Virginie P. Khare

This study answers the call for further research in the services of marketing (Javalgi & White, 2002; Knight, 1999; Shankarmahesh, 2006). It strives to fill the need to study whether traditional 'product' theories would easily apply to the marketing of services, and to evaluate the importance of culture and country-specific influences in marketing services internationally. Additionally, it addresses the issue of developing measurements of quality dimensions for services, and the development of a model incorporating culture, country of origin effects and ethnocentric tendencies. The focus of the current study is the marketing of foreign services. This investigation specifically tests whether consumer ethnocentrism, country of origin cues, and experience with a foreign service will actually influence the decision to use a foreign service. Consumer ethnocentrism and experience with a foreign service are hypothesized to be influenced by customer sophistication and global openness. Relationships between consumer ethnocentrism, experience with a foreign service provider, image of a foreign service provider, and intention to use a foreign service are also hypothesized. Services under study will include fast food restaurants, airlines, credit card companies, banks, and insurance firms. Data was collected through a survey conducted in India. A non-probability quota sample of consumers was selected to answer face-to-face interviews. Path analysis using structural equation modeling was used to analyze the data. Ten of this study's thirteen hypotheses were supported by the data. Age, customer sophistication, and global openness are significant variables when analyzing foreign services in India. Consumer ethnocentrism was not found to be very significant in influencing Indian consumers' purchase decisions of a foreign service. Intention to use a foreign service is positively influenced by both experience with foreign service providers and image of foreign service providers. These findings emphasize the importance of creating a positive image for one's service to attract potential consumers, whether they are ethnocentric or not. However, findings varied slightly among the services included in this study, especially between fast-food restaurants, a "mass-service", and more professional services, such as banks.