Exploratory study of service quality for online shopping

Abstract

Customer satisfaction and service quality are often treated together as functions of customer’s perceptions and expectations and research has shown that high service quality contribute significantly to profitability. Service quality is required to be first measured in order to improve the quality in a service organization. Service quality is measuring in order to have better understanding of its indispensable antecedent and consequences, and eventually ascertain methods for improving and measuring service quality in search for competitive advantage. The project objective of this study is to rank the dimensions of service quality that affect the customers’ expectation in online purchasing through Web 2.0 based in home business. A questionnaire used in this study sent to the respondents of Facebook and Blogspot which are two Web 2.0 based mediums that are chosen in this project. The measurements used were based on the widely accepted SERVQUAL model which is the most common method for measuring service quality. A descriptive statistics analysis was used to evaluate the level of service quality of online shopping through Web 2.0 based sites from the customers’ perspective. This study also examined the service quality gap by comparing customers’ expectations and their actual perceptions. The results of the study indicated that all of the service quality factors are important. Assurance was rated as the most important dimension followed by reliability, responsiveness, empathy and tangible.