Abstract
Little is known about using emoticons in online customer chat service. The purpose of this study is to examine customers’ responses to emoticon usage in the onine customer service chat. Hence, this study provides the concept of possible elements that may effect customer satisfaction when using different type of emoticons in online customer chat service context, such as the customer perceived information richness, control, intimacy, and expertise; whether customer negative affect influences those perceptions is also discussed. A 3 (emoticon usage: mixed/ positive/ none) by 2 (customer negative affect: high versus low) between-subjects experimental design was conducted using analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) and multiple liner regression for data analysis, the study finds that not using emoticons in online customer chat service would increase customers’ perceived control. Keywords: Emoticons, Customer Emotions, Customer Relationship Management (CRM), Computer-mediate Communication (CMC)