Investigating the impact of social factors and environmental factors on the purchase of landline communication services on improving customer experience (case study: FIX customers in Tehran)
Fariba Sayadi
1
(
Ph.D. Candidate, Department of Management, Central Tehran Branch, Islamic Azad University, Tehran, Iran
)
Hosein Safarzadeh
2
(
Assistant Professor, Department of Business Management, Central Tehran Branch, Islamic Azad University, Tehran, Iran
)
Sina Nematizadeh
3
(
Associate Professor, Department of Business Management, Central Tehran Branch, Islamic Azad University, Tehran,Iran.
)
Keywords: communication services, customer experience, customer experience improvement, customer loyalty, customer satisfaction,
Abstract :
The current research focuses on the cycle of customer experience management in the field of Iranian communications industry and designing and validating the model of customer experience improvement in this field (the services provided on the fixed telephone platform). In terms of research classification based on the result, the methodology is sequential-exploratory two-stage type with mix method, the combination of two qualitative and quantitative research methodologies. The research approach in the qualitative method is the grounded theory and exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis. The statistical population consisted of qualitative part are university experts and marketing experts and managers of communications companies. By conducting in-depth interviews, data analysis was also carried out through three stages of open, axial and selective coding. In the quantitative part, the statistical population using a questionnaire is the customers of fixed phone services in the Tehran region. Using simple random sampling approach and through Cochran's formula. Finally, 10 main criteria and 34 effective indicators were identified for improving the customer experience of communication services in Iran, which shows that customer factors have the highest rank in improving the customer experience in the field of communication services, and marketing strategies, environmental factors, and social factors are next ranked.
Keywords: Customer experience, communication services, customer satisfaction, customer loyalty
- Introduction
Jin et al., (2017) in resaerch showed that, the customer experience is one of the most important concepts in marketing, in order to create a memorable, enjoyable and unique experience for the customer. Theoretically and practically, it is a relatively new concept that has received considerable attention in recent years. In particular, in the last three decades, researchers and marketers have defined it as a strategic process for creating customer value, achieving differentiation and sustainable competitive advantage. In research, Becker et al., (2017), Customer Experience Management also defines management over customer interactions with different parts of the organization and perceptions management. in other words, Bravo et al. (2018) showed, considering that the purpose of companies is to protect existing customers and prevent customers from leaving and increase customer satisfaction and thus increase profitability, therefore, to increase customer satisfaction level, customer loyalty and customer retention should be helped to identify individual factors - psychological, socio - cultural, situational and brand related factors in order to create and improve customer experience and according to the results to increase customer perceived value to this end, customer satisfaction in order not to leave.
- Literature Review
By a wide review of customer experience management in the hotel industry, Kandampully et al., (2018) showed, the key components of customer experience management and its framework are presented. They believe that managing an attractive customer experience is accomplished through collaboration between marketing, operations, design, human resources and strategy sectors along with technology and social media. Hugo Becker (2024) also conducted a research that aims to achieve a comprehensive understanding of the factors influencing operators ' change to mobile services among telecom operators in the country of Portugal. The paper includes a quantitative study with customer donors who use the mobile services of a Portuguese telecom operator. This study shows that internet service, television service and service provided by call center have the most impact on operator loyalty by using bcm structural equation modeling and bony regression. In contrast, fixed phone service has a negligible impact, while loyalty has a negative impact on customer base. This study offers insights to telecom managers to identify the main factors of customer retention and preventing customer evasion. Worth and sushi (2014) is a research entitled the study of the effect of customer experience on customer loyalty in the field of communication, security and communication in India. An exploratory study has been conducted on the factors affecting customer experience on mobile phone in in dia, which led to a model on customer loyalty. With the increasing speed of technology and the impact of artificial intelligence on new tools for interacting with customers, such as chatbots and virtual assistants or virtual advisors, which can improve customer experience and increase their loyalty, and considering the role of the communications industry in this regard, paying more attention to the fact that personalizing the customer experience can be of particular importance for creating value for the organization can be given more attention. The main issue in the present study is to identify the factors for improving customer experience in the field of communications industry services and to provide a model for improving customer experience in this field (the case study is services provided on the fixed telephone platform). Which will fill the gap in the literature of past research to some extent. In this regard, the main question of the research is what are the factors affecting customer experience in the field of communications services in Iran and what is the model for improving customer experience in this field?
- Methodology
This research is an applied development research in terms of classification of researches based on the result and the research design approach is a mix method. From the viewpoint of qualitative research method, grounded theory method (grand theory) and data analysis method is exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis. The paradigmatic model is one of the main pillars of grounded theory that is used in Strauss and Corbin’s method (Strauss and Corbin, 2006). To collect data in the qualitative part, semi - structured in - depth interviews were used and for the validity of the interviews, participants were simultaneously asked to analyze and interpret the data and verify all the information related to the interviews. To confirm the reliability of the findings of this study in the qualitative part, the reliability calculation method between the two encoders (intra - subject agreement) was used. The statistical population in the qualitative part of the present study consists of experts and experts in the telecommunications industry who have more than 10 years of experience in this field. During this study, in - depth and semi - structured interviews with 11 participants were conducted to investigate the factors affecting customer experience in the communications industry that after the 8th silver reached to theoretical saturation. During an in - depth interview, the effect and each of the factors in the telecommunication industry’s customer experience improvement model was determined and the final model was presented. To evaluate the adequacy of the sample size and construct validity (possibility of performing factor analysis) respectively, the KMO and Bartlett tests have been used.
Three stages of coding were used to develop the data - based theory of customer experience improvement: open coding, axial coding, and selective coding. After identifying the important factors and indicators of customer experience improvement to determine the priority and importance of model variables, a quantitative study was conducted. For this purpose, the indicators obtained in the previous stage were summarized by exploratory factor analysis and were studied by first and second order confirmatory factor analysis and also by using relevant statistical tests. To do confirmatory factor analysis, a questionnaire was designed using the indicators obtained in the first stage of the research. Five - item Likert scale was used to measure the respondents ' attitudes in the relevant questionnaires. In order to investigate the validity of the quantitative part of the research, formal validity and qualitative validity of the content have been used. In order to fuzzier the experts ' views, triangular fuzzy numbers have been used. Confirmatory factor analysis (confirmatory factor analysis) was used to investigate the reliability of the quantitative part of the research. the statistical population in the quantitative part of the research is the customers of telecommunications services in Tehran region, which were collected in the autumn of 1402 and 387 people were selected using Cochran formula as a statistical sample and due to the fact that access to the entire statistical population is not possible, the sampling method is available and purposeful.
- Result
As a result of the interview and the use of grounded theory method, 10 main indicators and 34 sub - indicators for improving the customer experience in the field of communication services have been identified.
- Causal conditions: brand factors, customer factors, social factors, environmental factors and marketing strategies have been identified as causal conditions affecting the improvement of customer experience in the field of communication services.
- Improving customer experience includes cognitive, emotional, physical and emotional dimensions.
- Contextual factors include tools, infrastructure, and resources to support the organization’s customers and employees. The employees of the organization have components of behavioral dimensions, knowledge and skills of employees. Customer support components include response speed, response channels, and response quality.
- Intervening factors include competitors ' services which consist of two components: service cost and service quality.
Strategies for improving the customer experience include measuring customer satisfaction, shaping the customer experience, and interacting with the customer.
- The consequences of improving customer experience include customer satisfaction and customer loyalty.
after recognizing the important factors and indicators of improving customer experience in response to the next question of the research, which is determining the priority and importance of model variables, a quantitative study was conducted that shows that customer factors have the highest rank in improving customer experience in the field of communication services and marketing strategies, environmental factors, social factors are in the next rank. Also, customer support and knowledge and skills of organizational staff are identified factors affecting the consequences of improving customer experience. It is suggested that communication companies include these factors in their customer experience strategies.
- Discussions
Due to the new tools of artificial intelligence technology such as chatbots and tools for analyzing customer information and virtual consultants, more accurate management in the field of customer experience in this dynamic industry is more considered, because communication companies in addition to their customers can create and market suitable platforms for increasing customer experience in other industries as well as technology infrastructures. For this purpose, in this study, it has been tried to consider the factors affecting the improvement of customer experience in a more general and comprehensive way in the field of communications industry services, especially services that are provided in the landline (ADSL, VDSL ...) platform, and a comprehensive model for improving the customer experience in this field is presented.
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