 280 –292

we examine in a more nuanced way, mediated and moderated specifically conceive customer orientation as a behavioral
relationships among perceived employee behavior, social aspect associated with the quality of complaint handling. They
benefits and continuance commitment in explaining customer found employee behaviors related to showing concern and
feedback. Finally, we examine relationships among these respect for customers were positively related to interactional
constructs in a competitive and ubiquitous retail context. justice perceptions during complaint handling.
When customers perceive that employees are
Perceived employee customer orientation and social customer-oriented, that is, employees respect and value them
benefits and are concerned with their needs, this may lead to a
Looking specifically at a retail service context and based on a particular class of relational benefits akin to interpersonal
review of the literature in understanding the antecedents of bonds. In the relationship marketing stream of research,
feedback, the authors began by honing in on employee benefits accruing to the customer from this connection are
behavior, relational benefits and how they relate to customer discussed as social benefits (Jones et al., 2000; Gwinner et al.,
feedback. These constructs appear to have the potential to 1998; De Wulf et al., 2001). The social benefits construct
contribute to understanding when and how perceived assesses the customers’ perception of the level of social
employee customer-oriented behavior will result in customer bonding that occurs with employees (e.g. “enjoy talking” and
feedback. We define customer feedback as complaints, “employees are like friends”) above and beyond the core
compliments or thoughts about the organization’s goods or service performance. In addition to Gwinner et al.’s (1998)
services publicly voiced to an organization or its employees. benefit classification, Beatty et al. (1996) and Reynolds and
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We are interested in both positively and negatively valenced Beatty (1999) categorized customer benefits from the
feedback, as both can be extremely valuable to an customer–salesperson relationship into functional and social
organization, as well as both solicited and unsolicited benefits. In Reynolds and Beatty’s (1999) retail clothing
feedback. study, social benefits included enjoying the salesperson’s
The increasing importance of services to Western company, having a close relationship with the salesperson,
economies is undeniable, and the evaluation of that service is enjoying time with the salesperson and being friends with the
inextricably tied to the frontline employees that customers face salesperson. Price and Arnould’s (1999) work also highlights
in service encounters (Gronroos, 1990). Indeed, the behaviors friendship with service employees.
of employees can impact customers’ assessment of the quality Social relationship marketing programs show an
of such a service (Bitner et al., 1990), and humanic (employee approximate return of 180 per cent (Palmatier et al., 2006b)
behavior) cues are more important in the evaluation of service often due to social interaction relationships formed with
quality than are mechanic (non-human) cues (Wall and Berry, individuals compared to individual-to-firm relationships. In
2007). Brady and Cronin (2001) note that frontline addition, such programs have greater potential to lead to not
employees largely determine customers service perceptions. only financial outcomes but also positive relational behaviors
Hartline and Ferrell (1996) also suggest that the employee– (Palmatier et al., 2006a). Further, commercial friendships are
customer relationship is the most important determinant of strongly correlated with a customer’s intention to recommend
service quality. Beyond impacting service quality, perceptions (Price and Arnould, 1999) and relational bonds are
of service employees’ level of customer orientation was found consistently linked to customer advocacy (Griffen, 1995;
to be a key driver for customer satisfaction, customer
Bendapudi and Berry, 1997). Along similar lines, considering
commitment to the firm and customer retention, and as such,
that employee– customer rapport (consisting of enjoyable
is a main determinant of a firm’s success (Hennig-Thurau,
interaction and personal connection) explained 20 to 30 per
2004).
cent of the variability in WOM communication (Gremler and
Beyond their importance to customer service perceptions,
Gwinner, 2000), social benefits may be an important
frontline employees appear to be a “go-to” source for service
antecedent to customer feedback.
complaints, regardless of whether the complaints are
More specifically, some support exists for the notion that
specifically related to the behavior of these employees or other
aspects of the service. This is why many organizations have social benefits may act as a mediator of the impact of employee
explicit organizational policy for frontline employee complaint customer orientation on customer feedback. For example,
handling (Tax et al., 1998). Yet, as noted by Brady and relational benefits were found to play a mediating role between
Cronin (2001), there is a critical need to examine service technology perceptions and Internet retail customer
customer orientation, as perceived by customers. It is for these satisfaction and loyalty (Yen and Gwinner, 2003). Further,
reasons that we focus on employee customer-oriented Park and Kim (2006) also posit and find support for
behavior as a primary antecedent in our model of customer technology perceptions working through a relational benefit
feedback. construct to impact online shopping site commitment. Finally,
In his 2004 model, Hennig-Thurau (2004) conceptualizes perceived employee performance (including an empathy
the customer orientation of service employees as including dimension) was found to partially mediate the effect of
four dimensions: employee’s social skills, technical skills, organizational climate on customer loyalty (Salanova et al.,
motivation and decision-making authority. Employees’ social 2005).
skills and their motivation to fulfill customer needs were those Given the potential of employee customer-oriented
that had the strongest influence on satisfaction and behavior to produce social benefits derived from the
commitment, reinforcing the importance of the employee– customer– employee connection, it makes logical sense to
customer “connection”. Homburg and Furst (2005) more connect these two constructs to develop a better

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 A framework for encouraging retail customer feedback Journal of Services Marketing
Kevin Celuch, Nadine M. Robinson and Anna M. Walsh Volume 29 · Number 4 · 2015 · 280 –292

understanding of the antecedents of customer feedback. Based its role as a moderator. Some scholars have posited switching
on the preceding discussion, we posit that: costs (calculative commitment) to moderate the influence of
satisfaction and value on customer loyalty (Fornell, 1992;
H1. Perceived employee customer-oriented behavior will Woodruff, 1997; Oliver, 1999). Mattila (2004) posited that
work through (be mediated by) customer social benefit affective commitment will moderate consumer responses to
perceptions to influence customer feedback (please service failure and recovery outcomes. High affective
refer to Figure 1). commitment was found to amplify the negative impact of
service failure on recovery attitudes.
The moderating role of continuance commitment Although a disproportionate share of attention has focused
Commitment is conceived as an enduring desire to maintain a on affective commitment, less attention has been turned to
relationship (Moorman et al., 1992) and as such is more continuance commitment. Yet, as noted by Gustafsson et al.
“forward looking” than satisfaction (Gustafsson et al., 2005). (2005), this type of commitment captures the competitiveness
As such, commitment is a key motivational construct for of the value proposition as the current offering is compared
diverse relational behaviors (Fullerton, 2005; Dean, 2007). It relative to competitive offerings, and as such, it is an important
has been used to differentiate spurious loyalty from true strategic construct for understanding relational outcomes.
loyalty (Wu, 2011). Most relevant to the present research is However, Jones et al. (2007) note the often restricted view
that commitment has been linked to not only WOM but also associated with switching costs and their potential effects. In
customer communication to the company relative to service their review of commitment-related research, these authors
problems and ways the firm can better serve them also highlight the mixed findings (i.e. some significant; some
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(Bettencourt, 1997). non-significant effects) with respect to this form of

Empirical evidence supports the notion that commitment is commitment. The idea that continuance commitment might
a multifaceted construct consisting of affective, continuance provide the context under which some effects may operate is a
and normative dimensions (Meyer and Allen, 1997; Meyer possible explanation for these mixed findings.
and Herscovitch, 2001). The multidimensional Oliver (1999), in the context of more deeply understanding
conceptualization was originally developed in organizational the dynamism of loyalty, described the possible interactive
contexts and then extended to marketing business-to-business
effects of fortitude (continuance commitment) and
contexts and most recently business-to-consumer contexts.
community (social bonding) aspects of loyalty. In this
Within the context of business-to-consumer research, two
conceptual work, he detailed thinking that a higher level of
dimensions have received attention: affective commitment
fortitude combined with a higher level of community would
tied to identification with the relational partner and
interact to create the concept of “ultimate loyalty”.
continuance commitment associated with dependence,
Finally, more recent work has empirically explored the
switching costs and lack of alternatives (Fullerton, 2003).
moderating relationship between commitment dimensions
Continuance commitment has also been described as
(affective and continuance). Fullerton (2003), using
constraint-based or calculative commitment, as it reflects a
experimental manipulation, found interactive effects of
motivational basis tied to the costs (economic, social or
affective and continuance commitment on aspects of customer
psychological) of leaving (Bendapudi and Berry, 1997;
loyalty (switching intentions, advocacy and willingness to pay
Gilliland and Bello, 2002). The significance of the
more) associated with a cellular telephone service with
multidimensional commitment construct is that it reflects
continuance commitment detracting from the positive effects
different underlying psychological states associated with a
of affective commitment on the dependent variables. Bansal
target and as such dimensions have potentially different
et al. (2004) did not find interaction effects between affective
implications for behavior towards a target (Bansal et al.,
and continuance commitment on switching intentions for auto
2004).
repair services. Consistent with the findings of his earlier work,
When using commitment, a majority of marketing research
Fullerton (2005) found interactive effects between the two
has operationalized it as affective commitment (Fullerton,
dimensions of commitment with continuance commitment
2003) and has used this construct as an important mediator of
relational antecedents and outcomes (Hennig-Thurau et al., depressing the positive effects of affective commitment on
2002). While many relational studies have viewed switching and advocacy intentions for customer service
commitment as a mediator, not many studies have examined contexts.
The preceding discussion is our basis for positing the
moderating role of continuance commitment on the
Figure 1 Hypothesized mediating and moderating relationships relationship between social benefits and customer feedback.
Extending this thinking to the customer–retailer
Social
communication process, we expect that the customer
Continuance
Benefits
Commitment experience of social benefits will be related to more feedback
but only under conditions of higher continuance commitment.
Following Oliver’s (1999) reasoning, bonded loyalty should
result from the combination of high fortitude and high social
bonding. Note that in Oliver’s conception the social bonding
is oriented to a community of consumers. In this study,
Employee Customer
Behavior Feedback consistent with the service literature, we extend social bonding
to customer– employee relations. Under such conditions, the

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 A framework for encouraging retail customer feedback Journal of Services Marketing
Kevin Celuch, Nadine M. Robinson and Anna M. Walsh Volume 29 · Number 4 · 2015 · 280 –292

product/service is embedded within some portion of the acceptable amount of variance can be expected given that the
consumer’s lifestyle. In addition, for consumers also retailer has multiple retail locations where customer
experiencing stronger dependence ties or “lock-in” to the experiences could differ. The coffee house market is one of
retailer, it would be in the consumer’s interest to use the interest, given the market’s fascination with well-known
relational opportunities offered by employees to provide national retailers such as Starbucks and newer competition
feedback to maintain and perhaps enhance future product/ like McDonald’s. A large regional coffee retailer in the USA
service value. was chosen as a specific context for studying relationships for
As such, it is the combination of strong commitment and the following reasons: it has been in business for ⬎ 90 years
social benefits that should provide the motivational impetus (showing potential for strong customer relationships), the
for driving customer feedback as part of a more symbiotic offering includes both a strong product and service
relationship. Note that we are not arguing against component, customer interactions with the retailer vary
commitment as a mediator in other relational contexts but greatly in frequency and duration and the coffee house in
merely “expanding the conversation” and adding nuance to question holds substantial market share in its geographical
how commitment may work with respect to our understanding area, yet it has more than three major competitors (to account
of this under researched and less understood aspect of for choice alternatives).
customer engagement. Formally, we propose that:
Measures
H2. Social benefit perceptions will interact with (be The questionnaire included measures of customer perceptions
moderated by) the level of customer continuance related to their experience of social benefits from interacting
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commitment to influence customer feedback (such that with employees, their commitment to the retailer, their
the impact of social benefits on customer feedback will feedback behavior, customer-oriented behavior of the
be significantly stronger when commitment to the retailer’s employees and demographic descriptors. Construct
retailer is higher). measures were adapted from previously published scales that
exhibited acceptable levels of reliability and validity. Table I
Method includes a complete description of construct items.
The customers of a large regional coffee house were surveyed Perceived employee customer-oriented behavior
at five locations to study aspects of customer–retailer relations. Employee behavior broadly assessed customer perceptions
This study uses a cross-sectional, single retailer approach that relating to the extent that the employees of the coffee house
provides control over contextual effects (Garbarino and engaged in certain behaviors. The construct was made up of
Johnson, 1999; Jap and Ganesan, 2000; Liu, 2007). Even three, five-point items, rated from “never” to “always”,
though the relationships are constrained to a single retailer, an relating to employees acting as if they value, show concern for

Table I Results of confirmatory factor analysis

Standardized
Constructs and items coefficient
Employee customer-oriented behavior (scaled: never/always)
In general, how often do __________ employees [. . .]
Act as if they value you as a customer 0.90
Show concern for your specific needs 0.75
Treat you with respect 0.75

Social benefits (scaled: strongly disagree/strongly agree)

Indicate your level of agreement with the following statements regarding __________ [. . .]
Enjoy talking to the store employees 0.76
Feel the employees are like friends to you 0.85
Have a meaningful conversation with the employees since they know you as a person, not just as another customer 0.87

Continuance commitment (scaled: strongly disagree/strongly agree)

Indicate your level of agreement with the following statements regarding __________ [. . .]
Would keep visiting even if it became harder to reach 0.93
Would keep buying even if prices increased 0.85
Would ’go the extra mile’ to remain a customer 0.80

Feedback (scaled: not at all/extremely well)

How well do these statements describe what you actually do?
Provide a lot of feedback (positive or negative) to _________ about its products and services 0.80
Share your thoughts and feelings about __________ products and services with the organization or its employees 0.66
Take the time to provide helpful suggestions to __________ 0.89
Note: All standardized coefficients are significant at p ⬍ 0.01

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 A framework for encouraging retail customer feedback Journal of Services Marketing
Kevin Celuch, Nadine M. Robinson and Anna M. Walsh Volume 29 · Number 4 · 2015 · 280 –292

and treat the customer with respect. It is adapted from Results

Sirdeshmukh et al.’s (2002) dimensions of “trustworthy
The purpose of this study is to test for moderated mediation,
behaviors” of employees and largely represents their that is, that the mediational effect of social benefits on
operational benevolence dimension. Note that this dimension customer feedback varies across levels of customer
is consistent with how others have operationalized service commitment. As a precursor to analyses, reliability,
worker customer orientation which includes aspects of convergent validity and discriminant validity were assessed for
empathy for customers combined with addressing customer all multiitem measures. All measures were above the
needs (Brown et al., 2002). recommended thresholds for Cronbach’s alpha and composite
reliability (0.70) (Fornell and Larcker, 1981). Confirmatory
Perceived social benefits
factor analysis (AMOS 18) was used to assess the convergent
This construct assessed the experience of social benefits from
validity of measures, and observed indicators were all
interacting with retail personnel, adapted from Jones et al.
statistically significant (p ⬍ 0.01) for their corresponding
(2000) and Gwinner et al. (1998). The construct was made up factors. Measurement model fit statistics ␹2 (46) ⫽ 101.58,
of three five-point items, rated from “strongly disagree” to p ⫽ 0.00, NNFI ⫽ 0.98, CFI ⫽ 0.99, RMSEA ⫽ 0.04 suggest
“strongly agree”, relating to customer enjoyment in talking that the observed indicators are representative of constructs
with, having meaningful conversations with and feeling like with the combination of NNFI, CFI and RMSEA consistent
friends with employees. with fit index standards recommended for good fitting models
(Hu and Bentler, 1999; Hair et al., 2006; Bagozzi and Yi,
Continuance commitment
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1988). Table I presents measures used in this study.

This construct assessed the level of commitment to the
With respect to discriminant validity, for all constructs, the
retailer, with measures adapted from De Wulf et al. (2001).
amount of variance extracted for each construct is greater than
The construct was made up of three five-point items, rated the squared correlation between constructs (Fornell and
from “strongly disagree” to “strongly agree”, relating to Larcker, 1981). In sum, these results provide support for the
continued patronage such that the customer would “go the discriminant validity of the construct measures. Summated
extra mile” to remain a customer or would do so even if the scores of the multiitem scales were used to address the
retailer became harder to reach or prices increased. research hypotheses. Table II provides the means, standard
deviations, correlations and reliabilities of measures.
Customer feedback
Considered together, the proposed hypotheses suggest a
This construct assessed the extent of feedback provided to the
moderated mediation model (Preacher et al., 2007). While the
retailer by the customer. Three five-point items, scaled from
received view would suggest the use of Baron and Kenny’s
“not at all” to “extremely well”, measured customers’
(1986) procedure, recent literature has questioned the logic of
agreement with statements regarding their willingness to the Baron and Kenny criteria (Zhao et al., 2010). Preacher
provide feedback, suggestions, and share their thoughts and and Hayes (2004) developed a procedure for a rigorous and
feelings, to/with the coffee retailer about their products and powerful “bootstrap” test by generating a sampling
services. These were adapted from the business-to-business distribution from a researcher’s sample. In this procedure,
literature (Holden and O’Toole, 2004; Mohr et al., 1996). regression equations are estimated for each bootstrap sample
and after 1,000 such samples have been drawn effects are
Sample and procedure estimated from the mean of these estimates. Following
Purposive sampling was used to assure variability across Preacher et al. (2007), two regression equations were
retailer– customer relationships and that the sample size was estimated. For the first equation, employee behavior is entered
large enough to detect the effect of moderation. Store as a predictor of social benefits. For the second equation,
intercept surveys were conducted in five stores over a employee behavior, social benefits, commitment and the
four-week period; customers of the coffee house were sampled interaction term (social benefits ⫻ commitment) are entered
to reach those at “active stages” of the relationship. In as predictors of customer feedback.
Conditional process analysis is required with the
addition, members of a community organization were also
hypothesized model as the effect of the mediator (social
surveyed to expand the representativeness of consumers that
held varying levels of relationships with the coffee house. All
respondents were informed of the purpose of the study and Table II Descriptive statistics and correlations for employee
that their responses would be anonymous. This procedure customer-oriented behavior, social benefits, continuance commitment
resulted in a total of 864 usable surveys. and feedback
The average age of the respondents was 32 (with a range of Standard
18-76). Fifty-eight per cent of the respondents were female. Constructs Mean Deviation X1 X2 X3 X4
Thirty-five per cent of respondents had some college, and 34
X1 employee behavior 4.2 0.62 0.84
per cent held a bachelor’s degree. Managers/professionals and
X2 social benefits 3.0 0.92 0.48ⴱⴱ 0.86
full-time students accounted for 34 and 42 per cent of
X3 commitment 2.9 0.94 0.43ⴱⴱ 0.59ⴱⴱ 0.82
respondents, respectively. A majority of the sample (52 per
X4 feedback 2.4 1.01 0.26ⴱⴱ 0.55ⴱⴱ 0.47ⴱⴱ 0.87
cent) had been a customer of the coffee house between one
and five years. The average number of visits per month to the Notes: ⴱⴱ Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level; alpha’s are shown
on the diagonal
coffee house for a respondent was nine.

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Kevin Celuch, Nadine M. Robinson and Anna M. Walsh Volume 29 · Number 4 · 2015 · 280 –292

benefits) is conditional on the level of the moderator Figure 2 Standardized coefficients for mediating and moderating
(continuance commitment). That is, the mediator effect relationships
differs in strength as a function of the moderator (Hayes,
2013). The strength of conditional process analysis relative to
Social
conventional tests of moderated mediation (Baron and Benefits 0.72 Continuance
Commitment
Kenny, 1986) is that the procedure utilizes the bootstrapping
technique to calculate “path” effects in the form of a 0.48 0.02
confidence interval. Confidence intervals that exclude 0 are
evidence of a moderation effect. In addition, moderated
mediation would be indicated when there is evidence for
Customer
moderation at some levels of the mediator. Employee
Behavior Feedback
The study variables were loaded into the Process macro –0.03

(Hayes, 2013) in SPSS 20. Results of the analysis to test the

conditional effects model (Figure 1) are presented in Table III. Table IV Indirect effects through social benefits for different levels of
Table III shows that the hypotheses and expected relationships continuance commitment
were supported with p ⬍ 0.01. Figure 2 provides standardized
Value of Bootstrap Lower Upper
coefficients for each “path” in the hypothesized model. The test
Mediator moderatorⴱ Effect SE level CI level CI
of moderated mediation can be derived from the conditional
indirect effects that are provided by the bootstrapping results. Social benefits 2.04 0.223 0.039 0.145 0.292ⴱⴱ
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Table IV displays the bootstrapping results for one standard Social benefits 2.98 0.318 0.035 0.253 0.393ⴱⴱ
deviation below the mean, the mean and one standard deviation Social benefits 3.92 0.414 0.041 0.337 0.501ⴱⴱ
above the mean values of the moderator. Notes: ⴱ Values for moderator are for the mean and ⫾ one SD from
The “Effect” column in Table IV clearly shows as the value of the mean; ⴱⴱ signifies a 95% confidence interval for the mediated effect
the moderator increased the value of the effect of social benefits
also increased with the effect strongest for one standard deviation
above the mean for continuance commitment. Evidence of continuance commitment is found to interact with social benefits
moderation is provided by confidence intervals presented in the to moderate the relationship between social benefits and
right hand columns in Table IV. They show that commitment feedback. Specifically, when customer commitment is high,
increasingly positively moderated the link between social benefits experiencing social benefits from interacting with employees has
and customer feedback as all confidence intervals exclude 0. a strong positive effect on customers providing feedback to the
Figure 3 graphically depicts this effect which provides clear retailer. In contrast, when customer commitment is low,
evidence of moderated mediation. experiencing social benefits from interacting with employees does
To depict the nature of the interaction in a different format, not have a significant effect on customers providing feedback to
slopes are plotted for individuals one standard deviation above the retailer.
the mean (Mean ⫽ 4.6) and for individuals one standard
deviation below the mean (Mean ⫽ 1.4) for commitment.
Figure 4 displays the interaction effect on customer feedback. Discussion
As expected, for high commitment individuals, stronger social In the relationship marketing stream, much research has been
benefit perceptions significantly enhanced customer feedback done on important relationship marketing outcomes such as
(F ⫽ 48.70, p ⬍ 0.01). In contrast, social benefit perceptions loyalty and WOM and their antecedents – relationship
do not have this effect on customer feedback when customer benefits, commitment and satisfaction (Hennig-Thurau et al.,
commitment is low (F ⫽ 3.06, p ⫽ 0.08). 2002) – however, this paper extends such work to include the
In summary, consistent with predictions, experiencing social importance of feedback to the company (including negative,
benefits mediates the effect of employee customer-oriented positive and neutral information) in the emerging area of
behaviors on customers providing feedback. Further, customer engagement.

Table III Linear regression results

Consequent
Social benefits Customer feedback
Antecedents Coefficient Standard error p Coefficient Standard error p
Employee behavior 0.72 0.05 0.00 ⫺0.05 0.05 0.32
Social benefits – – – 0.02 0.10 0.82
Continuance commitment – – – ⫺0.17 0.09 0.07
Social benefits X
Continuance commitment – – – 0.14 0.03 0.00
Constant ⫺0.04 0.19 0.83 1.71 0.30 0.00
R2 ⫽ 0.23 R2 ⫽ 0.35
F(1, 862) ⫽ 259.48, p ⬍ 0.00 F(4, 859) ⫽ 116.75, p ⬍ 0.00

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Kevin Celuch, Nadine M. Robinson and Anna M. Walsh Volume 29 · Number 4 · 2015 · 280 –292

Figure 3 Effect size of social benefits at one SD above and below customer feedback – by exploring relationships among
mean for continuance commitment employee customer-oriented behavior, social benefits and
continuance commitment. To our knowledge, this is the first
0.5
study to explore these constructs in an integrated approach.
0.4 Another contribution of this research is the integration of
0.4 important relational constructs (customer-oriented employee
behavior and social benefits). Findings support social benefits
0.3
mediating the relationship between perceived employee
Social Benefits
Effect Size

0.3 customer-oriented behavior and customer feedback, thus

0.2
explaining how aspects of experienced customer orientation
can spawn reciprocal company-targeted communication
0.2
behavior – an important dynamic of relational exchange.
0.1 Future research can investigate the influence of additional
employee behaviors and relational benefits (i.e. confidence
0.1
and special treatment benefits). Another interesting area for
0.0 future research relates to the generalizability of these results to
–1 0 1
online retail contexts. Would current findings hold under
SD Above/Below Mean virtual rather than face-to-face interaction? Yen and Gwinner
Continuance Commitment
(2003) note the possibilities of personalization with current
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database capabilities. However, they also recognize that

Figure 4 Interactive effects of social benefits and continuance aspects of friendship might better translate in community
commitment on feedback forums as opposed to virtual interaction with company
4.5
personnel. It would also be worth investigating personality
4.0 4.1
traits such as extroversion and altruism to better understand
the personality-related reasons that might help or inhibit a
3.5
customer from voicing positive or negative feedback as well as
3.0
new ideas for products and services.
Feedback

2.5
2.3 A third contribution of this research relates to the notion of
High
2.0 continuance commitment as a moderator with social benefits
Commitment
1.6
1.5 Low
Commitment
positively influencing customer feedback only for
1.2
1.0 high-commitment customers. Therefore, even if retail
0.5 managers focus on employee customer-oriented behaviors
0.0
leading to social benefits, the positive effect this could have on
1 2 3 4 5 customer feedback is negated if customers do not have
Social Benefits “lock-in” commitment to the retailer.
This research can be viewed as paralleling Oliver’s (1999)
Historically, the majority of feedback research has focused conception that bonded loyalty should result from the
on customer complaining behavior as a potential outcome of combination of high fortitude and high social bonding.
dissatisfaction. Many dissatisfied customers do not complain Although, as noted earlier, where he focused on the social
based on inconvenience and doubtful outcomes. While bonds established between customers, we investigate the role
voicing complaints publically is clearly a component of that employee– customer bonds play in producing engaged
customer feedback, this category of complaints only includes customers. Berry (1995) has also suggested the importance of
negatively valenced feedback. Hence, the calls for research social and structural bonds in strong customer relationships.
that addresses a broader conception of feedback tied to an Further, the work begins to address his question as to what
effective way to increase managerial response. additional synergistic effects arise from fortitude and
The relationship marketing discourse continues to evolve community. In addition, we extend thinking in the area by
beyond satisfaction, loyalty and commitment to seeking identifying a transitioning mechanism (social benefits) that
customers that are engaged with a brand or organization. helps explain when continuance commitment may extend to
Within the service climate, a focus on customer orientation extra-role behavior (feedback).
and customer engagement has been linked to helping firms We also extend thinking with respect to continuance
remain competitive, especially as the importance of customer commitment in that it has been linked to potentially negative
involvement in the new product development process has communication outcomes. For example, it has been found to
emerged to keep companies relevant and competitive. increase negative consumer-to-consumer WOM (Jones et al.,
Previous discussions of customer engagement often include 2007) and was found to depress the positive effects of affective
WOM and advocacy, and co-creation, but they often do not commitment on advocacy (Fullerton, 2003, 2005). We have
mention customer feedback. A key marketing research priority introduced a more nuanced understanding of its effects in
and the topic of a 2010 Journal of Service Research special issue, that, when combined with social benefits it increased
customer engagement is still in its infancy and most work in consumer-to-business feedback – both positive as well as
this area is still conceptual. This research contributes to the negative in addition to increasing suggestions for products and
understanding of an underrepresented aspect of engagement – services. Future research could explore the potential

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moderating influence of not only continuance but also relatively young, single and part-time, in comparison to
affective commitment on other engagement-related concepts. employees in other work settings, managers might
A final contribution of this research extends to the context unintentionally create role conflict for such employees through
of a regional coffee house, a retailer that includes product and policies and procedures that create friction between customers
service components as well as varying customer interactions. and the firm (Babin and Boles, 1998). Managerial auditing of
Examples provided by Oliver (1999) of contexts where fully customer “touchpoints” could prevent such negative customer
bonded consumers exist included major durables such as encounters. In addition, limiting company procedures that may
Harley-Davidson motorcycles and Winnebago campers as mitigate the effect of customer-oriented and relational behavior
well as various sports teams, musicians and entertainers. Note such as minimizing staff rotations and customer handoffs from
that we found relatively strong effects in explaining 35 per cent one employee to another would be of help (Patterson and Smith,
of the variance in customer feedback with a parsimonious 2001), while at the same time being mindful of the dangers of
model for a more “mundane” type of retailer which extends salesperson-owned loyalty (Palmatier et al., 2007).
the thinking as to the types of settings where stronger loyalty Besides service climate and organizational culture,
and engagement concepts might apply. Future investigations management’s efforts at recruiting, the right type of employee
could certainly extend this research to alternative retail can help ensure employee relational capabilities over
contexts. An interesting extension would be to examine transactional capabilities (Butcher et al., 2001; Patterson and
models including alternative feedback channels beyond Smith, 2001). For example, recruiting employees with the
employees such as managerial and electronic channels. right personality is one of the keys to driving
customer-oriented behavior. Personality dimensions, such as
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Managerial implications agreeableness, extroversion and emotional stability have been

As an underdeveloped area of research, firms are left with little shown to lead to strong interpersonal customer-oriented
guidance as to how to best leverage resources to encourage behaviors, such as those represented by our main construct
customer feedback. Having a deeper understanding of how (Mechinda and Patterson, 2011).
employee behavior and company strategy influences customer In addition, training for interpersonal skills that develop
feedback could aid managers in developing more systematic and social bonds (e.g. such as learning customers’ names,
responsive approaches to learn from customers. As noted by self-disclosure and social support) as well as rewarding and
Bowen (1986), face-to-face service encounters not only bring the retaining relationally valued personnel is also of upmost
customers close to the company physically but provide the importance. However, it is important to train employees to
opportunity to create psychological closeness. This research interpret and respond to the context of the sale because for
implies managers have the ability to influence the amount of some contexts (e.g. product is highly important or relatively
feedback that they receive by encouraging employee behaviors risky), attempts at social bonding might not be as high a
that demonstrate concern for customer needs and valuing priority. Though the coffee house setting studied here seems
patrons which engender and work through feelings of to provide a great opportunity for the development of social
personalization and friendship. By building an organizational benefits, other retail contexts might not produce the same
culture and service climate that attracts, trains, motivates and benefits. Employees also need to be aware of individualized
enables task and relationally skilled employees to do good work, differences between customers and trained to respond
managers are much more likely to create the stage for engaged appropriately. As noted by Yen and Gwinner (2003), it is
customers. possible a firm’s customer base has segments that can be
Organizational policies aimed at fostering this type of climate differentiated by desired relational benefits. For example,
might include explicit consideration that all customer-facing Homburg et al. (2011) found that customized orders and
employees are “marketers” for the firm and that a strong customers with an interaction (opposed to task) orientation
employee engagement program increases the likelihood provide a better opportunity for social bonding. In the
of employee behavior that translates to customer engagement opposite context, relational and customer-oriented advances
(Castro et al., 2004). A strong connection exists between internal can backfire. So, when customers exhibit signs of
and external marketing, and if a company culture sends the signal non-interaction oriented behavior (e.g. evasive responses to
that employees are valued and respected, employees are much more personal questions posed by employees), employees should
likely to send the same message to customers (Bowen, 1986). In respond appropriately. Therefore, understanding what
addition, management should support employees’ efforts with differences exist among customers may allow a firm to better
promotional messages communicating the company’s value and tailor employee effort and resources for enhancing social
respect for customers. Promotional materials to customers should benefits for those customers who deem them important.
also showcase social bonding of employees/customers as a way to set However, one of the challenges for management and
customer expectations for their store experience and lessen the employees alike is that consumers must perceive employees’
chances that they turned away from relational advances by customer-oriented behaviors as authentic expressions of
employees. Some evidence exists that supports the idea that concern for the customer and not shallow attempts to better
customers expect affective type interactions with employees that the company’s interest. This will surely lead to lack of trust
represent strong brands (Homburg et al., 2011), and advertisements and social bonding with employees (Sirdeshmukh et al.,
can easily support this expectation. 2002). Therefore, employees cannot be simply trained to
In addition, as noted by Gwinner et al. (1998), some firm recite scripts embedded with social clichés, but must be hired
policies may hinder the delivery of relational benefits. For and trained to perform concrete and personalized actions that
example, because frontline employees in many retail settings are signal that the company values and respects the customer.

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Kevin Celuch, Nadine M. Robinson and Anna M. Walsh Volume 29 · Number 4 · 2015 · 280 –292

Once customers perceive authentic customer-oriented research could assess similar relational processes over time.
behavior (i.e. value, concern and respect for the customer) This limitation notwithstanding, it is important to note that
coming from employees, they are more likely to trust common methods variance is not likely to account for
(Sirdeshmukh et al., 2002) employees and make themselves interaction effects, a focus of this study, as a method variance
vulnerable by engaging in reciprocal relational behavior (e.g. should increase correlations consistently between construct
social conversations and sharing thoughts) with employees. measures (Aiken and West, 1991). An additional limitation
In anticipation of garnering more feedback from the relates to the dependent variable, self-reported feedback.
methods mentioned above, management should design the Although the measure follows practice evidenced in prior
servicescape to do just that. Many channels should be research, future research could use matched customer
available for customers to provide feedback (e.g. comment feedback that is documented in company– customer
cards on the table/by the door, solicitation on the receipt/cup,
relationship management systems. Further, supervisor
promotional signs in the store encouraging and soliciting
perceptions of employee customer-oriented behavior could
feedback and stating mechanisms available). Not only will this
help validate customer perceptions as well as video recording
lessen the frustration that customers feel from wanting to
of employee behavior that is then rated by trained independent
provide feedback but not knowing how to but also it will
complement the message that feedback is valued which coders. Finally, additional constructs and measures could be
employees are sending through their behaviors and further included. For example, relationship stage is one construct that
encourage customer response. Along the same lines, is likely to impact synergistic effects between continuance
employees must be trained in handling the feedback (i.e. how commitment and social benefits. Further, would similar
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to solicit, record, report and respond) and trained in relationships hold with a more fine-grained measure of the
complementary service recovery tactics. dependent measure? That is, if an examination of the
Implied in the above discussion of employee roles in the influence of employee behavior, social benefits and
feedback process is the notion of educating and training commitment on discrete types of feedback (complaints,
customers how to provide feedback. Teaching customers how compliments and information sharing/ideas) were conducted,
to provide feedback not only how to complain but also to would results be consistent across feedback domains?
compliment and offer new ideas as well, in addition to sharing In conclusion, while there is much to be learned about how
changes made from customer suggestions would motivate retailers can create truly engaged customers, the perception of
customers as signals that the company is truly customer- employee customer-oriented behavior, social benefits and
oriented. Note that compliments could also be used as part of continuance commitment appear to have significant roles in
an employee incentive system, as could employee performance contributing to a key facet of engagement – customer feedback.
tied to soliciting the most feedback over a period of time. The The present research contributes to the engagement literature by
above suggestions are consistent with the emergent exploring a process critical to high-quality relational exchange.
service-dominant logic paradigm where employees and
customers are conceived as intertwined components of service
co-creation (Vargo and Lusch, 2004).
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Journal of Consumer Satisfaction, Dissatisfaction, and
Complaining Behavior, Vol. 6, pp. 176-181. About the authors
Soderlund, M. (1998), “Customer satisfaction and its
Kevin Celuch is the Blair Chair of Business Science in the Romain
consequences on customer behavior revisited: the impact of
College of Business at the University of Southern Indiana in
different levels of satisfaction on word-of-mouth, feedback
Evansville, IN. He has a PhD in marketing from Syracuse
to the supplier and loyalty”, International Journal of Service
University. His research interests include consumer, salesperson and
Industry Management, Vol. 9 No. 2, pp. 169-188.
managerial cognition. Kevin Celuch is the corresponding author
Tax, S., Brown, S. and Chandrashekaran, M. (1998),
and can be contacted at: [email protected]
“Customer evaluations of service complaint experience:
implications for relationship marketing”, Journal of Nadine M. Robinson is faculty in the Department of
Marketing, Vol. 60 No. 2, pp. 60-76. Business and Economics at Algoma University in Sault Ste.
Tronvoll, B. (2012), “A dynamic model of customer Marie, ON, Canada. She has a Doctorate in Business
complaining behavior from the perspective of Administration from Athabasca University. Her research
service-dominant logic”, European Journal of Marketing, interests include consumer behavior, feedback, word-of-
Vol. 46 Nos 1/2, pp. 284-305. mouth and relationship marketing.
Tschol, J. (1994), “Do yourself a favor: gripe about bad
service”, The American Salesman, Vol. 39 No. 6, pp. 3-5. Anna M. Walsh is Assistant Professor of Marketing at the
Vargo, S.L. and Lusch, R.F. (2004), “Evolving to a new Seidman College of Business at Grand Valley State University
dominant logic for marketing”, Journal of Marketing, Vol. 68 in Grand Rapids, MI. She has a PhD in Marketing from
No. 1, pp. 1-17. Louisiana State University. Her research interests include the
Verhoef, P.C., Reinartz, W.J. and Krafft, M. (2010), “Customer formation, development and dissolution of business-to-
engagement as a new perspective in customer consumer relationships.

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