The aim of this review is to provide insights to the usage of Kano-model and innovation product development, and at the same time, answer to the research question “How customer needs can be identified by using Kano-model for innovation product development?” The research is conducted by reviewing existing literature on Kano- model and innovation product development (IPD). The relevant literature used for this research is conducted by utilizing the databases of Halmstad University and Google Scholar. A model for customer needs identification by using Kano model for Innovation Product Development (IPD) was constructed based on the reviewed theories. In addition, a general recognition for the term of IPD was acknowledged.

We are living in a competitive business world, on which every company strives to have a better and more significant share of the market. Long term customer relationship is essential in order to reach that success. At the same time, an essential aspect of generating and creating that customer-company engagement, customer loyalty, is product promotion. This research aims to address one of the most important key elements for companies, particularly in the case of Zara: The impact of product promotion on customer loyalty. This particular research aims to illustrate which are the key variables that have the most impact on customer loyalty. There is a hard work/high implication behind customer loyalty for a company; for this reason, it is necessary to know on what to focus, invest, and concentrate. In order to be able to answer the presented question an in-depth research together with a study and analysis has been made. To accurately explore the purpose of this study, we conducted a quantitative research in the Spanish market, aiming to best answer this study. To do so, we administered a survey (created in English and then translated in Spanish) between 157 respondents analyzing different variables on the Spanish market; Promotional Pricing, Point of Purchase Display, Perceived Quality, Perceived Value, Attributes, Customer Relationship, Trustworthiness and Loyalty where the variables analyzed. The theoretical framework that we used to base our survey construction comes from different researchers on the analyzed variables. We made use of different theories from the marketing field as well as promotion-based ones in order to be able to empirically analyze and give an answer to the proposed question of this research. Finally, we concluded by answering the research question, and the research gap found. The main conclusion of this research includes an algorithm that leads to customer loyalty: Customer loyalty = Perceived Value + Customer Relationships + Trustworthiness As presented above, we came to the conclusion that the three main divisors that affect to our customer loyalty formula are: perceived value, customers relationships, and trustworthiness. These fundamental elements that conform to our customer loyalty formula, mostly rely on POP Display as a main promotional tool to impact them.

Abstract also in Chinese / Bibliography: leaves 122-123 / Thesis (M.B.A.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 1983

This dissertation consists of three chapters on the economics of the Internet. The first chapter begins with presenting the advertising spending patterns of US local restaurants that have different ratings on Yelp.com. Rating information on Yelp includes display ratings and review distributions. The Yelp's rounding algorithm creates a discontinuity in display ratings. Therefore, I use a regression discontinuity design to identify the effect of a higher display rating on local restaurants' advertising spendings. I find a significantly negative effect of display rating for highly-rated restaurants on advertising. However, when the display rating is constant between two steps, the relationship between local restaurant advertising spending and average rating is significantly positive. The second chapter uses a game-theoretic model to analyze competing firms' advertising and pricing decisions. Here customer reviews are available and firms may build up loyal customer bases. I find that highly-rated firms are more likely to advertise more, i.e., online reviews complement advertising. Comparative static results can explain the results found in the first chapter. Intuitively, when the capacity of a local business becomes limited, a jump in the display rating will reduce the complementary effect of online reviews on advertising. I also analyze an extension of the model, where an entrant and an incumbent interact. I find that customer reviews undo the "fat-cat" effect of a large incumbent with lots of loyal customers. The third chapter proposes a new explanation for adoption failure or delay in markets with network effects. In the model, consumers and software providers play a dynamic adoption game. Each group of players choose between two incompatible technologies. Consumers may wait, but firms may not. Although efficiency requires one technology to be adopted by all consumers and firms right away, there is a "market split and adoption delay" equilibrium. In this equilibrium some consumers choose to wait at first and firms split between the two technologies. The model is motivated by the 56K modem market, in which competition between two technologies appears to have led to adoption failure, until an industry standard setting organization coordinated the market on an alternative standard.

Customer experience is one strategic option for organisations wishing to differentiate their service offering. Little research however has been conducted to explain how service design and management practices influence customer experience in non-hedonic contexts, settings in which the objectives for the design of the delivery system are not experiential. The objective of this research is to address this gap in academic knowledge. The conceptual framework used as the basis of the empirical research demonstrates how four experience mechanism constructs, incorporated into the design of the delivery system, facilitate the customer’s involvement in the delivery of the service and influence how they perceive the experience that emerges as a result. To explore the relevance of the framework two case studies were conducted. Data was collected principally through interviews with employees working at various levels throughout the organisations hierarchy and with customers. Observations and secondary source material also provided additional evidence. The thesis provides an original and distinct contribution to knowledge, through three main findings: Firstly, the research found evidence that the conceptual framework was relevant to the design of the delivery system and in customers’ perception of their experience. This challenges assumptions in existing literature that experience might not be a relevant design consideration in non-hedonic service contexts. Secondly, the findings provide a point of distinction between experiences in hedonic and non-hedonic contexts. Finally the study extends experience design theory demonstrating how in the contexts studied, the experience mechanisms act as antecedents for the experience a customer perceives. Whilst conducting only two case studies limits the impact of the findings, the propositions formulated to explain the key themes identified, can be used as a vehicle through which future quantitative research can be carried out, therefore extending the generalisability of the study beyond the contexts studied.

Modebranschen är en ständigt föränderlig bransch med högt tempo. Konkurrensen är stenhård och hela tiden etablerar sig nya varumärken på marknaden. För att nå framgång, eller för att överhuvudtaget överleva, gäller det att slåss för sin sak – det gäller att synas! Ett företag som verkligen har lyckats i sitt arbete är svensk/amerikanska Gant, de har hittat en väg att följa, en väg som har lett dem till den position de har idag – ett internationellt ledande modeföretag. Att deras företag har en historia bakom sig, något att berätta i sitt varumärke, spelar troligen en stor roll i denna framgång. Syftet med detta arbete är att göra en kartläggning över Gant som företag samt deras marknadsföring och kundgrupp. Detta för att få förståelse för hur de arbetar för att nå långsiktig framgång i den hårda modebranschen. För att ta reda på detta har följande frågor ställts:1.Vad gör Gant som är unikt för att nå framgång på den konkurrenskraftiga marknaden? 2.Vad har varumärket för betydelse för Gants positionering i kundens medvetande?3.Hur jobbar Gant med att marknadsföra sig ut mot kund?4.Vilka är Gants typiska kunder?För att svara på dessa frågor har det varit nödvändigt att använda sig av en kombination av en kvalitativ och en kvantitativ metod. Den kvalitativa i form av intervjuer och den kvantitativa i form av en enkätundersökning, detta för att styrka den sekundärdata som insamlats. Rapporten har ett hermeneutisktiskt förhållningssätt då det handlar om att tolka texter, intervjuer och den utförda enkätundersökningen. Varumärket Gant bygger på en historia om dess amerikanska ursprung och denna historia genomsyrar allt i företaget. Varumärket står för en livsstil vars värderingar präglas av integritet, elegans, karaktär, samförstånd och optimism. I arbetet med att bygga upp ett starkt varumärke har det varit en självklarhet för Gant att vara konsekventa i sin marknadskommunikation. Detta för att konsumenten alltid ska känna igen sig och veta vad Gant står för. Historien bakom Gant är även grunden i all marknadsföring, i vilken det handlar om att förmedla en livsstil och en känsla bakom varumärket. Även om Gant har en väldigt spridd målgrupp är det främst en önskan om god kvalitet och design som kunden värdesätter. De personer som handlar Gant gör det främst på grund av den kvalitet, design och livsstil som Gant erbjuder.Under arbetets gång har det framkommit att bakom Gants framgång ligger en välbevarad historia som alltid har haft en avgörande roll i företagets utveckling. Kontinuitet i allt de tar sig för medför också en stadig grund och ger trygghet åt varumärket. Utöver detta har Gant en otroligt väluttänkt och välgenomförd marknadsföring som ger deras kunder känslan av en uppnåelig dröm. Gants framgång kan alltså sammanfattas med orden: en unik historia, den rätta känslan, en strategisk marknadsföring och kontinuitet i alla delar. / <p>The fashion industry is a constantly changing industry with a high tempo. The competition is fierce and every day new brands appear on the market. To be successful, or even to survive, you have to fight for your cause to be seen and heard! A company that has succeeded in their work is the Swedish / American Gant, they have found a path to follow, a path that has led them to the position they have today – a successful international fashion house. That their company has a story behind it probably plays a major role in this success. The purpose of this essay is to develop an overview of Gant and their marketing and customer group. This is to get an understanding of how they work to achieve the long-term success in the tough fashion industry. The brand Gant is built on a history of its American origins and history that permeates throughout the company. The brand represents a lifestyle whose values are characterized by integrity, elegance, character, understanding and optimism. In the process of building a strong brand, it has been important for Gant to be consistent in their marketing communications. This is to help the costumer to always recognize Gant and always be sure of what Gant stands for. The story behind Gant is also the foundation in all marketing, which is about to convey a lifestyle and a feeling behind the brand. Although Gant has a very diverse audience, it is primarily a desire for quality and design that the customer appreciates. The person who buys Gant does it mainly because of the quality, design and lifestyle that Gant offers. During the work of this essay it has emerged that behind Gant's success is a well-preserved history that has always played an important role in its development. Continuity in everything they do, helps to build a firm foundation and provides security to the brand. Also, Gant has an incredibly well-considered marketing that gives their customers the feeling of an achievable dream. Gant's success can be summarized by the words: a unique history, the right feeling, a strategic marketing and continuity in all areas.</p><p>Program: Butikschefsutbildningen</p>

Customers are influenced in the physical world by their surroundings; important factors such as packaging, human interaction and atmosphere (environment) play important roles in any purchase decision customers make. Today's customers are moving towards faster, and more efficient ways of purchasing products/services. One of the most influential features in online purchase decisions is the Virtual Store Atmosphere (VSA). VSA is a marketing tool that not only influences purchase decisions, but it also measures the level of satisfaction in tourism and other industries. A high level of customer satisfaction increases the chance that they will recommend the product/service to other customers. However, despite different studies concerning information technology development and the impact of Electronic Word of Mouth (eWOM) on online Customer Purchase Decisions (CPD), eWOM has been little explored in the sphere of web design. It is vital that this research gap should be addressed, based on the online customer nature and the number of online bookings made in the tourism sector. Based on the above, this study aims to critically investigate and examine the impact of the online shopping environment on eWOM and customer purchase decisions, with respect to online bookings in the hotel industry, and develops a framework. The study aims to assess whether or not this impact is due to customers' web satisfaction and willingness to book a hotel online. Additionally, it looks at the influence of the online tourism environment on eWOM and Saudi Arabian customers' purchase decisions with respect to trust and the perceived risks in the area of hotel bookings made online. This research mainly adopts a quantitative method to achieve the objectives. Therefore, a conceptual framework has been developed based on existing literature concerning eWOM, web design and the hotel industry. The proposed framework has been validated using a measurement scale from previous validated studies. The research embraced and applied two main theories in the study, which are the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) and the Stimulus-Organism-Response model (S-O-R). The research used an online survey of 1,002 respondents, which was distributed between two groups (Saudi national undergraduate students and Saudi national academic employees). Interviews, focus groups, and a pilot study were conducted to validate the survey too. Data analysis applied Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA), Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA), and Structural Equation Modelling (SEM) to validate the relationships between constructs and to test the research hypotheses. The findings from this study show that the majority of the environmental factors selected (web design) affect ES and motivate users to book a hotel online; these are: Perceived Ease of Use, Perceived Usefulness, Website Content, Intrusive Marketing Tools 'Pop-up Ads and Banner Ads', Search Engine and Enjoyability, but not System Quality. In addition, the results suggest that one of the organism factors, i.e. eWOM, does not influence CPD. As a result, this study contributes to the customer behaviour and web design/quality literature within the travel/tourism context in Saudi Arabia. It contributes to the existing knowledge and supports practitioners of third-party hotel websites in shaping their web development priorities and enables them to focus on the most influential and critical factors.

Retail banking service providers are facing challenges such as continuous changes in consumer expectations and escalating global competitiveness. The banking sector is characterised as an extraordinarily competitive and regulated sector. As a result, it is essential that retail banking service providers reassess the level of their service quality and recognise the important factors that influence customer satisfaction, intention and loyalty. As pointed out by the literature, there is a fundamental need for studies on customer intention and behaviour which will show whether customer attitudes provide significant evidence of how customers act and feel. Furthermore, there is a lack of theoretical modelling and empirical studies on the relationships between customer satisfaction, service quality and variables in other areas of service experience, such as price, reputation and complaint intention, in the retail banking context. Thus, the current study adopted the expectation confirmation theory because its aim is to develop a framework that advances the understanding of customer satisfaction, intention and loyalty in the retail banking sector, which can be best achieved by choosing a theory whose main target is to measure customer satisfaction and post-purchase behaviour. The proposed framework enhances our understanding by expanding ECT theory. To clarify, the conceptual framework introduces three constructs, price, reputation and complaint intention, which had not previously been brought together into one framework with the rest of the present study constructs, a practice which is considered to offer a highly valuable contribution. Additionally, the outcomes from this study have many implications for managers and decision-makers in the banking service sector. It is essential for marketing managers in the banking sector to understand the importance of all of the components of service quality as well as price and reputation, in order to understand fully customer satisfaction and intentions. The primary aim of this study is to examine how customer intention and loyalty are affected by service quality dimensions, price and reputation, using the intermediation role of confirmation and customer satisfaction. This study has developed a theoretical framework that integrates a set of essential variables to evaluate the impact of service quality dimensions, price and reputation on customer's intentions and loyalty, using Expectation Confirmation Theory. Consequently, hypotheses are created to examine the association between the framework variables. This study employs a quantitative method alongside a positivist approach to examine the hypothetical associations within the conceptual framework. Of the online surveys distributed to retail banking consumers, 923 were valid. To validate and analyse the data, the research study employs structural equation modelling using AMOS SPSS (Statistical Package for the Social Sciences). The final results illustrate that tangibles, assurance, responsiveness, empathy and price have a significant impact on confirmation and customer satisfaction. On the other hand, reliability has no significant impact on confirmation and customer satisfaction in the Saudi retail banking sector. In addition, reputation has a significant impact on customer satisfaction. Furthermore, confirmation also has an important influence on customer satisfaction and customer satisfaction has a significant relationship with customer intentions and loyalty. Customer satisfaction also has a significant relationship with customer loyalty. Indeed, the overall results of this study reveal the impact of service quality, price and reputation on customer intention and loyalty through customer satisfaction, along with confirmation of customer expectations. Finally, the outcomes of this study have practical and theoretical implications which advance the knowledge in this area.

Arguably, two conflicting norms may have been activated simultaneously for communal consumers in a service failure. The first norm focuses on self-obligation, that is, because s/he is my good friend, I have to tolerate his/her mistakes. The second norm focuses on other-obligation, that is, because s/he is my good friend, s/he has to provide me with good services. The relative salience of these two conflicting norms may influence communal consumers' dissatisfaction level to be different from exchange consumers. Building on the psychological contract theory (Rousseau 1989), it is proposed that promise breach type would reconcile the original prediction and the reverse finding in study 1. Specifically, communal (vs. exchange) consumers would be less dissatisfied in an implicit promise breach, but the reverse pattern would occur in an explicit promise breach. Moreover, self-construal would moderate the interactive relationship between relationship type and promise breach type on consumer dissatisfaction. In particular, the discrepancy in dissatisfaction between communal and exchange consumers would be larger for interdependents (vs. independents) in both implicit and explicit promise breach conditions. Two additional experimental studies with different consumption contexts provide convergent evidence of the proposed hypotheses. These results have broad implications for theory and practice, and point to fruitful opportunities for future research. / This dissertation examines the impact of relationship type on consumer dissatisfaction in service failures. According to the communal-exchange relationship framework (Clark and Mills 1979), whereas the central norm of communal relationships is to demonstrate a concern for others, that of exchange relationships is to give benefits to others with an expectation of immediate return. It follows that communal (vs. exchange) consumers would be less dissatisfied in service failures because enduring mistakes made by a service provider is more compatible with the communal (vs. exchange) central norm. Surprisingly, this argument was not supported and a reverse result was found in study 1. / Wan, Chun Ying. / Adviser: Hui King Man. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 70-09, Section: A, page: . / Thesis submitted in: December 2008. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2009. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 137-144). / Electronic reproduction. Hong Kong : Chinese University of Hong Kong, [2012] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Electronic reproduction. [Ann Arbor, MI] : ProQuest Information and Learning, [200-] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Electronic reproduction. Ann Arbor, MI : ProQuest dissertations and theses, [201-] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Abstracts in English and Chinese. / School code: 1307.

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