Studies On The Relationship Between Social Cues In The Servicescape And Customers’Behavioral Intention

As an important component of service environment, servicescape has a significant influence in the customer’s service experience. Former researches on servicescape always focus on the effect and influence of physical cues. As the rational consumption demand transfers to emotional, the impact of social cues is more and more important. Customers in the servicescape always have positive emotions and high perceived service quality because of the social cues. For further exploration, this study adds scene impression and self-congruence to the action mechanism of social cues in the servicescape and the customer’s behavioral intention. A questionnaire survey was conducted to collect the data, which were then analyzed by use of structure equation model. The results show that the social cues embedded in the servicescape have a positive effect on engendering a immediate perceived impression. This immediate scene impression will significantly affect the customer’s actual/ideal self-congruence, improve the customer’s positive emotions, enhance the customer’s perceived service quality, and thus will strengthen the customer’s purchase intention and repatronage intention. At the same time, consumption types (hedonic shopping and utilitarian shopping) has a significant moderating effect on the relationship between social cues and scene impression. The conclusion provides a new perspective for the managers, emphasizes that elegant environment and professional and intimate service are important marketing methods to attract and keep customers, to meet the demand of customers well, to improve the customer’s positive emotions and perceived service quality, to deepen the service place’s identity, and then to spur the purchase decision.