From servicescape to “cyberscape” Available to Purchase

Following Bitner's well‐known “servicescape” model, the propensity of physical surroundings to facilitate organisational as well as marketing goals is now well researched. Their importance is, in general, more important in service settings because of the unique characteristics of services, particularly their intangibility and perishability, the inseparability of production and consumption, and heterogeneity in delivery quality. E‐businesses, whether offering products or services, ultimately share many service characteristics. For example, the benefits consumed are often not solely in the products purchased, which could have been purchased elsewhere, but rather in the intangible benefits of interaction with the website, i.e. saved time, convenience, and a reduced risk of dissatisfaction with an enhanced availability of information. This paper adapts Bitner's model to encounters in “cyberspace”, where the key characteristics of the service “product” are still present, with the result that, just as in the physical setting, stimuli may be planned and designed to engender approach behaviour. In so doing, it borrows from the motivational psychology construct of “flow”, a metaphor for optimal experiences.