奖励对顾客网络口碑的影响与替代手段的寻求——以餐饮企业的点评返现活动为例

Do Rewards Impact Electronic WOM? A Study on the Effects of Monetary Incentives on Restaurant Customers'eWOM Behavior

文章以餐饮企业的点评返现活动为例,从顾客行为规范的角度,通过3组实验探讨不同奖励情况下奖励口碑相对于自然口碑在量、值和质3个维度上的变化规律,寻求奖励的替代手段。研究表明:(1)奖励启动了市场规范,使原先自然口碑下占据主导的社会规范被挤出。在市场规范下,顾客更加关注与企业之间的交易关系,进而有效地促进口碑值的增加,同时也更为在意奖励是否为其口碑劳动提供了足够的补偿,这导致口碑量与口碑质之间出现了此长彼消的情况,难以兼得。(2)基于市场规范的思想,采用提高奖励金额的方法增强顾客的口碑行为意愿,虽然最终能够解决上述矛盾,实现口碑量、值和质的全面提升,可也为之付出了相当高的成本。(3)相比之下,采取服务人员请求的方法从社会规范的路径上强化顾客对于口碑社会价值的认知,使口碑的量—质矛盾问题得以化解,并意外地使口碑值也获得了增加,说明从行为绩效的角度来看,社会规范与市场规范并无绝对的优劣,合理地利用社会规范同样可以实现口碑管理目标。

Electronic WOM（eWOM） has become a very important information source for consumption decision,especially when purchasing experience（vs.search） goods,such as restaurants and hotels.This is because consumers are unable to get accurate quality information before consuming the experience goods,which therefore enhances the importance of WOM information in decision making.Marketers nowadays have gradually realized the critical role of WOM and become more actively in WOM management.One of the most widely adopted managing strategies is rewarding consumer for engaging in WOM,i.e.,the referral reward program（RRP）.Taken restaurant as an example,this research aims to examine the effect of monetary incentives on consumer WOM in terms of quantity,value,and quality.The current research also investigates into the underlying mechanism through which rewarding impacts consumer WOM.A total of 3 experiments were conducted to test the hypotheses.Experiments 1 tested the main effect of monetary incentives on consumer WOM and found that rewarding effectively enhanced consumer WOM value of the restaurant.However,results demonstrated a＂seesaw effect＂of rewarding on the quantity and quality of WOM.Specifically,rewarding increased the WOM quantity while reducing the quality of WOM in the meantime.Study 1 further showed that rewarding manifested the role of market norm rather than social norm followed by consumers engaging in WOM.Experiments 2 further found that increasing incentives,which intensified the market norm,can only solve the quantityquality conflict when there was a quality requirement.Without the quality control,higher incentives only enhanced WOM quantity and value,but not WOM quality.Experiments 3 aimed to figure out a more effective and economic alternative for rewarding WOM.Results suggested that a request from employees,by emphasizing the social norm,successfully enhanced the quantity,value,and quality of consumer WOM.By investigating eWOM from a more comprehensive perspective as well as highlighting the important roles of market and social norm,these findings contribute to research on consumer WOM behaviors while also providing practical suggestions to marketers for effective WOM management.