Shanshan Shang, Zao Xun
Purpose Drawing on the sensory marketing framework and cue congruence theory, this study aims to investigate how chatbot dynamic congruence – the real-time alignment between facial expressions in chatbot profile pictures and the content of generated messages – shapes customer satisfaction and continuance intention in service recovery. The underlying mechanism is examined through the mediating roles of perceived empathy and perceived trustworthiness. Considering three key contextual factors in the service process, this study further explores boundary conditions by testing the moderating effects of product involvement, human intervention and customer loyalty tier. Design/methodology/approach Four experiments were conducted. ANOVA and structural equation modeling were used to validate the proposed effects. Findings The results of this study demonstrate that chatbot dynamic congruence significantly enhances customer satisfaction and continuance intention. Mediation analyses confirm that perceived empathy and perceived trustworthiness serve as critical pathways. Moderation analyses reveal that product involvement exerts no significant moderating effect; human intervention unexpectedly weakens its effect on perceived empathy; and a high customer loyalty tier attenuates the effect as expected. Originality/value This study advances services marketing by conceptualizing chatbot dynamic congruence as temporal and multimodal service cue orchestration in AI-mediated service recovery. The findings of this study extend services marketing theory by identifying the psychological mechanism underlying the emotional and cognitive pathways through which dynamically coordinated cues become meaningful to customers during unfolding service encounters.