Relative Contributions of Product Quality and Service Quality in the Automobile Industry

Abstract

This paper answers two key research questions: 1) What is the relationship between product quality and service quality on customer satisfaction within an integrated model? 2) What is the relationship between customers' satisfaction and customers' intention to switch brands in the automobile industry? PLS-SEM is a tool used to assess measurement reliability and validity and to estimate the relationships among service quality, product quality, customers' satisfaction, and customers' intention to switch brands. Results show that service quality does not significantly determine customer satisfaction. Instead, product quality significantly influences customer satisfaction. The findings contrast a prior Quality Management Journal study conducted in the mobile phone industry that found that provider service quality is relatively more important than product quality. The results also show that customer satisfaction has a negative effect on customers' intention to switch brands. This research contributes to the ongoing debate surrounding service-dominant (S-D) logic and goods-dominant (G-D) logic of exchanges by empirically supporting the G-D logic in the context of the automobile industry. The study suggests future modification to the traditional quality-satisfaction model based on the type of product.

• customer satisfaction
• intention to switch
• product quality
• service quality

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Lu Xu

Lu Xu is a doctoral candidate in management science in the Department of Information Technology and Decision Sciences at the University of North Texas. She is a member of the Decision Sciences Institute (DSI), the Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences (INFORMS), ASQ, and the Decision Sciences Institute Southwest Region (SWDSI). Her current research interest includes business research methods, environmental sustainability, logistics product quality, and service quality and the underlying impact on customer behavior, operation management, and supply chain management. She can be reached by email at: [email protected].

Charles Blankson

Charles Blankson is an associate professor of marketing and the marketing doctorate program coordinator in the Department of Marketing and Logistics, College of Business, University of North Texas. He obtained his doctorate from Kingston University, London, England. He is a member of the Chartered Institute of Marketing, the American Marketing Association, and the Academy of Marketing Science. Blankson's research interests include strategic marketing, including positioning, brand management and market orientation, services marketing, industrial/B2B marketing, small business marketing, and international/multicultural marketing. His papers have been published in the Journal of Advertising Research, European Journal of Marketing, Journal of Business Research, Journal of Business and Industrial Marketing, Journal of Marketing Management, Journal of Services Marketing, Journal of Global Marketing, and many others.

Victor Prybutok

Victor R. Prybutok is a Regents professor of decision sciences in the Information Technology and Decision Sciences Department and vice provost of the Toulouse Graduate School at the University of North Texas. He received his bachelor's degree, two master's degrees, and a doctorate from Drexel University. Prybutok is an ASQ Certified Quality Engineer (CQE), Quality Auditor (CQA), Manager of Quality/Organizational Excellence (CMQ/OE), and an accredited professional statistician (PSTAT) by the American Statistical Association. Prybutok has authored over 175 journal articles, several book chapters, and more than 200 conference presentations in information systems measurement, quality control, risk assessment, and applied statistics.