BUSINESS RESEARCH PROJECT (BGP7730)
SUBMITTED BY:
GROUP 6
ASHWINI GUBBA (s4601630)
GRISHU RISAL (s4601638)
SRUTHI GOLIPALLI (s4608559)
“ANALYSIS OF DIFFERENT STRATEGIES TO INCREASE CUSTOMER SATISFACTION IN FASHION INDUSTRY”
RESEARCH PROPOSAL
ASSIGMENT 1
Table of Contents
Content
1. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY 8
2. RESEARCH BACKGROUND 9
3. RESEARCH OBJECTIVE 10
4. LITERATURE REVIEW 11
4.1. Technological Factor: 11
4.1.1. E-commerce 11
4.1.2. Online survey 12
4.1.3. Digital network 12
4.2. Psychological Factor: 12
4.2.1. Perception 12
4.2.2. Motivation 13
4.2.3. Attitude 13
4.2.4. Personality 13
4.2.5. Self-concept 13
5. CONCEPTUAL MODEL 14
6. HYPOTHESES 15
7. REFERENCES 16
EXECUTIVE SUMMARYIn this competitive market of global economy in fashion industry customers play a crucial role and considered as a major component for growing up the company profitability [ CITATION FEW941 l 1033 ]. In fashion industry, customer satisfaction mainly explain the behavior of customer regarding how they intend to purchase, what they purchase, when they purchase and why they purchase [ CITATION Ney15 l 1033 ]. Therefore, in order to meet the expectation and needs of customer a company should follow different strategies to increase customer satisfaction. Fashion industry has become one of the biggest and famous sectors in the world where large numbers of consumers are involved. Due to the maximum usage in the fashion industry we have decided to do research on the analysis of different strategies to increase customer satisfaction in fashion industry. Here, we have mainly explained two major factors which are technological factors and psychological factors.
RESEARCH BACKGROUNDOver the past two decades, the fashion industry has been changing drastically and this vigorous change has great impact on the customer satisfaction. Due to the increasing needs and expectations of the customers, the fashion industry face the changes over the past few years where fashion retailers have to provide customers with the correct product at the correct time in a short time [ CITATION Bha10 l 1033 ]. Introduction of mobile and e-commerce, digital transformation and online survey through the use of internet has brought an evolution in the fashion industry where consumers get access from any corner of the world. Bansal (2016) mentioned that, with the increase in the use of internet by consumers many companies are getting involved into e-commerce. It is stated that mobile and e-commerce technologies have introduced the first phase of transformation in the fashion industry. Ngumba and Kagiri (2018) mentioned that, E-commerce helps the firms and the consumers by acting as a means of communication with the help of internet by providing comforts of online shopping and helps to increase customer satisfaction with the help of online surveys, reviews about the product, rate the product, easy trial of the product through online for some products such as spectacles, necklace etc. Customer satisfaction is also influenced by psychological variables (attitude, perception, motivation and personalities. Consumer behaviour towards fashion highly depends on their needs and demands, flexibility, availability of the products and how they are provided to the customers. This explains how customer selects the product as per their need, how they use the product and their attitude and belief towards the products.
Analysing the importance of customer satisfaction in fashion industry, we have decided to study different strategies that can be applied further in the fashion industry to increase the customer satisfaction in depth since fashion industry is evolving in a wide range. Here, we have given the topic of our research as “Analysis of different strategies to increase customer satisfaction in fashion industry” where we discuss about the technologies and ideas to increase consumers’ need and demands.
Therefore, our research proposal will give detail information about the fashion industry and how they are adopting new technologies in order to increase customer satisfaction and also company profitability. It will help fashion companies understand to what extend technological and psychological factors influence customers to buy products online. Furthermore, it will provide opportunity for the companies to improve marketing strategies on the basis of the reviews and comments of the consumers’ purchase.
RESEARCH OBJECTIVEManagement Decision Problem (MDP)Business Research Problem (BRP)Business Research Questions (BRQ)MDP: What factors influence to increase customer satisfaction in fashion industry?BRP-1 Technological factor: To what extend does technology factor influences customer satisfaction in fashion industry?BRQs: Does mobile and e-commerce technology help to increase customer satisfaction? How does online survey contribute to fashion industry? Does digital network help companies to meet expectation of the customer needs and requirements? How does internet helps in acquiring information about fashion brands and satisfy customers?BRP-2 Psychological factor: To what extend does psychological factor influences customer satisfaction in fashion industry?BRQs: How does motivation, attitude, perception and personalities will influence the customer satisfaction in fashion industry? Does impact of influencers really affect the customer satisfaction in fashion industry? Does purchase of products affect the customer satisfaction? How does usage of products satisfy the customer in fashion industry?LITERATURE REVIEWCustomer satisfaction is one of the most arguable topics in every sector of the business and considered to be challenging where it explains the customers’ needs and expectation. [ CITATION Hag13 l 1033 ]. Agu and Onuoba (2016) mentioned that, it is essential to understand the behavior of the customers that the organizations will have an idea of what to produce and how to create new styles which can increase customer satisfaction. The well-accepted definition of customer satisfaction is an assessment of variation between prior expectations and the actual performance (Hanif et al, 2010). The factors that impact customer satisfaction are deemed as crucial elements that determine the competitiveness and success of the product or service (Hennig-Thurau and Klee, 1997). Satisfied customers are most likely to repeat buying behavior if the service provided has exceeded their prior expectations (Hanif et al, 2010).
There are two main factors which drive the customer satisfaction that are technological factors and psychological factors.
Technological FactorPsychological Factor4.1. Technological Factor:
Factors related to technology help to network the producer with customers, suppliers, and any other stakeholders (Hammer and Champy, 1993). It ensures optimizes further interaction with customers, this subsequently leads to customer satisfaction (Eckerson and Watson, 2000). The technological perspective according to Hurley et al (2014) deals with common databases created through e-commerce other factors related to this perspective is the automation of sales inquiry, where through online databases and mining information on one can learn factors that can increase customer satisfaction through delivering the correct information to them. The following research follows the impact of two factors that are technological and psychological factors on customer satisfaction.
4.1.1. E-commerce
One of the biggest e-commerce platforms defines e-commerce as the trading of goods and services over the internet (Shopify, 2020). Research conducted by Vasicet al, (2020) shows that e-commerce increases satisfaction among customers this is due to several factors such as time, buyers save more time shopping online than in traditional stores as it doesn’t require travelling to the shop or standing in queues. The research also states hoe e-commerce saves money, the pricing on most online shops is lower than traditional stores, the overall basis shows that e-commerce is the new wave of technological shopping which provides a faster cheaper method of shopping leading to an increase in overall customer satisfaction.
4.1.2. Online survey
Surveys mostly are undertaken to gauge the customers feeling about buying experiences and products (Ramshaw, 2018). In the paper written by Harvard Business review, through questioning management at financial service companies on their customer network program found that higher level in customer satisfaction customers surveyed a year ago were three times more likely to open new accounts or keep subscriptions, this phenomenon is explained as the customers feel more inclined with the brand as they feel they have communicated with the company through some form of the channel (Dholokia and Morwitz, 2002).
4.1.3. Digital network
Networking in conventional means was carried through telephone or face to face meetings, but as technology has advanced networking now is conducted through the lens of Facebook, Whatsapp or other social sites, this is known as the digital network (DONNELLY, 2017). The establishment of an organisation presence in such a digital network allows it to tap in various opportunities and build a deeper relationship with its customers (Agnihotriet al2016). This factor is prevalent in recent times when comprehending customer satisfaction levels.
4.2. Psychological Factor:
Psychological factors which influence the customer satisfaction are perception, attitude, behavior, personality and self-concept; these are observed to be the major psychological factors which influence the customer satisfaction and also drive the consumer buying patterns in fashion industry (Agu and Onuoba, 2016).
The customer satisfaction is majorly influenced by psychological factors and the customers online experience is driven by three major factors called e-distrust, e-negatively beliefs and interactions in websites (Pandey and Chawla, 2018).Motivation factors such as ‘Hedonic shopping’ which gives the customers the fun, excitement for the new products, fantasy about the products will have a greater influence on customer satisfaction. The influence of influencers has a greater impact on the customer satisfaction. ‘Opinion leader’ a person who influence others while choosing their desired product, it will affect the levels of satisfaction of the consumers (Singh, Chaudhuri and Verma, 2019).It is to be noted that psychological factors such as perception, motivation, learning and attitude plays a major role in driving the customer satisfaction (Li and Srisutto, 2016).
Agu and Onuoba (2016) explained the psychological factors influencing customer satisfaction as following in context with the consumer behavior are:
Perception:It refers to the purchase of the product. It explains how the customer feels about the product. Perception discusses about customer satisfaction after purchasing the product, if the customer is not satisfied then the customer will not be any more interested in the product, as the level of customer satisfaction is very low.
Motivation:It refers to the usage of the product. Motivation drives the customer satisfaction, as the customer feel happy while using the product then the rate of customer satisfaction is very high and there will be high chances for the product so that the customer will be happy to buy again.
Attitude:It refers to the disposal of the products. Basit and Durrani (2018) mentioned that, attitude of the consumers can be explained as their interest towards the brands of the product. Attitude drives the customer satisfaction because; consumers have the tendency of buying their desired product which is the attitude of the consumer towards the product.
Personality:It refers to the loyalty and honesty which influence the customer satisfaction either positively or negatively. The satisfaction is the crucial thing in building up the relation between the consumers and organizations. The loyalty of the organization influences the personality of the consumers there by increasing customer satisfaction (Basit and Durrani, 2018).
Self-concept:It refers to the demand for the same patterns of the product by the consumers.
CONCEPTUAL MODELCUSTOMER SATISFACTION TECHNOLOGICAL FACTOR PSYCHOLOGICAL FACTOR MOBILE AND E-COMMERCE INTERNET ONLINE SURVEY DIGITAL NETWORK ATTITUDE PERSONALITIES MOTIVATION PERCEPTION SELF-CONCEPT H1 (+) H2 (+)
HYPOTHESESTherefore, for this research project we have concluded two major hypotheses on the basis of technological and psychological factors. They are as follows:
Technological factor significantly influence to increase customer satisfaction.Psychological factor significantly influence to increase customer satisfaction.REFERENCESLi, S. and Srisutto, S., 2016. Psychological Factors Affecting Consumers’ Purchase Intentions of Agarwood Beads: A Case Study of Nanning City, China. School of business, University of Thai Chamber of commerce. Thailand.Bansal, S., 2016. Effects of online shopping on consumer behaviour. Multidisciplinary international journal, 8(6), pp.234-232.Webster. F. E (1994). Defining the New Marketing Concept, Marketing Management, Vol.2, No.4, pp22-31Bhardwaj, V. and Fairhurst, A., 2010. Fast fashion: response to changes in the fashion industry. The international review of retail, distribution and consumer research, 20(1), pp.165-173.Agu, A.G. and Onuoba, O.A., 2016. Psychological influences and fashion consumption behaviour of consumers in South East Nigeria. International Journal of Research, 38.Pandey, S. and Chawla, D., 2018. Online customer experience (OCE) in clothing e-retail. International Journal of Retail & Distribution Management.Singh, V., Chaudhuri, R. and Verma, S., 2019. Psychological antecedents of apparel-buying intention for young Indian online shoppers. Journal of Modelling in Management.Basit, H.A. and Durrani, U.A., 2018. Rational and emotional factors of customer satisfaction and brand loyalty on J. and Khaadi. Journal of Marketing, 23.Haghshenas, L., Abedi, A., Ghorbani, E., Kamali, A., Harooni, M. N., 2013. Review Consumer Behavior and Factors affecting on Purchasing Decisions. Singaporean Journal of Business, Economics and Management Studies, Vol.1 Issue 10, pp.17-24Hanif, M., Hafeez, S., and Riaz, A., 2010. Factors affecting customer satisfaction. International research journal of finance and economics, 60(1), pp.44-52.Hennig-Thurau, T., and Klee, A. (1997), “The Impact of Customer Satisfaction and Relationship Quality on Customer Retention: A Critical Reassessment and Model Development, “Psychology & Marketing”, Vol. 14, Issue 8, Page 737–764Hurley, R., Jan, M.T. and Abdullah, K., 2014. The impact of technology CSFs on customer satisfaction and the role of trust. International journal of bank marketing.Hammer, M. and Champy, J. (1993), Reengineering the Corporation, Harper Business, New York, NY.Eckerson, W. and Watson, H. (2000), Harnessing Customer Information for Strategic Advantage: Technical Challenges and Business Solutions, The Data Warehousing Institute, Chatsworth, CA.Vasić, N., Kilibarda, M. and Kaurin, T., 2019. The influence of online shopping determinants on customer satisfaction in the Serbian market. Journal of theoretical and applied electronic commerce research, 14(2), pp.0-0.Dholokia, P. and Morwitz, V., 2002. How Surveys Influence Customers. Harvard Business Review.Ramshaw, A., 2018. How Customer Surveys Can Affecting Customer Purchase Behaviors. [online] Genroe. Available at: <https://www.genroe.com/blog/customer-surveys-affecting-customer-purchase-behaviors/332> [Accessed 28 April 2020].Shopify. 2020. Ecommerce Definition – What Is Ecommerce. [online] Available at: <https://www.shopify.com/encyclopedia/what-is-ecommerce> [Accessed 28 April 2020].DONNELLY, R., 2017. What Is Digital Networking? — Digital Road. [online] Digital Road. Available at: <https://www.digitalroad.io/blog/what-is-digital-networking> [Accessed 28 April 2020].Agnihotri, R., Dingus, R., Hu, M.Y. and Krush, M.T., 2016. Social media: Influencing customer satisfaction in B2B sales. Industrial Marketing Management, 53, pp.172-180.
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