Modelling Customer Satisfaction for Business Services

Abstract

Research in the area of business services, which include marketing research companies, advertising agencies and consulting firms, has concentrated on service quality, relationship quality, and overall customer satisfaction. In some of the best known models which connect these concepts, customer satisfaction is modelled as a function of customer expectations and perceived quality. Little research has been done, however, to explain the development of relationships between businesses and business services over time. Additionally, research in this area has been almost non-existent in the transition countries. Our study proposes a customer satisfaction model with an integrated time component to be tested on the transition country data. The relationship quality in our model is expected to be paramount for customer satisfaction, loyalty and the long-term success of business services.