The Quadratic Effect of Flow

 Flow can be described as a perceived state of effortless action, loss of time, and a sense
that the experience stands out as being exceptional compared to everyday life
 creating a commercially compelling website depends on facilitating a state of flow for
consumers and an important objective for marketers is to provide these opportunities
 On this basis, the Internet can be used as a tool to create and deliver unique and
memorable website-service experiences which contribute to the development of flow for
the consumer, as opposed to just facilitating transactions and the provision of
information.
 Lot of empirical work has confirmed that the inducing flow of experiences for consumers
in the online environment has a positive influence on website loyalty such as purchase
behavior, site revisits, and word of mouth referrals

The Relationship Between Flow and Loyalty

 Previous studies in offline environments have argued that people who experience flow
tend to want to replicate or re-experience that state. Therefore, a consumer who
experiences flow will seek to reengage and revisit the activity which delivered the flow
experience.

 For example, a direct outcome of flow during a website navigation session has been
found to be exploratory behavior which, in turn, will increase the amount of time spent at
the website

 Firm should satisfy the hygiene factors and only then try to invest in satisfying motivator factors
which will motivate them to be more loyal to the firm.
Exploring the role of Technology Readiness in Developing Trust and Loyalty
for E-services

 Technology readiness relates to an individual’s propensity to embrace new technology

Technology Readiness
Parasuraman defines TRI as “People’s propensity to embrace and use new technologies for
accomplishing goals in home life and at work”.

Technology readiness index measure an individual’s predisposition towards technology across

four dimensions:

(i) optimism (ii) innovativeness (iii) discomfort and (iv) insecurity.

TRI is basically “a state of mind resulting from mental enablers and inhibiters that collectively
determine a person’s predisposition to use new technologies”

Service Quality in E-services

As Fassnacht and Koese observes, “For the providers of electronic services, quality is the major
driving force to long-term success”. The origin of E-service quality as a concept can be traced to
the service quality concept itself. Several studies have attempted to describe e-service quality
over the past few years. Most of these studies have identified dimensions that represent various
facets of the customer’s interaction with eservices.
Trust in e-services

Trust has been considered as an important variable in the context of e-commerce (Hoffman, Novak and
Peralta, 1999). According to Lee and Turban (2001) one of the most frequently cited reasons for
consumers not purchasing from internet vendors is lack of trust. Urban et al (2000) has opined that
implementation of a technology like internet involves trust and therefore trust is very significant in e-
commerce.

Loyalty

Along with satisfaction and trust, e-loyalty has been considered in the context of e-services.
According to Srinivasan et al (2002, p.42), e-loyalty is a “customer’s favourable attitude towards
the e-retailer that results in repeat buying behaviour”. Chiou and Shen (2006) consider e-loyalty
as an outcome of satisfaction with the e-service provider in their study among users of internet
portals in Taiwan they found sufficient support for this association.