Antecedents and consequences of online customer satisfaction: A holistic process perspective

- Post-purchase experiences are more important than pre- and purchase experience.
- Order fulfilment, ease of return, responsiveness are contributors to satisfaction.
- Customer satisfaction contributes to repurchase intention and word of mouth.
- Customer satisfaction does not contribute to willingness to pay more.

This paper examines the determinants and consequences of online customer satisfaction by considering the entire online shopping experience, based on data collected from our survey of UK consumers in 2016. We found evidence that post online purchase experiences including experiences with order fulfilment, ease of return and responsiveness of customer service are the most significant contributors to online customer satisfaction. Security assurance, customisation, ease of use, product information and ease of check-out, all have significant impact but at much lower levels. The effect of website appearance on customer satisfaction is not significant. Our findings show that online customer satisfaction leads to repurchase intention, and a likelihood of making positive recommendations to others, but not willingness to pay more. We also found the effects of product information, customisation, order fulfilment and responsiveness of customer service on customer satisfaction are stronger for experience products than search products, while there is no significant difference in the effects of other determinants for search products and experience products. Several theoretical and managerial implications are provided, based on our findings.