Den svenska byggsektorn har de senaste årtiondena genomgått en kraftig tillväxt, vilket har resulterat i en hög konkurrenssituation inom branschen. I denna konkurrensmiljö fokuserar denna studie på hur mikroföretag inom plåtslageribranschen implementerar marknadsföring under en lågkonjunktur, samt hur digital marknadsföring kan stödja dem under sådana perioder. Resultaten från studien förväntas vara värdefulla för både ägare av plåtslageriföretag och andra intressenter inom byggsektorn. Under studien användes semistrukturerade intervjuer som genomfördes med sju plåtslageriföretag. Den insamlade empirin visade att Word-of-Mouth-marknadsföring, tillsammans med relationsmarknadsföring, framstod som den mest betydelsefulla marknadsföringsstrategin. Dessutom erkände mikroföretagen värdet av digital marknadsföring och argumenterade för att strategin bör integreras för att öka överlevnadschanserna under lågkonjunktur. / The Swedish construction sector has experienced significant growth in recent decades, resulting in intense competition within the industry. In this competitive environment, this study focuses on how micro sheet metal companies implement marketing during an economic downturn and how digital marketing can support them during such periods. The results of this study are expected to be valuable for both owners of sheet metal companies and other stakeholders in the construction sector.   During the study, semi-structured interviews were conducted with seven sheet metal companies. The collected empirical data indicated that Word-of-Mouth marketing, combined with relationship marketing, emerged as the most significant marketing strategy. Additionally, microenterprises acknowledged the value of digital marketing and argued that this strategy should be integrated to enhance survival prospects during economic downturns.

The purpose of this study is to determine which marketing communication methods tour operators in Gauteng, registered with SATSA, utilise. Tour operators aim to enhance tourist experiences. Companies need to be exposed to the marketplace to attract and keep business, thus marketing communication methods used by tourism organisations are examined at length. The results for the study were obtained using a web-based questionnaire. Main findings include the fact that SATSA-registered tour operators frequently use interactive media, direct marketing and advertising. Word of mouth was continually regarded as an important marketing communication method. The larger the company, the more likely it is to use advertising. Interactive media can be used by small and large companies alike. Many marketing communication methods that are used frequently were not deemed to be efficient. One may therefore conclude that SATSA-registered tour operators in Gauteng prefer to use interactive media. / Business Management / M. Comm. (Business Management)

孤兒保單不僅普遍存在於壽險公司，同時它對壽險公司造成的負面影響也相當大，包括：增加保單的脫退率、減弱壽險公司與保戶的關係、迫使孤兒保戶投向競爭者….等等，可見得壽險公司對於孤兒保單的議題不得不去重視並應有效的加以管理。 本研究探討台灣壽險業保險孤兒服務稀少的缺失、服務修復策略與顧客行為反應之關係，以試圖找出最有效的保險孤兒服務修復策略，並根據研究結果,提供給壽險業管理者採取適當的服務修復策略。研究方法共分兩階段：深入訪談及問卷調查。第一階段首先是進行深入訪談，主要是為了對研究主題作一探索性的研究，並將訪談結果作為問卷發展及設計的依據，第二階段問卷調查則為本研究之重點，問卷調查方式採立意抽樣，發出問卷418份，回收問卷289份，回收率為69﹪，最後共蒐集到230份由合格受訪者所填寫的問卷，其中有效問卷為225份，無效問卷有5份。 本研究之限制主要有兩點：採非隨機抽樣及問卷調查所蒐集到的樣本單位數不多。研究結果之發現說明如下。 一、 保險孤兒經驗 14.3％的受訪者其保險孤兒之狀態已獲得解決,僅4.2％的受訪者其孤兒經驗低於1年,顯示壽險公司並沒有將消除保險孤兒視為急迫性的服務缺失。服務稀少及服務接觸品質不佳的情況的確占大多數（占84.2％），並且專屬業務員的失職的確已影響到受訪孤兒的服務。 二、缺失歸因及缺失嚴重性受訪孤兒普遍將缺失歸因於業務員（占67.7％）。受訪者中認為服務稀少的缺失之嚴重性程度嚴重者占大多數（占43.0％），「新業務員不聞不問的孤兒」有高達63.4％認為這種缺失是嚴重的。 三、保險的重要性及保險知識 受訪者普遍認為保險產品是重要的。對保險商品的了解則顯示為中等（絕大多數表示普通49.3%），僅有不到五分之一的受訪孤兒對抱怨反應管道表示了解及非常了解 。 四、保險孤兒的行為反應 六成以上的受訪孤兒對壽險公司及業務員的服務修復作法感到不滿意；64.0％的受訪者呈現負面口碑，僅12.9％的受訪者呈現正面口碑；69.8％的受訪者沒有再購意願，僅16.4％的受訪者有可能再光顧。 五、孤兒保戶期望的服務修復孤兒保戶最高期望的3項服務修復作法依序分別是：「業務員將保單權利義務向我說明清楚」、「我要解約時，提供對我有利的其他選擇（如換約、展期保險…）」及「我可自由更換適合我的服務員（如熟識、業務員人格特質等考量）」。最低期望的2項依序分別是：「別家壽險公司的業務員耐心傾聽或表示關切」、「別家壽險公司的業務員樂於出面幫忙」。文獻推論而得的服務修復策略與因素命名的結果僅「即時性更正」及「更正服務」相似，其餘的服務修復策略於文獻推論而來的較以「行動」為主要區別，而因素命名普遍是與修復「服務提供對象」有關。 六、假設驗證結果之發現 （一）一旦有服務需求發生時，保戶看待服務缺失的嚴重性拉高。 （二）影響期望的服務修復的因素 缺失嚴重性越高，保戶期望的服務修復程度及項目數越高及越多；保戶認知保險的重要性程度越高，保戶期望的服務修復程度及項目數越高及越多。 （三）影響服務修復滿意度的因素 期望的與實際的服務修復之差距顯著影響服務修復滿意度；並且此差距越大服務修復滿意度越低。另外期望的與實際的服務修復之差距較缺失嚴重性的認知對服務修復滿意度的影響大；同時期望的與實際的服務修復之差距也較缺失歸因之差異對服務修復滿意度的影響大。 （四）影響保戶口碑行為的因素 服務修復滿意度顯著影響保戶口碑行為；並且服務修復滿意度越低保戶口碑行為越負面。另外服務修復滿意度較缺失歸因之差異對保戶口碑行為的影響大。 （五）影響保戶再購意圖的因素 服務修復滿意度顯著影響保戶再購意圖；並且服務滿意度越低保戶再購意圖越負面。另外服務修復滿意度較缺失歸因之差異對保戶再購意圖的影響大。 七、有效的服務修復策略 「更正服務」因素及「業務員良好的報怨處理技巧」因素皆對「服務修復滿意度」產生顯著的影響，並且「更正服務」因素較「業務員良好的報怨處理技巧」因素對「服務修復滿意度」的影響更大。因此，對於壽險公司而言，致力於更正服務的缺失及提升業務員良好的報怨處理技巧可以大大的提高保戶「服務修復滿意度」，故「更正服務」因素及「業務員良好的報怨處理技巧」因素是最有效的保險孤兒服務修復策略，尤其是「更正服務」因素。 / Life insurers need to be concerned about issues related to orphan policyholders in order to manage them well. Evidence shows that there is a widespread orphan policyholder’s in life insurance industry. They also have many negative influences on insurers, such as increasing their rate of lapse, weakening the insurer/orphan relationships, etc. This study proposes suitable service recovery strategies for orphans to managers. It examines relationships among service failures towards orphans, service recovery strategies and customers’ behaviors in Taiwan’s life insurance market. Customers’ behaviors include secondary satisfaction, word-of-mouth (W-O-M) and repurchase intentions. The research methods include in-depth interviews and surveys. The first step is an exploratory study of the theme of orphan policies by conducting in-depth interviews with both managers and orphans. The results of the in-depth interviews consider the sources for developing and designing a survey. The survey is the second step, and is the focus of this research. There were 418 questionnaires sent out and responses for received from 289 of these. Of these 289 questionnaires, 230 were completed by eligible respondents, and 225 of the 230 questionnaires were valid. The limits of this study are non-random samplings with insufficient sample sizes. The findings show below: 1. Orphans’ experiences There are 14.3﹪respondents that claim they are no longer orphans. Only 4.2% of the respondents declare that they have been orphans for less than a year. This reveals that insurers do not regard policyholders becoming orphans to be an urgent service failure. The majority of respondents rarely received services from their agents and if so, the services were of poor quality. 2. Failure attribution and severity The majority of respondents hold the agents’ responsible for service failures (67.7%) and consider failure severity to be serious（43.0﹪）. In addition, 63.4% of orphans whose assigned agents never kept contact with them after their original agents left thought that is a serious service failure. 3. Orphans’ behavior responses Over 60% of respondents show dissatisfaction with the service recovery from insurers and agents. W-O-M behaviors of respondents show a negative 64% and a positive 12.9%. Repurchase intentions of respondents show a negative 69.8% and a positive 16.4%. 4. Expected service recovery of orphan policyholders The first 3 highest expectations of orphans are that 1) The agent must make a clear description of rights and responsibilities of the policy that an orphan holds, 2) Offer options that are beneficial to orphans while willing to cancel the policy, and 3) The ability for the insured to have the right to choose an agent who is a better fit without restrictions. The first two lowest expectations of orphans are 1) Agents who work for competitors are willing to listen and show their concerns, and 2) Agents who work for competitors are willing to offer assistance in need.” To compare the names of service recovery that are reasoned by literature review to those that are given by factor analysis show that the former names tend to be distinguished by recovery action, the latter ones are related to subjects who offer service. 5. The result of hypothesis testing a. Orphans who have service needs consider service failure more serious than those who don’t have service needs. b. Factors that affect expected service recovery Orphans consider service failure more crucial, they expect a higher degree of service recovery and more actions of service recovery. c. Factors that affect the secondary satisfaction The gaps between expected and practical service recovery have significant influences on the secondary satisfaction. The bigger the gaps are, the lower an orphan’s secondary satisfaction tends to be. The gaps have more influence than failure severity on the secondary satisfaction. Besides, the gaps also have more influence than the difference of failure attribution on the secondary satisfaction. d. Factors that affect orphans’ W-O-M behaviors The secondary satisfaction has a great influence on an orphan’s W-O-M behavior. The lower secondary satisfaction, the more negative the W-O-M behavior. The gaps between expected and practical service recovery are more influential than the differences in the failure of attribution on orphans’ W-O-M behaviors. e. Factors that affect orphans’ repurchase intentions The secondary satisfaction greatly influences on an orphan’s repurchase intentions. The lower the secondary satisfaction is the greater the decrease in repurchase intentions. The gaps between expected and practical service recovery are more influential than the difference of failure attribution on orphans’ repurchase intentions. 6. Effective strategies of service recovery for orphan policyholders In order to enhance secondary satisfaction for policyholders, life insurers have to devote themselves to service correction and improvement of the agents’ complaint-handling skills. Evidence shows that the factors of service correction and agents’ excellent complaint-handling skills have significant effects on the secondary satisfaction. Thus, the factors of service correction and agents’ excellent complaint-handling skills are the most effective strategies of service recovery for orphan policyholders.

以往針對客戶流失與轉換行為所研究的對象，多偏重以消費品產業為主，較少探討工業品產業客戶流失對於企業經營所造成之影響。本研究針對工業品產業中之營建工具業，探討其客戶流失之原因及行為表現，並期望透過相關研究，使業者可預先發現可能流失之客戶，並做為後續發展客戶慰留專案之參考。 本研究可分為五部份，第一部份首先將回顧與本論文有關之文獻。第二部份則提出本研究之研究架構及研究方法。第三部份則以SPSS軟體進行實證研究，統計方法係利用敘述性統計分析、因素分析、信度分析、單因子變異數分析及區別分析等進行資料分析。第四部分為討論前述之研究發現，並將其與消費品市場之客戶流失行為模式相比較。最後則為結論與建議。 研究結果發現：1.流失原因可萃取出產品及服務因素及價格因素兩大構面。轉購原因可萃取出服務及品牌策略、產品策略及價格策略三大構面。2.流失行為係以降低購買頻率及轉換新的供應商兩種方式表現。3.營建工具業與服務業客戶轉換行為模式有明顯差異。4.購買持續時間較長之客戶，對於送貨時間太久之重要性認知程度與購買持續時間較短之客戶有明顯差異。產品價格太高及採購頻率兩項變數可作為判別流失客戶是否會轉換供應商之模式。但由於區別力不甚良好，故並不適合以此兩項變數作為判斷預測之基準。 / A great deal of effort has been made on the causes of customer churn in the consumer products industry. What seems to be lacking, however, is this subject in the industrial products industry. This study will focus the discussion on the causes of customer churn and customer switching behavior in the construction products supplier, in order to provide guidance for developing retention and loyalty programs. This study can be divided into five parts; the first part reviews the literature on this subject. The second part introduces the methodology to be utilized throughout the study, first with structural diagram of study followed by study methods, and object in study. The third part utilizes using SPSS for Windows as the tool to conduct statistical analysis, including description statistical analysis, reliability test, Discriminant Analysis, Factor Analysis, and One-way ANOVA. The fourth part discusses the experimental result of this study, and compares it with customer switching behavior in the consumer products industry. The last part is a conclusion of the thesis. The results of this study show as follows. 1. The main causes of customer churn are product and service oriented or price oriented. The main causes of customer switch are service and brand strategy, product strategy or price strategy. 2. Customer switching behavior includes decreasing purchased frequency and transferring to a new service provider. 3. Customer switching behavioral model in the service industry is different from the model in the construction products supplier. 4. The customers who have longer purchasing duration have higher recognition of importance for deliver time. Purchasing frequency and product price are not the best variables to predict if the customers would churn or not.

Bakgrunden till detta arbete ligger i att Sportlife kommit ut med en egen kollektion med träningskläder. Problematiken är att den inte nått ut i den omfattningen som ledningen önskat. Metoden som beskrivs i denna rapport är intervjuer samt enkätundersökningar. Genom att intervjua ledning, personal och medlemmar har information samlats för att kunna hitta vart det brister i marknadsföringen. Syftet med arbetet är att öka försäljningen för ett företag med hjälp utav befintliga marknadsföringsstrategier. I denna studie tillämpas detta på företaget Sportlife.Begränsningarna i arbetet är som i syftet visar, att endast använda befintliga marknadsföringsstrategier.Dagens forskning och marknadsföringsstrategier ligger till grund för litteraturöversikten. Med hjälp av den information som införskaffats under arbetets gång valdes sju strategier. De presenteras i rapporten då de sju strategierna kan hjälpa Sportlife att öka sin försäljning.Slutsatsen för studien resulterade i att en eller flera strategier kan tillämpas utav Sportlife vilket kan leda till en ökad försäljning. / Program: Textil produktutveckling med entreprenörs- och affärsinriktning

過往顧客滿意架構多集中在購前因素分析或購後行為探討，甚少連結前因後果之整合性架構，故本研究從認知、態度、行為三個面向予以探究，並以關係階段與替代性吸引力雙變數作為調節變項。 本研究針對上海速食業者德克士之消費客群為抽樣對象，共收集有效問卷329份，並利用結構方程模式檢驗研究假說。研究結果歸納如下： 1. 品牌聲望對知覺價值與顧客滿意度皆有正向影響，且知覺價值亦對顧客滿意度有顯著的正向關係。 2. 慣性行為對於顧客滿意到顧客忠誠的路徑具有部分中介效果，結果顯示慣性亦是形成忠誠度的前驅因子之一。 3. 顧客滿意到口碑傳播的路徑並不顯著，但顧客忠誠到口碑傳播卻有顯著的正向關係，代表客群如果只有滿意還不足以衍生口碑行為，需要透過忠誠機制才有足夠強度驅動口碑。 4. 關係階段會顯著調節「顧客滿意到顧客忠誠」以及「顧客滿意到慣性行為」之關係，其他路徑則不顯著。替代性吸引力則對所有路徑的調節效果皆不顯著，此結果可能源於實證對象與競爭企業在消費者的認知中並沒有太大差異或偏好。 / Past researches of customer satisfaction focus on analysis of pre-pruchasing factors or post-buying behaviors. Nevertheless, few studies have adapted integrative structures of combining whole causal connection. The study investigates into three dimensions of cognition, attitude and behavior, taking relationship stage and alternative attractiveness as moderating variables. The study collected 329 valid questionnaires from fast food chain stores, Dicos, in Shanghai and took advantage of SEM to verify research hypotheses. Results and discussions are concluded below： 1. Brand Reputation has positive influence in Perceived Value and Customer Satisfaction. Perceived Value also has significantly positive influence in Customer Satisfaction. 2. Inertia Behavior has mediation effect towards the path of Customer Satisfaction and Customer Lotalty. The result indicates inertia is one of the pre-exponential factors of Customer Loyalty. 3. Customer Satisfaction to Word of Mouth isn’t significant, but Customer Loyalty to Word of Mouth is significantly positive. The result reveals satisfaction is not enough to motivate WOM spreading. Loyalty mechanism is needed to drive WOM behaviors. 4. Relationship stage moderates “Customer Satisfaction to Customer Lotalty” and “Customer Satisfaction to Inertia Behavior” significantly and other hypotheses aren’t significant. Alternative attractiveness doesn’t significantly moderate all of the hypotheses. It may indicate there is no difference or preference to cognition of customers towards Dicos and their competitors.

在社群網路發展蓬勃的時代，各企業都要求行銷人員尋求在社群網路曝光最大化的方法。企業也渴望透過培養忠實顧客得到穩定的顧客關係;換句話說，企業無意識地在顧客參與度的方面進行著墨。除此之外，企業習慣於藉著整合(聯合)性行銷來增加企業曝光度以及減少行銷成本；但僅止於與利益關係夥伴的行銷而喪失了更進一步培養顧客關係的機會。在我們的研究中，我們發展了原創性的概念性架構去幫助企業完成三項目標：優化口碑行銷之可能性、發展顧客參與度、以及加強與合作夥伴整合性行銷的效益。本研究設計了顧客參與平台，提供企業以協助企業管理粉絲專頁、發展顧客參與度以及挑選適合的合作夥伴以進行整合性行銷。我們研究發現，內省意見領袖之顧客參與度與文章型態以及內容有顯著關係，他們較容易受到知識性文章內容所吸引；而一般Facebook使用者也容易因朋友分享文章而有更高度閱讀的意願。我們也藉由這些發現針對兩間企業進行聯合行銷的個案研討，成功提高其B2C2C在Facebook上的口碑行銷廣度和顧客參與深度。 / In view of the explosive growth of social network, businesses want their marketers to find ways to be more ad exposure. Furthermore, businesses desire to get loyal customer for sustainable customer relationship; in other words, businesses are interested in developing customer engagement, even if they do not realize that they are so. Besides, businesses used to increase their brand exposure and decrease marketing cost through integrated marketing, but merely cooperating with stakeholders lost opportunity to further cultivate customer relations. In this study, we develop an original conceptual framework to assist business to complete three objectives: locally optimizing eWOM likelihood, developing customer engagement, and enhancing effectiveness of integrated marketing with cooperation stakeholder. We design an engagement site to help businesses choose their cooperation stakeholders, manage their fan page and further engage their customers on their fan page through our services provided on engagement site. Our finding includes the insights of the significant engagement degree between the informative content article and introvert leaders, the introvert leader to arouse their friends’ interest by the article, the method to enhance B2C2C eWOM through the introvert leaders and the practices of cooperating campaign between two businesses on Facebook.

Thesis by publication. / Thesis (PhD) -- Macquarie University, Macquarie Graduate School of Management, 2008. / Bibliography: leaves 124-133. / Introduction - Literature review -- Online word-of-mouth: a comparison of American and Chinese discussion boards -- Electronic word-of-mouth: a comparison of stated and revealed behaviour on electronic discussion boards -- A cross-cultural comparison of electronic word-of-mouth and country-of-origin effects -- Conclusion. / The growth of electronic discussion boards has enabled consumers from different cultures to communicate with people of similar interests. Through this online channel, marketing concepts such as word-of-mouth (WOM) and country-of-origin (CoO) effects have the potential to become more important because of the potentially large number of participants involved. The US and China, being the largest and second-largest online population in the world respectively, are ideal countries to investigate the frequency and extent of these marketing concepts. --The thesis consists of three separate but inter-related papers which have been published in journals or have been accepted for publication. Each paper builds on the one before and analyses different aspects of online consumer behaviour such as information-giving, information-seeking and the CoO statements made by participants of discussion boards. By examining and comparing the frequency and content of discussion postings on discussion boards within US and China based websites, the thesis makes a comparison of the information-giving and information-seeking behaviour of the discussants and also looks at the extent and the content of CoO statements made. Online observation of discussion postings from six different discussion boards (three each from the US and China) was conducted over two 90-day period in 2004 and 2005 and a total of 5,993 discussion postings were downloaded for analysis. In addition, an online survey of 214 participants was conducted to compare the stated and actual (or "revealed") behaviour of discussants on the US and China based discussion boards. -- Overall, the findings indicate consistent differences over a 12-month period in the bahaviour of the US and Chinese discussants. The US discussants were found to provide more information than their Chinese counterparts while the Chinese discussants exhibited more information-seeking bahaviour on the discussion boards. The findings also indicate that the Chinese discussants demonstrated more negative CoO statements and these statements were observed to be related to Japan and/or brands that originated from Japan. The findings suggest that such negative CoO statements can increase rapidly online and it appears that the negative sentiments by the Chinese were apparently unrelated to product quality; instead they appear to have been predominantly associated with war related animosity. -- These findings have important implications for marketers selling to the Chinese as discussion boards appear to be more important as a source of information for the Chinese than the Americans. Also, given that the Chinese discussants demonstrated a high level of negative CoO statements relating to products from Japan, marketers selling Japanese products to the Chinese must understand the underlying issues related to these negativeCoO statements and take steps to prevent non-purchase of Japanese products. / Mode of access: World Wide Web. / vii, 133 leaves ill

The purpose of this study is to determine which marketing communication methods tour operators in Gauteng, registered with SATSA, utilise. Tour operators aim to enhance tourist experiences. Companies need to be exposed to the marketplace to attract and keep business, thus marketing communication methods used by tourism organisations are examined at length. The results for the study were obtained using a web-based questionnaire. Main findings include the fact that SATSA-registered tour operators frequently use interactive media, direct marketing and advertising. Word of mouth was continually regarded as an important marketing communication method. The larger the company, the more likely it is to use advertising. Interactive media can be used by small and large companies alike. Many marketing communication methods that are used frequently were not deemed to be efficient. One may therefore conclude that SATSA-registered tour operators in Gauteng prefer to use interactive media. / Business Management / M. Comm. (Business Management)

The purpose of this research was to investigate the marketing communication practices of car dealerships, in order to identify what factors are considered in the selection of the marketing communication mix incorporated in the marketing communication strategy. Furthermore, identify and establish an understanding of the marketing communication mix elements used by car dealerships in their marketing communication strategies. A qualitative research approach was followed in this paper. Semi-structured, in-depth interviews were conducted with marketing personnel of various car dealerships in Gauteng, South Africa. In this paper, a qualitative content analysis was followed, and Atlas.ti version 10 computer software was used to generate themes. The study uncovered that car dealerships use various marketing communication mix elements to achieve their marketing communication objectives, such as creating dealership brand awareness, stimulating sales, and closing sales transactions. The study revealed also uncovered that internet is also used by car dealerships in executing marketing communication strategies. The study revealed the internal and external factors considered in planning and executing marketing communication strategies and campaigns. The study further discovered that these marketing communication elements are not used in isolation, but support each other in conveying marketing messages that lead to the attainment of various marketing communication objectives. The findings revealed that despite the use of radio and print media, social media types are increasingly being used by dealerships to share information with existing customers and potential customers regarding the dealerships‟ products and special offers, although the use of social media platforms varied. The study also discovered that car dealerships experience some challenges in planning and executing marketing communication strategies and campaigns. Recommendations to stakeholders in the motor industry and future research directions are provided. / Business Management / M. Com. (Business Management)