Not all words are beneficial: The impact of management response contents on customer engagement behavior

Zili Zhang, Hengyun Li, Yang Yang, Yukuan Xu

Research output: Journal article publicationJournal articleAcademic researchpeer-review

20 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

Online reviews play an important role in motivating hotels to enhance customer engagement through appropriate management responses. However, the impact of management responses on customer engagement remains unclear. With data from hotel reviews and management responses, this study demonstrates that customer engagement is significantly reduced when causal explanations and certain words are included in management responses, as indicated by the number of future reviews. We also observe that the negative influence of causal explanations can be alleviated when management responses contain uncertain words. Furthermore, management responses which include positive-emotional words attenuate the negative impact of causal explanations. However, no significant effect is found when negative-emotional words are used in management responses. These findings can help managers develop effective response strategies to facilitate customer engagement behavior.

Original languageEnglish
Article number102805
JournalInternational Journal of Hospitality Management
Volume93
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - Feb 2021

Keywords

  • Causal explanations
  • Certain words
  • Customer engagement
  • Emotional words
  • Management response content
  • Uncertain words

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Tourism, Leisure and Hospitality Management
  • Strategy and Management

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