An emotion-based segmentation of bank service customers

Purpose: Emotional and affective responses are experienced during service use that determine customer behavior; and for this reason, bank services require an better understanding of the emotions customers feel in service experiences. This research aims to examine whether different customer segments exist in the bank services industry, based on the emotions they experience when using the service. Design/methodology/approach: The factors were examined through confirmatory factor analysis (CFA). Then, two-step clustering analysis was developed for customer segmentation on data from 451 bank service customers. Finally, an Anova test was conducted to confirm the differences among the obtained customer segments. Findings: Our findings show that the emotion-based segmentation is meaningful in terms of behavioral outcomes in bank services. Further, research findings indicate that bank service customers cannot be perceived as a homogenous group, since four customer clusters emerge from our research namely “angry complainers”, “pragmatic uninvolved”, “emotionally attached customers” and “happy satisfied customers”. Research limitations/implications: Our findings show that the emotion-based segmentation is meaningful in terms of behavioral outcomes in bank services. Further, research findings indicate that bank service customers cannot be perceived as a homogenous group, since four customer clusters emerge from our research namely “angry complainers”, “pragmatic uninvolved”, “emotionally attached customers” and “happy satisfied customers”, being the “angry complainers” the most challenging customer group. Originality/value: The study is the first one to specifically segment bank customers based on the emotions they experience when using the service.