Managerial Implications of the Relationship Between Customer Care and Purchase Intention in Online Shopping

Abstract

This paper studies customer care as an important factor that affects the performance of B2C e-commerce websites. A survey was conducted to 464 Turkish B2C website customers. Analysis method of this study is partial least square structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM). Specifically, customer care in B2C e-commerce web sites is found to have direct effect on perceived value and indirect effect on purchase intention via perceived value and brand loyalty. Besides relationship between customer care and purchase intention was found as insignificant. The most important contribution of this research is the unveiling of the indirect relationship between customer care and purchase intention. This study also offers some important manageral suggestions for B2C web sites.

Keywords: Online Shopping, Customer Care, Perceived Value, Brand Loyalty, Purchase Intention

JEL Classification: M10, M31