The goal is to help the retail industry define customer-company relationships, and to manage the relationships in a more effective way in terms of the balance between retail service quality and product quality. This study proposes a two-step modelling approach to the development of an exploratory-based customer relationship management (CRM) simulation model, which consists of a static relationship (exploratory) module and a dynamic simulation module. To support and test the model development, Hunter Douglas, a world-class leader in the window fashions industry, was used as a case study for data collection. A customer survey and focus group discussions were therefore conducted with staff and customers. Hypothesis testing and other statistical methods including factor analysis, ANOVA, multiple regression, post-hoc analysis, sensitivity analysis, and policy analysis were adopted in this research to develop the exploratory module. System dynamics modelling and simulation were applied to develop the dynamic simulation module. The major dimensions regarding retail service quality, product quality and customer loyalty were defined in the exploratory module. Five dimensions regarding retail service quality (policy, physical aspects, reliability, problem solving, and personal interaction) and three dimensions regarding product quality (feature, aesthetics, and customer-perceived quality) were considered and their impacts on the two levels of customer loyalty - customer loyalty to the store and customer loyalty to employees - were investigated. These measures consist of forty variables in total. Through the exploratory module, it is found that reliability, physical aspects, and problem solving exert positive impacts on customer loyalty to the store while personal interaction significantly influences customer loyalty to employees. Furthermore, gender differences have significant impacts on customer loyalty to the store, particularly in terms of physical aspects, reliability, problem solving and aesthetics. Connecting with the exploratory module, the dynamic simulation module further takes account of employee satisfaction, spending on advertising and order completion efficiency. This module can make significant contribution to the field of CRM by providing the retail industry with a full picture of CRM for the scenario analysis and strategic planning. Based on the findings of the dynamic simulation module, appropriate CRM strategies had been adopted and various aspects of Hunter Douglas, including customer satisfaction, employee satisfaction, numbers of repeat customers, sales volume, etc. have significantly improved. These fruitful results achieved by Hunter Douglas, a typical retailer, confirm the high value and the contribution of this research to the retail industry. The model developed could form a generalised CRM model for adoption in other retail sectors after further testing and evaluation in a wider range of retail environments.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:bl.uk/oai:ethos.bl.uk:640990 |
| Date | January 2014 |
| Creators | Yuen, Fung Ting |
| Publisher | University of Warwick |
| Source Sets | Ethos UK |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation |
| Source | http://wrap.warwick.ac.uk/66809/ |
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