Investigating the relationship between shopping mall patronage motives and customer satisfaction using importance-satisfaction analysis

Abstract

Satisfying shoppers is crucial for a mall manager. To do this he/she must focus on attributes of importance to customers, or else he/she may waste resources on improving attributes that matter less. Importance-satisfaction analysis has a useful place in this regard. Therefore, this study identifies the importance-satisfaction gaps in the patronage attributes of shopping malls, as mall shoppers in the UAE perceive them. The author reviews different models of importance-satisfaction analysis and finds hortcomings in the four quadrant model and the diagonal model. To overcome these shortcomings, importance-satisfaction gap analysis is used and the author concludes that there are negative satisfaction gaps for most of the patronage attributes of shopping malls. Improvements should be directed to filling these gaps.