Consumer Complaint Propensity and Geo-Culture s Impact on it : An Empirical Examination in China

Researchers and practitioners have recently given increasing attention to CCB research in non-western settings. We made a dip into this field in China in this article. Based on the data of three industries in 20 regions, the Beta-Binomial model and Empirical Bayes method were employed to get the “true” complaint rate. By means comparison, we found that Chinese consumers are more likely to voice their discontent than to turn to private word-of-mouth communication. The division of regions into market segments with special geo-cultures in terms of the rate of voice responses and private responses of CCB was validated by cluster analysis.