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Title:
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MIND THE GAP! ARE LOCAL RETAILERS MISINTERPRETING CUSTOMER EXPECTATIONS REGARDING DIGITAL SERVICES? |
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Author(s):
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Lars Michael Bollweg, Richard Lackes, Markus Siepermann, Peter Weber |
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ISBN:
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978-989-8533-42-5 |
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Editors:
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Mário Macedo, Claire Gauzente, Miguel Baptista Nunes and Guo Chao Peng |
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Year:
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2015 |
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Edition:
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Single |
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Keywords:
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Local Commerce, SERVQUAL, gap-theory, shopping-convenience, buying decision |
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Type:
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Full Paper |
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First Page:
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111 |
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Last Page:
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117 |
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Language:
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English |
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Cover:
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Full Contents:
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click to dowload 
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Paper Abstract:
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The owner-operated stationary retail industry is in a phase of intense transformation. Digitalization and e-commerce are questioning the traditional retail business models. A conducted survey in a German city points out that local retailers are aware of the importance of digitalization for their businesses in future, but nonetheless do not think that their customers actually expect sophisticated digital services by them. In contrast to these findings, another recent study for the same city just revealed that 45% of all asked customers have already changed their buying behavior towards online retail. In this context, this paper uses the SERVQUAL Gap-Model by Zeithaml et al. (1985) to classify and interpret these observations. Shopping-convenience (e.g. time saving) is a known key factor for the buying decision and for the channel choice of customers, but local retailers do not seem to be fully aware of the changing expectations of their customers in this regard. If so, they run the risk of losing sight of the continuously developing digitalization-based business model innovations and the accordingly changing customer expectations which would inevitably weaken their competitive position. |
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