The Effect of Customer Service and Content Management on Online Retail Sales Performance: The Mediating Role of Customer Satisfaction

This paper analyzes the mediating role of customer satisfaction by studying the relationship between IT-enabled customer service and content management efforts and online sales performance. Using data on the top performing Web retailers in the U.S. based on their online annual sales, we show that the extent of retailers’ efforts in online customer service and content management is positively linked to customer satisfaction, which in turn is positively related to the retailers’ online sales performance. In addition to directly increasing the revenue, our results indicate that customer service and content management features can also indirectly improve the retailers’ financial performance. Specifically, customer service management impacts the sales performance via the average ticket amount, while content management affects the sales via the repeat visit

Technology-Enabled Retail Services and Online Sales Performance

Drawing on the past literature on four retail service areas: content management, customer management, multi-channel management, and visitor traffic management, this research offers an empirical analysis of the relationships between these four service areas and the online sales performance of Web retailers. Using data from an independent source on the profiles as well as operational and sales performances of the top-ranked Web retailers, we map the retailers’ online features into a unified conceptual framework that incorporates the above four broad areas, and empirically study their direct implications on online sales performance. The results show that the retailers’ efforts in content, customer, and multi-channel management features have a significant positive impact on their online sales. However, while retailers expend considerable efforts on attracting visitors to their retail Web sites, our result is inconclusive regarding whether or not the visitor traffic management features have an impact on retailers’ sales performance

The moderating impact of internal social exchange processes on the entrepreneurial orientation-performance relationship

This paper applies a social exchange perspective to understand the internal contingencies of the relationship between entrepreneurial orientation (EO) and performance. It focuses on two aspects of social interactions among functional managers (procedural justice and trust), as well as on their organizational commitment, as potential enhancements to the firm's successful exploitation of entrepreneurial opportunities. A study of 232 Canadian-based firms finds several positive moderating effects: The EO-performance link is stronger for higher levels of procedural justice, trust, and organizational commitment. In addition, consistent with a systems approach to organizational contingencies, the EO-performance relationship is stronger when the organization's social context comes closer to an "ideal" configuration of procedural justice, trust, and organizational commitment that is most conducive to knowledge exchange within the organization. The study's implications and future research directions are discussed.Entrepreneurial orientation Social exchange theory Procedural justice Trust Organizational commitment

The connection and disconnection between e-commerce businesses and their customers: Exploring the role of engagement, perceived usefulness, and perceived ease-of-use

Significant time, resources, and attention have been given over the past few decades to explore how businesses can attract more customers to their online stores, and yet problems remain. It is still difficult to convert a potential customer’s initial online encounter into a buying relationship. Thus, this study aims to develop a deeper comprehension of the driving forces that not only attract visitors to a website, but also motivate them to make a purchase. Drawing from the e-commerce, regulatory focus, and regulatory fit theory literatures, this study crafts a series of predictions about visitors’ attraction to and intention to purchase from a website. In studies conducted using three different technology-product websites (i.e., websites selling smartphones, smartwatches, and laptops) and two different samples (i.e., students and actual shoppers), we found supporting evidence that visitors’ evaluation and purchase intentions are determined by the fit between the shopping experiences offered (hedonic vs. utilitarian) and visitors’ regulatory focus (promotion vs. prevention). Furthermore, we reveal that engagement, perceived usefulness, and perceived ease of use serve as the underlying mechanisms that mediate the effect of regulatory fit on visitors’ attitudes and purchase intentions