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Introduction
According to the service value chain model initiated by [14] Heskett et al. (1994), the services delivered by enterprises to their customers help improve customer satisfaction. However, it is crucial for the service sector to consider how to leave the customers a deep impression and memory regarding their intangible services. In other words, experiential marketing plays a much bigger role than ever before. From the perspective of experiential marketing developed by [26] Schmitt (1999b), experience can be divided into sense, feeling, thinking, acting, and relating. The experience refers to the complex psychological feelings of customers when faced with products and services ([9] Carbone, 2004), but the "experience" has the following characteristics:
- Heterogeneity: inconsistent sense and perception of different customers to external stimulation.
- External clues are more important than internal clues, especially in the service industry focusing on intangible service products: the intangible value for the customers is originated from external elements, such as physical environment and atmosphere, actual feeling in the participation and resonance of value outlook.
- Lag effect of value, i.e. time difference for the feedback of psychological value.
Generally speaking, the research on experience value focuses on:
- Application of the structural equation modeling (SEM) of [25] Schmitt (1999a), in particular to the planning and transfer of external clues ([23] Pine and Gilmore, 1998; [21] Moye and Kincade, 2002; [13] Hannam, 2004). For example, [19] Mathwick et al. (2002) used the cognitive continuum theory to describe the effect of retail shops' information on the economic value, shopping playfulness, and actions of customers during their shopping process.
- Comparison of different effects on the experience value of customers under various physical environments, such as the internet and the retail environment ([18], [19] Mathwick et al. , 2001, 2002).
- Assortment and construct evaluation of experience value.
For example, [15] Holbrook (1994) divided the experience value into extrinsic value (a value obtained from missions) and intrinsic value (self-perceived value of customers from personal experience or sense). [18] Mathwick et al. (2001) developed a measurement scale of experience value for retail customers in lieu of previous questionnaires.
The purpose of this paper is to discuss the issues from the following aspects:
- Previous researches were mainly devoted to value connotations obtained...