The diploma thesis deals with the analysis of a selected company Notino, s.r.o. which is a retail company selling perfumes and cosmetics in Europe. The analytical part analyzes in detail the company, its competitors and loyalty programs of competitors. Based on the theoretical and analytical part, a loyalty program is developed for the company with a comparison of costs and benefits of the program for the company. Also, the risks associated with the introduction of a loyalty program and suggestions on how to reduce their impact are summarized.

The biggest challenge facing organizations in service industry today is that of customer retention. Loyalty/reward programmes have been promoted as the ultimate strategic solution towards customer retention by some industry experts, while the others question its influential potential as a customer retention strategy. The primary purpose of this research was to establish whether loyalty/reward programmes, as one of the main contributing Customer Relationship Management (CRM) factors, are either simply a fad or actually a fab solution! Subsequently, the research focused on the evaluation of the three most noted and influential CRM components in current literature and concluded that service quality and customer contact rated higher than loyalty/reward programmes with what should be considered the ultimate critic, namely the customer, or rather 60 of them.

Study Supervisor: Mr J.H. Visser Completed: 2008 / A loyal customer can mean a consistent source of revenue to organizations. Organizations have shifted their emphasis of finding customers to one of keeping customers. One of the relationship-marketing tools employed to harness customer loyalty is the customer loyalty programme. Loyalty programmes are an established feature of the retail landscape in mature, developed markets. The South African market has recently seen the implementation of such programmes. There is considerable debate as to the effectiveness of loyalty programmes in achieving customer loyalty. Research conducted in mature markets has revealed mixed results. The South African market has been shaped by the recent economic, political and social changes, and is unique in its make-up. The value and effect of loyalty programmes still have to be explored within this market. The study aimed at exploring the awareness, perceptions and effects of customer loyalty programmes within the retail industry of the Durban Metropolitan area. Focus groups were conducted from which a questionnaire was formulated. The questionnaire was then distributed to 115 consumers with the Durban Metropolitan area. The study revealed that the respondents within the sample had an accurate understanding of the purpose of a customer loyalty programme. A slightly higher proportion of respondents belonged to one or more customer loyalty programmes. It was revealed, however, that membership to customer loyalty programmes did not primarily influence purchasing behaviour. Consumers were influenced to join and use the customer loyalty programmes by the rewards and perks offered by the programme. Customers tended to favour programmes offering incentives perceived to be worthwhile and when the benefits of joining such a programme outweighed the cost. Regular customers are more loyalty programmes likely to join customer, thereby increasing the received benefits.

This thesis investigates the application of multimodal metaphors in electronic Customer Loyalty Management Systems (e-CLMS) in terms of efficiency, effectiveness, user satisfaction, and understandability of the customisation tasks and information communicated. The potential of users developing loyalty as a result of better usability and user satisfaction is also accessed via questionnaires. The first experiment investigated issues of usability and the users' views of an e-commerce platform developed for these experiments using three conditions with three independent groups. A visual group (VICLMS, n=25) that was communicated information within the platform using text with graphics, a multimodal group (MICLMS, n=25) that usedrecorded speech, earcons and auditory icons and an expressive avatars group(AICLMS, n=25) that was predominantly communicated information using avatars. The second experiment evaluated three avatar-based multimodal conditions using a dependent group (n=50). This experiment evaluated user satisfaction, perceived convenience, enjoyment, ease of use and customisation, and successful completion of user tasks. The conditions were avatars with earcons (AEICLMS), avatars with auditory icons (AAICLMS) and avatars with both earcons and auditory icons (AICLMS).The use of expressive avatars in the e-CLMS interface contributed to the positive predisposition of usersto develop loyalty. Multimodal metaphors contributed more significantly to complex customisation tasks. A set of empirically derived guidelines and a validation approach is suggested for designing multimodal E-CLMS interfaces.

The biggest challenge facing organizations in service industry today is that of customer retention. Loyalty/reward programmes have been promoted as the ultimate strategic solution towards customer retention by some industry experts, while the others question its influential potential as a customer retention strategy. The primary purpose of this research was to establish whether loyalty/reward programmes, as one of the main contributing Customer Relationship Management (CRM) factors, are either simply a fad or actually a fab solution! Subsequently, the research focused on the evaluation of the three most noted and influential CRM components in current literature and concluded that service quality and customer contact rated higher than loyalty/reward programmes with what should be considered the ultimate critic, namely the customer, or rather 60 of them.

Study Supervisor: Mr J.H. Visser Completed: 2008 / A loyal customer can mean a consistent source of revenue to organizations. Organizations have shifted their emphasis of finding customers to one of keeping customers. One of the relationship-marketing tools employed to harness customer loyalty is the customer loyalty programme. Loyalty programmes are an established feature of the retail landscape in mature, developed markets. The South African market has recently seen the implementation of such programmes. There is considerable debate as to the effectiveness of loyalty programmes in achieving customer loyalty. Research conducted in mature markets has revealed mixed results. The South African market has been shaped by the recent economic, political and social changes, and is unique in its make-up. The value and effect of loyalty programmes still have to be explored within this market. The study aimed at exploring the awareness, perceptions and effects of customer loyalty programmes within the retail industry of the Durban Metropolitan area. Focus groups were conducted from which a questionnaire was formulated. The questionnaire was then distributed to 115 consumers with the Durban Metropolitan area. The study revealed that the respondents within the sample had an accurate understanding of the purpose of a customer loyalty programme. A slightly higher proportion of respondents belonged to one or more customer loyalty programmes. It was revealed, however, that membership to customer loyalty programmes did not primarily influence purchasing behaviour. Consumers were influenced to join and use the customer loyalty programmes by the rewards and perks offered by the programme. Customers tended to favour programmes offering incentives perceived to be worthwhile and when the benefits of joining such a programme outweighed the cost. Regular customers are more loyalty programmes likely to join customer, thereby increasing the received benefits.

M.B.A. / Throughout the world companies are restructuring there processes. Companies are trying to provide a better service to the customers with the same cost or alternatively at a lower cost. The service-profit chain is an equation that establishes the relationship between corporate policies, employee satisfaction, value creation, customer loyalty and profitability. This paper examines the direct relationship between employee satisfaction and customer satisfaction. It concentrates on the elements that influence employee and customer satisfaction in line with “Heskett’s Service Profit Chain” model.

<p>Loyalty programs have become an important element of the modern company and its existence can be noticed in every kind of businesses. The aim with loyalty programs is to win customers loyalty in order to keep them away from the competitors. However, there are some issues existing in creating and maintaining long-term relationships, for instance when consumers choose to decline participation in loyalty programs. A qualitative research method with an inductive approach has been used, by using the interview method CIT to collect the empirical data. 82 open-ended interviews were made with respondents from Sweden and Hungary in order to identify possible differences in loyalty program avoidance between the two countries. Based on the answers, a model with factors that indicates loyalty program avoidance was created, which represent the foundation of the literature review. The result of the study has shown that both similarities and dissimilarities between the nationalities exist, where the major difference is preference of convenience and personal issues. The study indicates that the Swedish consumers tend to reject loyalty program offers for the convenience reasons, in terms of store distance and bad service, while the Hungarian consumers are more concerned about their personal integrity, such as trust and privacy. However, similarities that could be clearly observed were issues with commitment, gaining benefits and struggling with time pressure.</p>

Loyalty programs have become an important element of the modern company and its existence can be noticed in every kind of businesses. The aim with loyalty programs is to win customers loyalty in order to keep them away from the competitors. However, there are some issues existing in creating and maintaining long-term relationships, for instance when consumers choose to decline participation in loyalty programs. A qualitative research method with an inductive approach has been used, by using the interview method CIT to collect the empirical data. 82 open-ended interviews were made with respondents from Sweden and Hungary in order to identify possible differences in loyalty program avoidance between the two countries. Based on the answers, a model with factors that indicates loyalty program avoidance was created, which represent the foundation of the literature review. The result of the study has shown that both similarities and dissimilarities between the nationalities exist, where the major difference is preference of convenience and personal issues. The study indicates that the Swedish consumers tend to reject loyalty program offers for the convenience reasons, in terms of store distance and bad service, while the Hungarian consumers are more concerned about their personal integrity, such as trust and privacy. However, similarities that could be clearly observed were issues with commitment, gaining benefits and struggling with time pressure.

Purpose - The aim of this study is to explain two relationships: between e-loyalty and the emotional responses (e-trust and e-satisfaction) and between these emotional response and the appraisals (e-service quality and e-reputation). Method – The quantitative approach and survey method were used in this study. Both Internet survey and personal survey method were used to administrate the questionnaire. The sample of 221 students was employed in this paper. Finding – Using Bagozzi’s framework, the authors constructed the four relationships which were tested in this study. The result indicates the more satisfied customers feel about the purchase, the more loyal they become. In addition, when customers trust that the e-tailer is credible and benevolent, they tend to be more loyal. The finding also shows that the better service quality, the more satisfied customers feel about the purchase. Finally, the result indicates that the more reputed the e-tailer is in term of being honest and concerned to customers, the more customers trust in them. Originality/value – This study is one of the limited number of study using Bagozzi’s framework to research e-loyalty. In addition, this study also tried to bridge the gap in research about e-loyalty using Bagozzi’s framework by taking e-trust and e-reputation into account.