The Moderating Effect of Relationship Length on the Relationship between Brand Commitment and Word-of-Mouth

• Main Authors: LU, YEH-SEN, 呂月森
• Other Authors: CHOU, CHIEN-HENG
• Format: Others
• Language: zh-TW
• Published: 2019
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/ydhf3n

博士 === 中國文化大學 === 國際企業管理學系 === 107 === In the field of marketing,consumer consumptions have moved from manufactured products to services, and service industry has grown into high ratio of the world’s GDP. Therefore, the importance of word-of-mouth on enterprises’ competitive advantage increases. The purpose of this study is to explore whether behavior through brand commitment can influence consumers positive willingness to spread word-of-mouth. In addition, to find out does the relationship length in customer relationship interfere with brand commitment and positive word-of-mouth. Brand commitment has been a widely accepted marketing paradigm among scholars and practitioners because of the psychological linkage of the desire for consumers to maintain relationships with brands. With rising of consumer awareness, consumers want not only the products or services provided by the enterprises, but also care about the feeling from the enterprises image. This study distributed structured questionnaires to customers in restaurant industry. 528 questionnaires were distributed. 505 valid questionnaires were returned. The response rate is 96%. The result of the study is that brand commitment is significantly positively correlated with word-of-mouth, which is consistent with the first hypothesis. The moderating effect of the customers relationship length is negatively interfering with the brand commitment and positive word-of-mouth, which does not supportthe second hypothesis. Hypothesis 2 may not be supported because service quality of a restaurant brand may be inconsistent through time delivered by different service staffs. Finally, based on the results of this study, the implications and practical implications are discussed.