Building and sustaining profitable customer loyalty for the 21st century

The Effects of Trust, Commitment and Satisfaction on Customer Loyalty in the Distribution Sector

“…Loyalty is the primary goal of relationship marketing and sometimes equates to the concept of relationship [15] marketing. Customer loyalty to the brand is essentially a relational phenomenon [16].…”

Customer–company identification and the effectiveness of loyalty programs

“…At the micro-level, latent financial risk reflects how a current member of a loyalty program behaves in response to the termination of a loyalty program, assuming competitors offer similar programs. Changes in corporate marketing strategies and financial pressures might force managers to modify, revamp, or discontinue loyalty programs (Capizzi & Ferguson, 2005;Kumar & Shah, 2004); the responses of program members to such changes represent an important substantive question that has not received adequate research attention. When a loyalty program ends or the benefits change, customers with high program loyalty may exhibit a greater propensity to leave the company, because program loyalty depends fully on the level of benefits received from the program (Evanschitzky et al, 2012;Yi & Jeon, 2003).…”

The Effect of Customer Service and Content Management on Online Retail Sales Performance: The Mediating Role of Customer Satisfaction

“…In addition, many Web retailers implement online features such as live chats, online forums, and social networking as part of a customer service management (CSM) system to enhance the shopping experience of customers and to strengthen their long-term customer relationships (Kivetz and Simonson, 2003;Kumar and Shah, 2004;Piccoli et al, 2004). According to existing literature (e.g., Collier and Bienstock, 2006), customer service is often identified as one of the key criteria for measuring the quality of websites.…”

“…With increasing competition in the online retail market, e-commerce companies have shifted their focus beyond "the technological factors of conducting business" to a more comprehensive approach to better understand the customer's online experience and behavior (Anderson and Srinivasan, 2003). As a result, one of the goals of implementing IT-enabled features is to create value for customers that will lead to what Anderson and Srinivasan (2003) called "e-satisfaction," which is defined as the "contentment of the customer with respect to his or her prior purchasing experience with a given electronic commerce firm" (p. 125).Based on this definition, we focus on consumer satisfaction with online Past research (e.g., Kumar and Shah, 2004;Srinivasan et al, 2002;Szymanski and Hise, 2000) has investigated customer satisfaction as a means to increase profitability for retail businesses. In studying customer satisfaction in online retailing, researchers and practitioners frequently use the number of "visits per visitor" as a measure to estimate the website's ability to attract and retain customers (Moe and Fader, 2004).…”

“…Additionally, because online customers usually do not interact in person with store employees, many retailers have added website features that allow customers to communicate and interact with them virtually, hence reducing the para-social 'distance' from their customers. In particular, many Web retailers implement a customer service management (CSM) system with service features such as live chats, online forums, and social networking to enhance the shopping experience of customers and strengthen long-term relationships with them (see, for example, Kivetz and Simonson, 2003;Kumar and Shah, 2004;Piccoli et al, 2004). These CM and CSM systems are intended to help motivate the consumers to make purchases and return to the retail sites in the future.…”