B-SERVQUAL: B2B시장에서의 서비스품질 척도 개발

Abstract

Recently the necessity and importance of service has been increasing more and more according to change the focus of business from the manufacturing industry to the service industry. Much interest in service rises in B2B market and importance of evaluating service quality is recognized. However, the study of service quality specialized for B2B market is insufficient. Accordingly, the purpose of this article is to deepen our understanding of concept of buyer perceived service quality when establishing relationships in the B2B market. Therefore, it need to investigate how business customers who purchase B2B services evaluate the service quality through the qualitative and quantitative research as the first step of developing the scale to measure B2B service quality. We began this research with two main objectives: (1) develop the service quality scale to facilitate assessments of service quality in B2B and (2) investigate relation between the service quality scale and business relationship quality concepts such as relationship satisfaction and trust. This study carried out the comparative analysis against the measured items of previous researches and the contents acquired from the qualitative research. Various different measuring items and aspects related with service quality evaluation can be drawn out through the in-depth interview with actual purchasing staffs. Regarding the measured items acquired from such comparative analysis, the definition of concept and items of questionnaire that reflect the concept well should be extracted with validity of contents verified by expert panel. After performing the pre-test with the filtered measuring items, the scale of service quality specialized for B2B service was developed after passing through survey with final measuring items. In our study, it could be recognized that the evaluation of aspect regarding process quality and convenience quality especially is important as well as technical quality that is emphasized in B2B market. And, the economic quality aspect that the previous researches neglected could be grasped. Collectively, the results of our analyses provide insights into the relationship between customers` perceptions of individual service quality dimensions and their relationship quality concepts such as relationship satisfaction and trust. Convenience quality plays a key role in driving customers to satisfy the relationship with the service supplier, and process quality has relatively much effect on trust with the service supplier. In addition, service quality relatively influences relationship satisfaction much more in professional service trade, and service quality is more important factor to bring trust in industrial service trade. Our study suggests useful tool to evaluate and improve B2B relationship by developing B2B service quality measurement scale. B-SERVQUAL scale has new dimensions in service trade situation and can be used in both business service type, industrial service and professional service. To B2B service buyer, our scale help to select good service provider and the scale is new criteria to improve old service trade relation. In addition, service provider can know the needs of service buyers and manage service quality by using the scale.