An Evaluation of Moderating Variable of “Physical Distance” among Customers on Social Servicescape and Place Attachment: Impact of Customer Loyalty in the Context of Hotel Indusrty

Abstract

Customer loyalty is undeniably a significant issue in service organizations. The retention issues, especially in the hotel, are becoming challenging due to the postbreak pandemic of Covid-19. Even though Malaysia is recognized as one of the countries in the fastest recovery from this pandemic, it has given a massive impact on the hospitality industry in the coming years. The widespread movement order control (MOC) and social distance initiatives to minimize the transmission of fast spread virus in the neighboring countries, including Malaysia, have changed how the service organization operates and how customers behave that created uncertainty in future tourism. Hence this study is attempting to develop on customers’ loyalty framework for the hotel industry by considering how physical distance moderates the relationship between people's indirect interaction (social servicescape) and emotional attachment (place identity). Also, how this emotional attachment mediates the relationship between social servicescape and customer loyalty, overall, this conceptual paper could demonstrate the critical elements of social servicescape in contributing customer loyalty even in the existence of physical distance among people. In a further study, the PLS-SEM method is appropriate to analyze the proposed relationships.