Roles of customer involvement in rapport and satisfaction

Purpose – The study investigates different roles (antecedent, mediator and moderator roles) of customer involvement in rapport and satisfaction. It is also designed to reveal the comparative impact of three types of relational benefits (confidential, social and special treatment benefits) on customer involvement. Design/methodology/approach – Structural equation modeling (using Amos) is used for analyzing the data, collected from a survey of 212 sample respondents of the private commercial banking sector. Findings – Results suggest that customer involvement does have antecedent and mediated influence on rapport-satisfaction link while the moderation impact of customer involvement is not supported. In contrast, social treatment benefit is found as the most important relational benefit for developing customer involvement in Bangladesh followed by confidence and special treatment benefit. Research limitations/implications – Findings will assist bank management to set effective future strategies and to manage successful relationships with customers in order to motivate customer satisfaction with the bank. But the study may suffer from lack of generalization and poor sample representation as it focuses on a single country (Bangladesh) and a single industry (banking sector). Originality/value – The paper for the first time attempts to reveal antecedent, mediator and moderator role of customer involvement in rapport and satisfaction. It also identifies the level of importance among three relational benefits for Bangladeshi bank customers.