The effect of service cues on perceived service quality, value, satisfaction and word-of-mouth recommendations in Indonesian university settings

In today's competitive environment, where all students have many options opened to them, factors that enable educational institutions to attract and retain students should be seriously studied. Higher education institutions, which want to have competitive edge in the future, may need to begin searching for new and creative ways to attract, retain and foster stronger relationships with students.; The purpose of this research was to investigate the effect of cues in university settings on perceived service quality, value, satisfaction and word of mouth recommendations. A theoretical framework was developed to test the relationship among the study constructs.; An analysis of the data revealed that the effect of service cues on word of mouth recommendations mediated by quality, value and satisfaction. However the direct effect of value was larger than its indirect effect.; The results of this research have important implications for higher education marketers. First, they should consider certain cues, which can lead to higher students' perceptions. Secondly, higher education marketers should pay a special attention on student's perception of value to achieve competitive advantage to attract, retain and foster stronger relationships with students.; Recommendations for future research were provided. Future research could explore alternative constructs in the model, investigating the true directionality or causality among the constructs. Also, using multi items measurement scales to provide a better measurement of the study's constructs, and extend the current study to other service contexts.