Service quality of sports centers and customer loyalty
Asia Pacific Journal of Marketing and Logistics
ISSN: 1355-5855
Article publication date: 11 September 2017
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to establish the effects of service quality of sports centers on customer loyalty and intention to adhere to exercise.
Design/methodology/approach
In total, 500 questionnaires were distributed to five sports centers located in the city of Seoul, of which 472 were returned and used in the data analysis. The collected data were subjected to frequency analysis, exploratory factor analysis, a reliability test, and structural equation model analysis using SPSS 21.0 and AMOS 18.0.
Findings
The results show that, first, service quality, comprising the two factors of the facilities of sports centers and instructors, positively influences customer loyalty. Second, the service quality of sports centers positively influences the intention to adhere to exercise, and, third, so does customer loyalty.
Practical implications
Management needs to make more efforts to strengthen service quality, comprising facilities and instructors, in order to increase customer loyalty, represented by the sense of closeness with and attachment of customers using sports centers, as well as to increase the need for exercise.
Originality/value
Previous studies on the service quality of sports centers have been limited to customer satisfaction, customer trust, reuse intention, recommendations to others, consumption behavior, and relationship commitment. Since the research on the direct relationship between service quality of sports centers and exercise adherence is still limited, this study provides data and implications relevant to the management of sports centers by investigating the relationship among service quality of sports centers, customer loyalty, and intention to adhere to exercise.
Keywords
Citation
Lee, S.Y. (2017), "Service quality of sports centers and customer loyalty", Asia Pacific Journal of Marketing and Logistics, Vol. 29 No. 4, pp. 870-879. https://doi.org/10.1108/APJML-10-2016-0191
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2017, Emerald Publishing Limited