When do AI chatbots lead to higher customer satisfaction than human frontline employees in online shopping assistance? Considering product attribute type

The increasing adoption of AI chatbots in online shopping assistance, as
a complement or substitute for human frontline employees (HFLEs), leads
to the question whether HFLEs perform better than AI service robots and
why. From the perspective of product attribute type (experiential/ func-
tional) and focusing on customer satisfaction, this study explores how the
impact of service agent on customer satisfaction varies along with product
attribute type. A scenario-based experiment was designed and completed
by 567 participants. Although HFLEs lead to higher customer satisfaction
when the product attribute is experiential, AI chatbots perform better than
HFLEs when the product attribute is functional. We make use of perceived
information quality, perceived waiting time, and positive emotions, three de-
terminants of customer satisfaction, to explain the variation of the role of
different service agent types. The findings offer useful implications for com-
panies when selecting service agent types in online shopping assistance.