Customer journey design in omnichannel retailing: Examining the effect of autonomy-competence-relatedness in brand relationship building

Customer journey design (CJD) has garnered significant attention among scholars and practitioners due to the proliferation of digital products and platform technologies which created more touchpoints and enriched customer experiences in omnichannel retailing. Despite this, retailers still lack comprehensive guidance on how to design high-quality touchpoint combinations. Existing literature on customer journey loyalty has predominantly focused on the experiential aspect, while consumer psychological factors have received less attention. Based on this, this study adopts a self-determination theory, utilizing the autonomy - competence - relatedness (ACR) model to define and examine the key attributes of CJD, and investigates the impact of these attributes on consumer behavioral loyalty. A total of 1112 respondents were examined using PLS-SEM (symmetric) and fuzzy-set Qualitative Comparative Analysis (asymmetric) methods to confirm the consequences. Results identify CJD attributes that influence the satisfaction of autonomy, competence, and relatedness, subsequently generating consumers’ re-patronage intentions and value co-creation behaviors. Moreover, there are multiple paths within the combination of ACR-oriented CJD attributes that lead to behavioral loyalty. This study marks the first attempt to apply the ACR model in the context of an omnichannel customer journey, providing noteworthy implications for practitioners seeking to enhance customer behavioral loyalty in omnichannel retailing.