Title: The moderating role of relationship quality in the customer engagement and satisfaction relationship in brand communities: the role of gender

Authors: Matti J. Haverila; Kai Haverila; Caitlin McLaughlin

Addresses: Thompson Rivers University, Kamloops, British Columbia, Canada ' Concordia University, Montreal, Quebec, Canada ' Thompson Rivers University, Kamloops, British Columbia, Canada

Abstract: The purpose of this research was to examine the relationships between customer engagement, customer satisfaction and relationship quality in brand communities. Specifically, the moderating role of the relationship quality construct was examined first for the whole dataset, and then for the male and female respondents. The respondents were members of brand communities who originated from Canada and the USA. Partial least squares structural equation modelling (PLS-SEM) was utilised to analyse the relationships. The results indicate that the relationship between customer engagement and satisfaction is significant for both male and female respondents. However, the relationship between the relationship quality and customer satisfaction was significant in the whole dataset as well as for the male respondents, but not for the female respondents. Thus, the relationship quality construct moderated the customer engagement and customer satisfaction relationship only for the male respondents. The relationship quality has a different impact for males and females.

Keywords: brand community; customer satisfaction; customer engagement; relationship quality; gender.

DOI: 10.1504/IJEMR.2021.118294

International Journal of Electronic Marketing and Retailing, 2021 Vol.12 No.4, pp.339 - 356

Received: 27 Aug 2019
Accepted: 14 Feb 2020
Published online: 20 Oct 2021 *

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