Repurchase intention in B2C e-commerce—A relationship quality perspective

Information systems professionals must pay attention to online customer retention. Drawing on the relationship marketing literature, we formulated and tested a model to explain B2C user repurchase intention from the perspective of relationship quality. The model was empirically tested through a survey conducted in Northern Ireland. Results showed that online relationship quality and perceived website usability positively impacted customer repurchase intention. Moreover, online relationship quality was positively influenced by perceived vendor expertise in order fulfillment, perceived vendor reputation, and perceived website usability, whereas distrust in vendor behavior negatively influenced online relationship quality. Implications of these findings are discussed. © 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Extending Customer Relationship Management into a Social Context

Informed by the resource-based view, this study draws on customer relationship management (CRM) and value co-creation literature to develop a framework examining the impact of social networking sites on processes to manage customer relationships. Facilitating the depth and networked interactions necessary to truly engage customers, social networking sites act as a means of enhancing customer relationships through the co-creation of value, moving CRM into a social context. Tested and validated on a data set of hotels, the main contribution of the study to service research lies in the extension of CRM processes, termed relational information processes, to include value co-creation processes due to the social capabilities afforded by social networking sites. Information technology competency and social media orientation act as critical antecedents to these processes, which have a positive impact on both financial and non-financial aspects of firm performance. The theoretical and managerial implications of these findings are discussed accordingly.

Understanding online customer repurchasing intention and the mediating role of trust - an empirical investigation in two developed countries

Although e-commerce adoption and customers initial purchasing behavior have been well studied in the literature, repeat purchase intention and its antecedents remain understudied. This study proposes a model to understand the extent to which trust mediates the effects of vendor-specific factors on customers intention to repurchase from an online vendor. The model was tested and validated in two different country settings. We found that trust fully mediates the relationships between perceived reputation, perceived capability of order fulfillment, and repurchasing intention, and partially mediates the relationship between perceived website quality and repurchasing intention in both countries. Moreover, multi-group analysis reveals no significant between-country differences of the model with regards to the antecedents and outcomes of trust, except the effect of reputation on trust. Academic and practical implications and future research are discussed. © 2009 Operational Research Society Ltd.

Trust, Satisfaction and Online Repurchase Intention: The Moderating Role of Perceived Effectiveness of E-commerce Institutional Mechanisms

The effects of e-commerce institutional mechanisms on trust and online purchase have traditionally been understood in the initial online purchase context. This study extends this literature by exploring the role of e-commerce institutional mechanisms in the online repurchase context. In doing so, it responds to the emerging call for understanding the institutional context under which customer trust operates in an e-commerce environment. Specifically, this study introduces a key moderator, perceived effectiveness of e-commerce institutional mechanisms (PEEIM), to the relationships between trust, satisfaction, and repurchase intention. Drawing on the theory of organizational trust, and based on a survey of 362 returning online customers, we find that PEEIM negatively moderates the relationship between trust in an online vendor and online customer repurchase intention, as it decreases the importance of trust to promoting repurchase behavior. We also find that PEEIM positively moderates the relationship between customer satisfaction and trust as it enhances the customer’s reliance on past transaction experience with the vendor to reevaluate trust in the vendor. Consistent with the predictions made in the literature, PEEIM does not directly affect trust or repurchase intention. Academic and practical implications and future research directions are discussed.

From Customer-Oriented Strategy to Organizational Financial Performance: The Role of Human Resource Management and Customer-Linking Capability

Drawing on the organizational capabilities literature, the authors developed and tested a model of how supportive human resource management (HRM) improved firms’ financial performance perceived by marketing managers through fostering the implementation of a customer-oriented strategy. Customer-linking capability, which is the capability in managing close customer relationships, indicated the implementation of the customer-oriented strategy. Data collected from two emerging economies – China and Hungary –established that supportive HRM partially mediated the relationship between customer-oriented strategy and customer-linking capability. Customer-linking capability further explained how supportive HRM contributed to perceived financial performance. This study explicates the implication of customer-oriented strategy for HRM and reveals the
importance of HRM in strategy implementation. It also sheds some light on the ‘black box’ between HRM and performance. While making important contributions to the field of strategy, HRM and marketing, this study also offers useful practical implications.

Using projective techniques to tap into consumers' feelings, perceptions and attitudes ... getting an honest opinion

An investigation into customer loyalty to food retailers posed a methodological problem namely how to delve beneath the surface and access consumers' unspoken feelings, perceptions, attitudes and values. This paper explains how four different projective techniques were used to access the thoughts and feelings of 160 interviewees in order to obtain a thorough understanding of the interviewees' satisfaction with their 'main' food retailer and to characterize the relationship between the customer and retailer. A brief description of the use, analysis and examples of cartoon friends, word association, personification and mini case studies was provided in order to describe their role in the data collection process.

Overcoming Customer Dependency - A Case Study of Small Consumer Food Producers in Northern Ireland

Dependency on a small number of customer puts intense pressure on suppliers' profit margin and, in slow growing markets, limits their ability to grow. using stragtegic benchmarking information, a group of Northern Ireland consumer food producer are shown, depsite slow market growth and higher than averge customer dependency, to have increased market share while maintaining aboe vergate proitability. examination of the business strategic and develoment activites of the consumer food firms,and comparble information for other small food prodcuers in Ireland, suggests and emphasiss on cost-reduction and new prodcut development. A comparision of the productivity and prodcut range of the consuer food firms provides evidence of the success of these strategic. This suggests that even a relatively weak market situations, charactrised by dependency on a small number of customers, can be over come by effective and appropriate business strategy.

The use of process simulation methods in support of organisational learning in availability contracting

Traditional business models in the aerospace industry are based on a conventional supplier to customer relationship based on the design, manufacture and subsequent delivery of the physical product. Service provision, from the manufacturer's perspective, is typically limited to the supply of procedural documentation and the provision of spare parts to the end user as the product passes through the latter stages of its intended lifecycle. Challenging economic and political conditions have resulted in end users re-structuring their core business activities, particularly in the defence sector. This has resulted in the need for original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) to integrate and manage support service activities in partnership with the customer to deliver platform availability. This improves the probability of commercial sustainability for the OEM through shared operational risks while reducing the cost of platform ownership for the customer. The need for OEMs to evolve their design, manufacture and supply strategies by focusing on customer requirements has revealed a need for reconstruction of traditional internal behaviours and design methodologies. Application of organisational learning is now a well recognised principle for innovative companies to achieve long term growth and sustained technical development, and hence, greater market command. It focuses on the process by which the organisation's knowledge and value base changes, leading to improved problem solving ability and capacity for action. From the perspective of availability contracting, knowledge and the processes by which it is generated, used and retained, become primary assets within the learning organisation. This paper will introduce the application of digital methods to asset management by demonstrating how the process of learning can benefit from a digital approach, how product and process design can be integrated within a virtual framework and finally how the approach can be applied in a service context.

Accountability and Value for Money: A Framework for Exploring the Relationship in Private Finance Initiative Contracts

There is an implicit assumption in the UK Treasury’s publications on public-private partnerships (PPP) – also more commonly known in the United Kingdom as private finance initiative (PFI) - that accountability and value for money (VFM) are related concepts. While recent academic studies on PPP/PFI (from now on as PFI) have focused on VFM, there is a notable absence of studies exploring the ‘presumed’ relationships between accountability and VFM. Drawing on Dubnick’s (Dubnick and Romzek, 1991, 1993; Dubnick, 1996, 1998, 2003, 2005; Dubnick and Justice, 2002) framework for accountability and PFI literature, we develop a research framework for exploring potential relationships between accountability and VFM in PFI projects by proposing alternative accountability cultures, processes and mechanisms for PFI. The PFI accountability model is then exposed to four criteria - warrantability, tractability, measurability and feasibility. Our preliminary interviews provide us guidance in identifying some of the cultures, processes and mechanisms indicated in our model which should enable future researchers to test not only the UK Government’s claimed relationships between accountability and VFM using more specific PFI empirical data, but also a potential relationship between accountability and performance in general.