The dissertation of economic doctor: Does customer experience always benefit service companies? Examining customers’ epistemic motivation and interaction with service contexts

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The primary purpose of this study is to explain how and when customer experience benefits the company. Built upon Customer-Dominant Logic, Social Identity theory and Need for cognition, the study propose that customer experience leads to customer engagement behavior via two routes: customer-firm and customer-employee identification.

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Nội dung Text: The dissertation of economic doctor: Does customer experience always benefit service companies? Examining customers’ epistemic motivation and interaction with service contexts

MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING UNIVERSITY OF ECONOMICS HO CHI MINH CITY -------------------------------- VU THI MAI CHI DOES CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE ALWAYS BENEFIT SERVICE COMPANIES? EXAMINING CUSTOMERS’ EPISTEMIC MOTIVATION AND INTERACTION WITH THE BEAUTY SERVICE CONTEXTS THE DISSERTATION OF ECONOMIC DOCTOR Ho Chi Minh city – 2022
MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING UNIVERSITY OF ECONOMICS HO CHI MINH CITY -------------------------------- VU THI MAI CHI DOES CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE ALWAYS BENEFIT SERVICE COMPANIES? EXAMINING CUSTOMERS’ EPISTEMIC MOTIVATION AND INTERACTION WITH THE BEAUTY SERVICE CONTEXTS Major : Business Administration ID : 9340101 THE DISSERTATION OF ECONOMIC DOCTOR Academic advisors: Assoc. Prof. TRAN HA MINH QUAN Ho Chi Minh city – 2022
DECLARATION OF AUTHENTICITY I would like to declare that, the thesis “Does customer experience always benefit service companies? Examining customers’ epistemic motivation and interaction with service contexts” is my own and conducted with the instruction and advice of Assoc. Prof. Tran Ha Minh Quan. Apart from the acknowledged references, there are no any materials previously published or written by another authors, or has not been previously submitted to any other educational and research programs or institutions. I take full responsibility for the legality of the whole scientific research process of this dissertation. Vu Thi Mai Chi
i ACKNOWLEDGMENTS First and foremost, I am sincerely acknowledging the managing boards of Industrial University of Ho Chi Minh City (IUH) and University of Economics Ho Chi Minh City (UEH) for offering me the chance of studying PhD and financially supporting my study. I would like to thank my supervisor, Assoc. Prof. TRAN HA MINH QUAN makes me a better reader, a better thinker, and a better writer. His constant guidance, invaluable suggestions, and deep research insights have immensely shaped this study. This dissertation would never have been written without their kind and patient assistance. I am also very grateful to Assoc. Prof. NGO VIET LIEM for his help with the valuable comments, suggestions, and ideas. I would also like to express my deepest appreciation and gratitude to all my kindly colleagues and friends who had contributed to the completion of this study. Above all, the dissertation is dedicated to my beloved parents, my son, who have been encouraging me along the way.
ii TABLE OF CONTENT DECLARATION OF AUTHENTICITY ...................................................................... ACKNOWLEDGMENTS........................................................................................... i LIST OF TABLES ......................................................................................................v LIST OF FIGURES................................................................................................... vi ABSTRACT ............................................................................................................. vii TÓM TẮT ............................................................................................................... viii CHAPTER 1 - RESEARCH OVERIEW ....................................................................1 1.1. Precursors and rationales of the research ....................................................1 1.2. Research gaps ..............................................................................................4 1.3. Research aims ..............................................................................................7 1.4. Research objectives and questions ..............................................................8 1.5. Research context ..........................................................................................9 1.5.1. Beauty service industry....................................................................10 1.5.2. Beauty service industry in Vietnam .................................................12 1.5.3. Beauty salon service ........................................................................15 1.5.4. Beauty salon service in Vietnam .....................................................16 1.6. Key terms ...................................................................................................18 1.7. Research subject and scope .......................................................................18 1.8. Structure of the research ............................................................................19 CHAPTER 2 - LITERATURE REVIEW .................................................................20 2.1. Review of Customer experience (EX) .......................................................20 2.1.1. Conceptualization of Customer experience .....................................20 2.1.2. Consequences of Customer experience ...........................................26 2.2. Review of Customer engagement behavior (EG)......................................31 2.2.1. Conceptualization of Customer engagement behavior ....................31 2.2.2. Antecedences of Customer engagement behavior ...........................33 2.3. Theoretical background .............................................................................37 2.3.1. Customer-Dominant Logic ..............................................................37 2.3.2. Social Identity Theory .....................................................................39 2.3.3. Need for Cognition ..........................................................................41
iii 2.4. Proposal framework...................................................................................42 2.5. Operationalization of the selected variables ..............................................44 2.5.1. Customer experience (EX)...............................................................44 2.5.2. Customer engagement behavior (EG) .............................................47 2.5.3. Relationship between Customer experience (EX) and engagement behavior (EG) ............................................................................................49 2.5.4. Mediating role of Customer-firm identification (FI) and employee identification (EI) .......................................................................................50 2.5.5. Moderating role of Customer epistemic motivation (EM) ..............53 2.5.6. Controlled variables ........................................................................56 CHAPTER 3 - RESEARCH METHODOLOGY .....................................................58 3.1. Research framework and hypotheses ........................................................58 3.2. Research design .........................................................................................61 3.3. Population and sampling ...........................................................................64 3.3.1. Sampling method .............................................................................65 3.3.2. Sample size determination ...............................................................66 3.4. Instrument development ............................................................................66 3.5. Scales used in the research framework ......................................................68 3.5.1. Measurements of Customer experience ...........................................69 3.5.2. Measurements of Customer epistemic motivation ..........................70 3.5.3. Measurements of Customer- Firm Identification ............................71 3.5.4. Measurements of Customer-employee identification ......................71 3.5.5. Measurements of Customer engagement behavior ..........................72 3.6. Data collection procedure ..........................................................................73 3.7. Data analysis process .................................................................................78 3.8. The results of Pilot study ...........................................................................86 3.8.1. The results of Qualitative pilot study...............................................86 3.8.2. The results of Quantitative pilot study.............................................93 CHAPTER 4 - DATA ANALYSIS ..........................................................................99 4.1. Descriptive analysis of Sample .................................................................99 4.2. Validation of Measures: Reliability and Validity....................................103
iv 4.2.1. Reflective-reflective second-order construct .................................103 4.2.2. Reflective-formative second-order construct ................................107 4.2.3. Reliability and Validity of Measurement model ...........................108 4.3. Assessment of Common method bias .....................................................112 4.4. Testing hypotheses by PLS-SEM application .........................................112 4.4.1. Mediation analysis .........................................................................114 4.4.2. Moderation analysis .......................................................................115 CHAPTER 5 - DISCUSSION AND CONTRIBUTIONS ......................................118 5.1. Findings of the research...........................................................................118 5.2. Discussion of the findings .......................................................................120 5.2.1. Characteristics of demographic .....................................................120 5.2.2. Scale validates of customer experience .........................................120 5.2.3. Relationship of EX and EG – mediating and moderating role .....121 5.3. Contributions of the research...................................................................122 5.3.1. Theoretical contributions ...............................................................122 5.3.2. Practical contributions ...................................................................124 5.4. Limitations and Future research suggestions ..........................................126 5.5. Conclusion ...............................................................................................126 PUBLICATION ......................................................................................................128 REFERENCES ........................................................................................................129 APPENDIX I: ENGLISH QUESTIONNAIRE ........................................................ xi APPENDIX II: VIETNAMESE QUESTIONNAIRE ........................................... xvi APPENDIX III: LIST OF BEAUTY SALONS ..................................................... xxi APPENDIX IV: LIST OF EXPERTS OF IN-DEPT INTERVIEW .......................xxv APPENDIX V: DATA FROM QUANTITATIVE PILOT STUDY .................... xxvi APPENDIX VI: SCALE ASSESSMENT OF CUSTOMER ENGAGEMENT BEHAVIOR ....................................................................................................... xxxvii APENDIX VII. SCALE ASSESSMENT OF CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE ......... xlii APENDIX VIII. PLS – SEM ................................................................................. xliv
v LIST OF TABLES Table 1.1 Classification of beauty services in Vietnam ............................................15 Table 1.2 Services offered by beauty establishes .....................................................16 Table 2.1 Overview of some important definitions of EX ........................................23 Table 2.2. Relevant literature on EX’s dimensions and consequenes ......................29 Table 2.3. Overview of some important definitions of EG .......................................32 Table 2.4. Relevant literature on EG’s dimensions and antecedences .....................35 Table 3.1 Research implementation progress ...........................................................64 Table 3.2. Summary of demographic variables ........................................................67 Table 3.3. “Customer experience” scale ...................................................................69 Table 3.4. “Customer epistemic motivation” scale ...................................................71 Table 3.5. “Customer- Firm Identification” scale .....................................................71 Table 3.6. “Customer-employee identification” scale ..............................................72 Table 3.7. “Customer engagement behavior” scale ..................................................73 Table 3.8 Summary of data collection procedure .....................................................74 Table 3.12. Data analysis techniques and purposes for Pilot test .............................84 Table 3.13. Synthesis of data analysis methods for the main research .....................85 Table 4.1. Discriptive analysis of Sample .................................................................99 Table 4.2. ANOVA for Customer experience.........................................................101 Table 4.3. Outer loadings of ‘Customer engagement behavior’ scale ....................104 Table 4.4. Convergent validity of ‘Customer engagement behavior’ scale ............105 Table 4.5. HTMT value of ‘Customer engagement behavior’ scale .......................105 Table 4.6. HTMT confidence interval of ‘Customer engagement behavior’ .........106 Table 4.7. Convergent testing results of ‘Customer experience’ scale ..................107 Table 4.8. Convergent validity of Constructs .........................................................109 Table 4.9 Correlations and Discriminant validity of Constructs ............................111 Table 4.10 Path analysis results ..............................................................................113 Table 4.11. The results of mediation analysis .........................................................115 Table 4.12. Summary of Hypothesese test results for Structural model .................116
vi LIST OF FIGURES ...................................................................................................................................11 Figure 1.1 Categorize services by customer interaction ...........................................11 ...................................................................................................................................12 Figure 1.2 Quality evaluations for goods and services .............................................12 Figure 2.1 Customer experience framework .............................................................26 Figure 2.2. Conceptual model of Customer experience ...........................................27 Figure 2.3. Conceptual model of Customer engagement ..........................................33 Figure 2.5. Characteristics of the offering and actor focus .......................................37 Figure 2.6. Customer-dominant logic of service and service management ..............38 Figure 2.7. Proposed framework ...............................................................................44 Figure 3.1. Research framework and hypotheses .....................................................59 Figure 3.2. Research procedure .................................................................................63 Figure 4.1. Validity testing result of Customer engagement behavior ..................106 Figure 4.2. Validity testing result of Customer experience ...................................108 Figure 4.3. Relationships in Path analysis model ...................................................117
vii ABSTRACT The primary purpose of this study is to explain how and when customer experience benefits the company. Built upon Customer-Dominant Logic, Social Identity theory and Need for cognition, the study propose that customer experience leads to customer engagement behavior via two routes: customer-firm and customer-employee identification. Furthermore, the study advances that customers’ epistemic motivation negatively moderates the mediated effect of customer experience on customer engagement behavior. The methodologies used for the research is a combinition of qualitative and quantitative technique. A survey method was employed for the two studies by recruiting female consumers of beauty salons in Vietnam. The results demonstrated that customer experience quality as a measurement for customer experience applies to the context of the study and provided empirical support for the hypotheses. This research found that customer experience identification positively influences customer engagement behavior mediated by customer-firm and customer- employee identification. Furthermore, this research revealed that customer epistemic motivation negatively moderates the mediated effect of customer experience on customer engagement behavior via customer-employee identification. However, the moderating role of customer epistemic motivation is insignificant for the mediated relationship via customer-firm identification. Finally, this research offers theoretical and practical contributions that are elaborated and further discussed. Keywords: Customer experience, Social identity theory, Customer-dominant logic theory, Need for cognition theory, customer engagement behavior, beauty service
viii TÓM TẮT Mục đích chính của nghiên cứu là giải thích khi nào trải nghiệm khách hàng mang lại lợi ích cho công ty và cách nó mang lại. Mô hình nghiên cứu được đề xuất từ ba thuyết đó là Thuyết sự thống trị khách hàng, bản sắc xã hội và nhu cầu nhận thức trong đó trải nghiệm khách hàng dẫn đến hành vi gắn kết khách hàng thông qua trung gian sự nhận diện khách hàng-nhân viên và sự nhận diện khách hàng-tổ chức. Luận án đã kết hợp cả hai phương pháp nghiên cứu định tính và định lượng. Một cuộc khảo sát đã được thực hiện cho hai nghiên cứu (sơ bộ và chính thức) bằng cách tuyển dụng những khách hàng nữ của các thẩm mỹ viện tại Việt Nam. Kết quả chứng minh rằng cấu trúc thang đo trải nghiệm khách hàng có thể áp dụng và hỗ trợ thực nghiệm trong bối cảnh dịch vụ thẩm mỹ tại Việt nam. Kết quả nghiên cứu cũng cho thấy trải nghiệm khách hàng ảnh hưởng tích cực đến hành vi gắn kết khách hàng khi có vai trò trung gian của nhận diện khách hàng-nhân viên và nhận diện khách hàng-tổ chức. Hơn nữa, nghiên cứu còn chỉ ra rằng động cơ nhận thức điều tiết tiêu cực tới mối quan hệ gián tiếp giữa trải nghiệm và hành vi gắn kết khách hàng thông qua trung gian nhận diện khách hàng-nhân viên. Tuy nhiên, vai trò điều tiết của động cơ nhận thức khách hàng là không đáng kể đối với mối quan hệ gián tiếp qua trung gian nhận diện khách hàng- tổ chức. Cuối cùng, kết quả nghiên cứu được thảo luận kỹ lưỡng để đưa ra một số đóng góp cả về lý thuyết và thực tiễn. Từ khóa: Trải nghiệm khách hàng, Thuyết nhận diện xã hội, Thuyết sự thống trị khách hàng, Thuyết nhu cầu nhận thức, hành vi gắn kết khách hàng, dịch vụ thẩm mỹ.
1 CHAPTER 1 - RESEARCH OVERIEW Chapter 1 is an overview of the research is introduced with the main content: the research topic and a concise background following by a dilemma statement, research questions, research objectives, scope and limitations, research context and the significance and structure of the dissertation. 1.1. Precursors and rationales of the research Competition in a global market has been increasingly challenging, including within the service sector (Gentile, Spiller, and Noci, 2007). Thus service companies need to ensure their competitive advantages (Lovelock, Patterson, and Wirtz, 2015). Service researchers have suggested customer experience is now becoming vital competitive advantages a service company can pursue (Lemon and Verhoef, 2016; Gentile, Spiller and Noci, 2007; Pine and Gilmore, 1998). In the same vein, service companies have realized the importance of improving customer experience, such as by putting customer experience as the top priority of the company as well as assigning executives to specifically handle customer experience management (Lemon and Verhoef, 2016; De Keyser, et al., 2020). There are multiple touchpoints pre- consuming, action, and post-consuming a service, and they are all equally important. At any touchpoint, a bad experience can derail an organization's efforts to offer an impressive customer experience (Rawson and Jones, 2013; De Keyser, et al., 2020; Siqueira, et al., 2020). Designing an effective customer experience means generating revenue for the business, preventing competitors from capturing the business' loyal customers, creating customer engagement and a distinctive culture for business (Thakur, 2016; Homburg, et al., 2017). According to a recent report from Acquia – Closing the Customer Experience Gap: Customer Experience Trends Report 2019 – globally, more than three-quarters (76%) of consumers switch to a brand competitor after just one bad experience (Brown, 2019). Your business will witness significant performance improvements across the top and bottom-line, if businesses focus effectively on the customer experience (Brown, 2019). Customer experience is conceptually defined as an internal and subjective response, including cognitive and affective responses, that customers have direct or indirect contact (Meyer and
2 Schwager, 2007; De Keyser, et al., 2020). Understanding customer experience helps executives design their services (Pullman and Gross, 2004; Teixeira, et al., 2012). In this competitive era, consumers desire more than just products or services, but they seek unique and memorable experiences and hence, understanding customer experience becomes critical to sustaining the company's competitive advantage (Stein and Ramaseshan, 2016; Pine and Gilmore, 1998) Besides, previous studies have empirically demonstrated the effect of customer experience on several positive outcomes (Pine and Gilmore, 1998; Klaus and Maklan, 2012 ; Mascarenhas, Kesavan and Bernacchi, 2006; Pullman and Gross, 2004). Companies respond to customers and form markets by designing and offering unique experiences that give them with a competitive advantage and lead to favorable business outcomes (e.g., customer retention and profitability) (Bolton, et al., 2009; Verhoef, et al., 2009). Positive customer experience emotions are the link to positive outcomes (e.g., satisfaction and repurchase behavior) and negative emotions to negative consumption outcomes (e.g., dissatisfaction and avoidance behavior) (Holbrook and Batra, 1987; Russell, Weiss and Mendelsohn, 1989). Customer experience is expected to significantly influence business performance (Prahalad and Ramaswamy, 2004), particularly on marketing outcomes (Camarero, 2007). The creation of positive customer experiences is related to successful performanceoutcomes (Rose, et al., 2012). Thus, understanding customer experience is essential. Today, modern marketing is much concerned with brand/ customer engagement (Kumar, 2019; Khan, et al., 2020; Pansari & Kumar, 2016; Meire, et al., 2019; Rather, 2020; Jessen, et al., 2020). Exploring the factors affecting customer engagement is important both academically and practically (Kumar, 2019; So, 2016). Previous studies have focused on debating the conceptual structure of customer engagement (Dwivedi, 2015; Hollebeek, 2011b; Hollebeek, 2014; So, 2016). The results of previous empirical studies are still limited, especially testing variables that play the role of antecedents of customer engagement (Dwivedi, 2015; France, et al., 2016; Hollebeek, 2014). The key question for the thesis: whether customer experience is the antecedence of customer engagement/ customer engagement is the
3 consequence of customer experience? How is the relationship? It is very necessary to focus on exploiting this relationship. In the process of creating and providing services, the customer is no longer an outsider; they often contribute in it as “partial employees” (Groth, 2005). In this changing role, the customer influences the firm's production efficiency and service quality and engages in active voluntary behaviors, such as customer citizenship behavior (Keh and Teo, 2001). Social identity theory is defined as "a part of an individual's self-conception is rooted in his knowledge of membership of a social group along with the attached emotional meaning. as a member (Tajfel, 1974). From this perspective, Dholakia, et al., (2004) argued that social identity is a defining motivation for consumers to recognize themselves as members of online communities, satisfy their fundamental social needs, and maintain positive social identity by engaging in social behaviors for the groups to which they belong to. And Brewer, (1991) stated that people tend to define themselves by identifying with the groups they belong to and will struggle to improve the group’s status. The higher the level of Customer company identification, the more likely it is that consumers will ponder themselves as part of the organization and show positive attitudes and behaviors to help the companies achieve its goals (Ran and Zhou, 2019). Therefore, the research bases on Social Identity Theory to propose the mediators for the relationship between customer experience and customer engagement. Kruglanski and Webster (1996) described that individuals have differences in their dispositional need for cognitive closure (NFC). Calogero, et al., (2009) conceptualized the NFC as an epistemic motive that is related to the reasons and behavior that people search for information in their social environments. And the reasons and behavior differ in individuals according to their motivation for information processing and judgment (Webster and Kruglanski, 1994; Kossowska, 2002; Leone and Chirumbolo, 2008). People with high NFC have a dislike for ambiguity and therefore low epistemic motivation, these people can be characterized as having a preference for quick decision-making, command and predictability, and are closed-minded. In contrast, people with low NFC showed a higher tolerance to ambiguity and therefore a high epistemic motivation. They prefer slow decision-
4 making, indecision, diversity, and openness (Kruglanski and Webster, 1996). Facial expressions play an essential role in interpersonal interactions, research on emotional infection has reported that emotional expressions can elicit affective reactions in others (Hatfield, et al., 1992). People frequently anticipate or predict the behavior of others and facial expressions are an important source of these predictions (Frith and Frith, 2007; Alguacil, et al., 2017). Van Kleef, et al., (2009) has recommended that people with low epistemic motivation directly base their behavior on their affective state that is suggested by the emotional expressions of others. Hence, in the present study explored the customers’ personal-characteristic, that is their motivation to process cues related to the beauty services. Customer experience has become increasingly important for service businesses that see it as a force of sustainable competitive advantage, and for service designers, who ponder it fundamental to any service design project (Teixeira, et al., 2012). Experiential marketing is emerging as a new marketing strategy as something to satisfy consumers' emotional desires with an sensational and memorable feeling or experience even in the beauty services industry (Jeon, 2013). In recent years, the experiential marketing research has been actively carried out in the cultural industry, the fashion industry, the cultural content industry and design industry, etc., for the most part while the experiential marketing elements such as sense, feelings, thoughts, actions and relationships (Schmitt, 1999). While the experiential marketing researches targeting cosmetics has been performed a great deal recently even in the beauty industry, the researches targeting beauty salons are performing research partially such as emotion or relation marketing and the situation is that the experiential marketing researches examined comprehensively are almost nonexistent (Jeon, 2013). 1.2. Research gaps Despite the prevalent research on the customer experience within the service industry, a closer look at the literature reveals a critical gap in this research. First, the literature on customer experience focuses on examining what makes customer experience (Alnawas and Hemsley-Brown, 2019; Quach, et al., 2020; Chylinski, et al., 2020). However, prior studies have suggested that the way customer experience products or
5 services varies across contexts (e.g., industry or cultural context) (Verhoef, et al., 2009; Shobeiri, Mazaheri and Laroche, 2018; Hwang and Seo, 2016). For example, playfulness, aesthetics, and service excellence are more valued by the US customers than by Chinese counterparts (Shobeiri, Mazaheri and Laroche, 2018). Therefore, researchers continuously attempt to develop a global measure of customer experience that needs to be validated over different contexts, but these studies have focused on financial services (Rose, et al., 2012; Klaus, et al., 2013; Garg, et al., 2014; Fernandes, and Pinto, 2019). Klaus and Maklan (2012) conceptualized and developed a measure for customer experience which involves four dimensions that represent a perceptual or higher-order perception such as, product experience, outcome focus, moments-of- truth, and peace-of-mind, despite its potential, it has not been widely tested empirically. The author found only two studies that investigated this concept in different service contexts: mortgage and hotel industry (Klaus and Maklan, 2012; Lemon and Verhoef, 2016), while previous studies have also suggested that customers experience of a product or service is different across different contexts (Verhoef, et al., 2009; Shobeiri, Mazaheri and Laroche, 2018; Hwang and Seo, 2016). Thus, the application of the “customer experience” conceptual structure of Klaus and Maklan (2012) for this reseach aims to examine its scales applicability in the context of beauty services in Vietnam and to propose managerial implications more detailed and comprehensive is needed. Second, amongst the existing research, little attention has been given to understand customer’s aspects and the service context that translates customer experience to positive outcomes for the companies (Teixeira, et al., 2012; Klaus and Maklan, 2012) but only examine customer experience as a factor affecting commitment, perception, and behavior (Khan, Garg and Rahman, 2015; Klaus and Maklan, 2012; Klaus, et al., 2013; Sharma and Chaubey, 2014; Garg, Rahman and Qureshi, 2014; Van Doornetal, 2010; Rose, et al., 2012; Keiningham, et al., 2017; Kumar, et al., 2019; Kuo and Chen, 2015; Sari and Wijaya, 2019; Karnowati and Astuti, 2020); Heo and Kim, 2016). Thus, this research is crucial to understand the mechanism and condition that translate customer experience into positive company outcomes. As customer-engagement behavior represents various consumers’ actions
6 that benefit the companies, the use of a multi-dimensional conceptual structure to examine the relationship between customer experience and customer engagement behavior deemed necessary because the outcome is more inclusive (Roy, et al., 2020; Ng, et al., 2020). Third, some previous studies had examined its effect on customer engagement behavior, but their research approaches through different theoretical background, not Social Identity Theory (Libaietal, 2010; Brodie, et al., 2011; Kumar, Peterson and Leone, 2010); Kumar, et al., 2013; Hollebeek, Glynn and Brodie, 2014; Bueno, et al., 2019). In other words, more studies are needed to understand how customer- experience can result in customer-engagement behavior with the new approach. Further, customer experience is not produced by the companies but is formed, it is important to understand what personal aspects of customers that influence their responses toward companies’ offerings and touch points (Heinonen and Strandvik, 2015; Heninonen, et al., 2010). Personal aspects of customers were found in the research results of Mann and Rawat, (2016) which are extraversion personality, conscientiousness and openness. According to social identity theory, when customers value their interactions with the company and the service staff, they are more likely to identify with the company and the service staff, this identification can be demonstrated through their post-experience behavior (Mael and Ashforth, 1992; Hong and Yang, 2009). During the process of customers experiencing the service, meaning that they are contributing and co-producing to jointly create profits for the business, the customer motivation factor is indispensable. This study also built upon Customer dominant logic and Need for cognition theory to focus an individual aspect that is related to individual cognitive framework, that is motivation (D'Andrade, 1992; Singer and Salovey, 1996). Particularly, this study focuses on customer epistemic motivation, individual’s motivation to develop a rich and accurate understanding of one’s current situation (Wang Ze, et al., 2017; Cote and Hideg, 2011). Finally, beauty service is also defined as personal service shown by marketing literature in which customer experience plays an important role in co-producing service outcome (Konishi, 2016). Konishi (2016) classifies services into two groups:
7 group one is that customers evaluate service quality based on the service's credibility such as medical, repair, legal services, ...; group two is that customers evaluate service quality based on customer experience such as beauty care services, resorts, restaurants, tourism, ..., from this classification, it shows that beauty services belong to the second group. It also confirms that customer experience is extremely important in beauty services, but has not found any researches of beauty services that examine aspects of the mechanism and condition that translate customer experience into positive company outcomes in generally and in Vietnam particularly. Therefore, the research has decided to choose beauty services in Vietnam to conduct the study. 1.3. Research aims Applied within the beauty service context in Vietnam, this research aims to validate the scale of customer experience as well as examining the mechanism and conditions that link customer experience and customer engagement behavior. Building upon Customer-Dominant Logic (Heinonen and Strandvik, 2015; Heninonen, et al., 2010), the Social Identity Theory within the consumer context (Lam, et al., 2010; He, Li and Harris, 2012), the Need for Cognition (Cacioppo, Petty, and Morris, 1983; Xiao, et al., 2021, Su, et al., 2021), this research proposed that customer experience leads to customer engagement behavior as mediated by customer-employee as well as customer-company identification and customer engagement behavior. In addition, this relationship between customer experience and customer engagement behavior is moderated by customer epistemic motivation. Below, this research elaborated the proposed research framework that can be divided into three main sections: (1) The mediating role of customer-employee identification on the relationship between customer experience and customer engagement behavior, (2) the mediating role of customer-company identification on the relationship between customer experience and customer engagement behavior, (3) the conditional role of customer epistemic motivation on the indirect relationship between customer experience and customer engagement behavior. Subsequently, the development of the formal hypotheses, methodology, results and general discussion will be presented and discussed.
8 1.4. Research objectives and questions Relating to the aim of the research showed in section (1.2), the following research questions/objectives are formulated with expected solutions. Objective 1: Determine whether customer engagement behavior is the outcome of customer experience in the beauty service context. The two corresponding research questions developed were: 1.1 Is customer engagement behavior the outcome of customer experience in the beauty service context? 1.2 How does customer experience effect customer engagement behavior in the beauty service context? Objective 2: Examine the mediating roles of customer-firm and customer-employee identification in the relationship between customer experience and customer engagement behavior of the beauty service context. The two corresponding research questions developed were: 2.1 Are customer-firm and customer-employee identification the mediators in the relationship between customer experience and customer engagement behavior of the beauty service context ? 2.2 How are the mediating roles of customer-firm and customer-employee identification in the relationship between customer experience and customer engagement behavior of the beauty service context? Objective 3: Examine the moderating roles of customer epistemic motivation in the indirect relationship between customer experience and customer engagement behavior of the beauty service context. The two corresponding research questions developed were: 3.1 Does customer epistemic motivation play the moderating role in the relationship between customer experience and customer engagement behavior of the beauty service context? 3.2 How is the moderating role of customer epistemic motivation in the relationship between customer experience and customer engagement behavior of the beauty service context?
9 Objective 4: Identifying the demographic variables control customer engagement behavior in the beauty service context. The corresponding research question developed was: 4.1 Which demographic variables control customer engagement behavior in the beauty service context? Objective 5: Provide recommendations to increasing customer engagement in the beauty service context. The corresponding research question developed was: 5.1 What recommendations for the managers on the mechanism that translate customer experience to customer engagement behavoir, especially in the beauty service industry? 1.5. Research context The beauty service industry involves businesses that offer services to help people with their best appearance. The fact that beauty services provide emotional as well as physical benefits add to their service value. That is one of the reasons that the beauty industry is always growing sustainably, almost never falling back. Even during the most recent economic recession, beauty businesses remained stronger (Professional Beauty Association, 2020). According to a report of the Global Welness Institute (2018), the global healthcare industry grew 12.8% in the period 2015-2017, from 3.700 billion to a market of 4.200 billion USD. In particular, the beauty industry is quite prominent with an increase of 8% per year, with a scale of approximately $ 100 billion. Looking back at the beauty industry statistics comprehensively, investors are extremely excited because business results in recent years have only increased, not decreased. The global beauty industry is worth more than 500 billion USD, the US market alone accounted for 93.5 billion in 2019; the global skin care market is worth nearly 135 billion USD; Growing rapidly and dynamically, new products and services appear on the market every day. Also according to the growth statistics of the beauty industry, the number of employees in the services segment is expected to increase by 10% for barbers, hairdressers, estheticians and nearly 22% for massage therapists in 2024. Asia is the fastest growing beauty market after Europe. Particularly in Vietnam, in recent years, cosmetic brands, beauty salons, and spas have sprung up and the sense of beauty