A relationship marketing catalyst: the salience of reciprocity to sport organization–sport consumer relationships

Abstract

One essential and increasingly emphasized area for sport managers to consider is relationship marketing (RM), with particular reference to relationship quality (RQ). Relationship quality is the overall assessment of relational strength and it is important to the study of RM because it provides a lens to view wide-ranging relational constructs and more precisely distinguish sport RM efforts. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to examine the impact of the RQ construct of reciprocity on the outcome of attendance intention through the established relational mediators of trust and commitment. Several hypotheses were generated. Specifically, reciprocity will positively impact trust, commitment, and attendance intentions. Additionally, both trust and commitment were hypothesized to positively impact attendance intentions. Participants were 423 NCAA Division 1 student-subjects. Through CFA and bootstrap confidence interval (CI) the research hypotheses concerning the direct and mediated effects of reciprocity on sport consumer attendance intentions were supported.

Keywords:

• relationship quality
• trust
• commitment
• reciprocity
• attendance
• sport fans