Shoe Shine Entrepreneurs Social Responsibility Practices on Loyalty in Eldoret Town, Kenya

Abstract

Micro Enterprises providing services for example haircutting, key making, M-pesa, hair dressing, child care, cleaning, video selling, hawkers and shoe shining to mention but a few find it difficult to envision and understand what aspect connote high quality to consumers, and the levels of the aspects that are required to deliver high quality service. Only when these enterprises have a fairly definite knowledge on how the service they offer would be perceived by customers, then they will be able to direct these assessments in the preferred direction. However loyalty as an outcome of social responsibility practices as a key in explaining service quality is little known. This study examined the influence of the shoe shine entrepreneurer's social responsibility practices on customer loyalty in Eldoret town, Kenya. The study was based on a survey of 230 customers of shoe shine enterprises selected randomly. Questionnaires were the main instruments for collecting data. Data was analysed using descriptive and inferential statistics. Frequencies, percentages, spearman's rho correlation, phi and ordinal regression were the specific methods of analysis in this study. The findings indicated that customers consider shoe shine entrepreneurs social responsibility practices as a critical indicator of their perception of service quality. This study concludes that shoe shine entrepreneurers social responsibility practices significantly influenced customer loyalty. Equally, the findings show that shoe shine entrepreneurs need to improve on their social responsibility practices. Basing on the conclusion of this study, firstly, it is recommended that shoe shine entrepreneurs embrace social responsibility given that it could substantially enhance customer acceptance and by extension loyalty. Lastly, the study recommends the integration of social responsibility practices into relevant training for shoe shine enterprises to encourage customer loyalty.