Mobile CRM (mCRM) : A CASE STUDY OF MOBILE CRM STRATEGIES

Abstract: Mobile technology has evolved drastically over the years, and so has the customer’s perception of and expectations on mobile services. Mobile phones have become the essential part of customer’s life style and they expect consumer services to be available on mobile phone. In this saturated market, providing better customer experience through the channel preferred by customers is as important as selling the actual product or services. In the quest to retain existing customers as well as attracting new, companies are developing innovative mobile customer relationship management (mCRM) strategies to strike a balance between its investments and fulfilling of customers need to generate maximum profit. However, not all mCRM strategies succeed leaving customers dissatisfied and switching to competitors providing better mobile services. The purpose of this study is to understand the dynamics between the customer acceptance, customer satisfaction and customer loyalty in the context of mCRM services. Thus, answering the following research questions: a) What are the factors behind customer acceptance? b) Do mCRM services have any effect on customer loyalty? Qualitative research method were utilized to closely study two different mCRM strategies from different industries with costumer in focus. Data for the study was gathered from a costumer survey as well as from interviews with informants within the company. In addition, external data from public domain was used to validate the findings of the study. Furthermore, a research model was developed by identifying the constructs adopted from literature study of technology acceptance model (TAM3) and customer loyalty. The research model was the basis for developing the customer feedback survey. In addition, the constructs helped in identifying the impact on customer acceptance and customer loyalty for the respective mCRM strategy. This study confirms previous findings and contributes to our understanding of technology acceptance as well as customer loyalty. The study reveals that mCRM services are mostly useful to urban customers with busy and on-the-go lifestyle. Furthermore, the study shows that through well practice use behavior customer develops a habit based on the prior evaluation of perceived usefulness and perceived value. In addition, the study indicates that customers build up a new trust towards the mCRM services through the usage of the service. Finally, the results of the study indicate that the mCRM services have an impact on company’s net customer loyalty.