Expectations, Industry Standards, And Customer Satisfaction In The Student Ticketing Process, pp. 7-14

T. Christopher Greenwell

This study explores the effects of expectations and industry standards on customer satisfaction in the student ticketing process in intercollegiate athletics. Data were collected from 378 students attending three NCAA Division I institutions, and an experimental design was used to determine which type of expectations best predicted customer satisfaction/dissatisfaction and how information about industry standards affected satisfaction levels. Findings suggest sport customers make satisfaction judgments based on what they think should be in a policy rather than what they think will be in a policy, indicating marketers need to work to understand what students would ideally want in a ticket policy. Further, students’ dissatisfaction lessened when presented with additional information about how the policy fit within industry standards; therefore, sport marketers need to educate sport consumers about industry standards in order to keep them from developing unreal expectations.