1.1 Introduction
Customer Relationship Management (CRM) is described as an approach to managing a company's engagement with current and potential customers through creating a trustworthy partnership (Bhardwaj et al., 2021). The term CRM will refer to the technologies, principles and practices that have been used by firms and organizations to analyze and manage their customer interactions with the data throughout the lifecycle of the customers. The main objectives of CRM are to improve business relationships with customers, assisting in customer retention that will lead to increase sales and profit. CRM has turn out to be one of exhortation for many organizations. CRM main role and purpose is to help organizations review productivity on dealings like repeat purchases, dollars spent, and long life (Khodakarami et al., 2014).
As a prelude to other parts of this study, this chapter will discuss the background upon which this study was initiated, the statement of problems that led to this study, the Aim and Objectives of the study. Others are Significance of the study, Scope of work, Research hypothesis and questions, Limitations of the Study and Definition of technical terms.
1.2 Background of Study
Customers are important and are said to be the driving source to the success of a business and a good business is one which considers customer’s interest (Mithas et al., 2005). In the light of the aforementioned, customer satisfaction is therefore key and a subject to be addressed. Although, customer satisfaction can be weighed on individual customer interests but the sampling of varying interests from customers would give an estimate of the average customer value and satisfaction.
According to Zainurrafiqi et al., (2012), there are varying direct and indirect effects of customer relationship management (CRM) to customer satisfaction. Commercial banks in Nigeria are excelling in this form of customer appreciation through promotion, digital marketing, social media presence, customer involvement and other customer-oriented business strategies. Popular methods revolve round support services and channels encouraging customer involvement. These methods have enabled the businesses done to be solution based focusing on customers’ needs.
Customer involvement was studied in over 259 firms and the empirical results reveal that this has brought about effects in the innovation capabilities of customer service (Ngo et al., 2013). This shows that there is a relationship between customer involvement and customer services including customer support services. Because of the strong ties between this two variant but identical variables, we intend to measure the individual results and compare their effectiveness in regards to customer satisfaction.
Incentives also are known to be one of the best ways for positive reinforcement and behavioral psychology re-engineering (Robinson & Berridge, 2001).
Customer behavior sometimes stems from present emotions such as anger, happiness etc. (Grandey et al., 2004). But incentives on the other hand, create a bridge that separates possible resultant actions from current emotional state. Beyond customer satisfaction, incentives through various innovative services may be used to win back an angry customer (Griffin & Lowenstein, 2001). In other words, to study the effects of Customer Relationship Management (CRM) on customer satisfaction, we should also consider measures that can reverse customer dissatisfaction and its effect for proper understanding. Part of the mechanism to implement the use of incentives is the accommodation of customer involvement and customer participation. With the integration of incentive oriented marketing strategies through customer participation, there is an opportunity available for customers to appreciate product value and add their input to the business activities.
There is a close bond between these Customer Relationship Management (CRM) concepts: Customer involvement and participation; Customer support services; Incentives. This forms the basis of this project and the motivation behind the scaling down of the dependent variables namely customer involvement, support services and incentives and their effect to customer satisfaction. At the end of the project, the empirical values of each variable would have been ascertained considering the sampling of customers’ opinion of three different Nigerian banks and conclusions can thereby be drawn.
Therefore, in Nigeria where the research was carried out, the activities that was conducted is to know the Effect of Customer Relationship Management on Consumer Goods.
1.3 Statement of Problems
Investigation revealed that researches on the effect of Customer Relationship Management (CRM) on customer satisfaction have been on for a long period of time (Zainurrafiqi et al., 2012). There have been diverse operational variables to measure Customer Relationship Management (CRM) from lack of trust to partnerships, empowerment etc. Contemporary Customer Relationship Management (CRM) problems have evolved from just customer attitudinal study or mentality to the perception of services offered by businesses in relation to Customer Relationship Management (CRM).
A major concern is how effective incentives, support services and customer involvement is to customer satisfaction as this sort of research leads the forefront of contemporary Customer Relationship Management (CRM) questions. Presence of an extensive customer relationship might also be argued to be operationally cost ineffective and might not worth a lot of investment; but it maybe profit inclined (Krasnikov, 2009).
A common argument that follows this ideology is the debunking of claims that customers are always right (Grandey et al., 2004). This surrounding claim even further reiterate that if customers are giving more privileges than they ought to have, the insatiable nature of customers may be continually harnessed (Grandey, Dicter, Sin, & Sin, 2004).
At a point where there are varying point of views in the effects of Customer Relationship Management (CRM) on customer satisfaction, it is paramount we conduct a research sampling the Customer Relationship Management (CRM) methods of three commercial banks in Nigeria, one of which is an old generation bank and coming to a consensus on whether the effects tends to the positives or the negatives on customer satisfaction in order to discover the truth. The research would not only measure these effects but also consider each effect in a bid to proffer a sustainable solution to the problem stated.
1.4 Aim and Objectives of Study
The aim of the study is to investigate the Effect of Customer Relationship Management (CRM) on Consumer Goods. In achieving this aim, the following specific objectives were laid out as follows:
- To determine the effect of customer support services on customer satisfaction;
- To determine the joint effect of CRM elements on customer satisfaction;
- To ascertain the effect of incentives on customer satisfaction; and
- To investigate the effect of customer involvement and participation on customer satisfaction.
1.5 Research Questions
The study came up with research questions so as to be able to ascertain the above stated objectives. The specific research questions for the study are stated below as follows:
- Does incentives to customers have an effect on customer satisfaction?
- Does the joint of CRM elements have an effect on customer satisfaction?
- What effects do customer support services have on customer satisfaction?
- What is the effect of customer involvement and participation on customer satisfaction?
1.6 Research Hypothesis
In order to pursue the objective of this study, the following generalized statements have been designed to guide and aids in obtaining the result for the experiment to be conducted. For this work, the null hypothesis will be represented with H0 while the alternative hypothesis will be represented with hypothesis H1.
Hypothesis One
- H0: Customer involvement and participation has no significant effect on customer satisfaction.
- H1: Customer involvement and participation has a significant effect on customer satisfaction.
Hypothesis Two
- H0: Customer support services have no significant effect on customer satisfaction.
- H1: Customer support services have a significant effect on customer satisfaction.
Hypothesis Three
- H0: Incentives has no significant effect on customer satisfaction.
- H1: Incentives has a significant effect on customer satisfaction.
Hypothesis Four
- H0: The joint of CRM elements has no significant effect on customer satisfaction.
- H1: The joint of CRM elements has significant effect on customer satisfaction.
1.7 Significance of Study
The study would help companies in developing strategies or maybe performing an overhaul in the customer relationship management approaches being used. It would also be significant to the customer in appreciating customer relationship management with the suggestions it recommends and also in attaining satisfaction.
Furthermore, employees and people who are involved in the system that manages customer relationship would be able to understand better the needs of the customer in regards to satisfaction and proffer sustainable solutions.
This study will be of immense benefit to other researchers who intend to know more on this study and can also be used by non-researchers to build more on their research work. This study contributes to knowledge and could serve as a guide for other study.
1.8 Scope of Study
The scope of the research is focused on the Effect of Customer Relationship Management on Consumer Goods in Nigeria.
1.9 Limitations of the Study
During the course of this study, many things militated against its completion, some of which are:
- Time Constraint: The time frame given to accomplish this project was very short due to school academic calendar and it was carried out under pressure which made the researcher not to implement some necessary features.
- Establishment Policies: Establishment policies posed a serious limitation as most staffs are not ready to release information needed for this project work. There were lots of information needed from the staffs of this establishment to enhance the study which took them time to release or they did not release at all for security purposes, hence the scope was reduced.
- Research material: availability of research material is a major setback to the scope of the study.
- Frequent power failure: This made the researcher append more money on fuel to ensure sustainable power.
- Financial Constraint: Insufficient fund tends to impede the efficiency of the researcher in sourcing for the relevant materials, literature or information and in the process of data collection (internet, questionnaire and interview).
1.10 Definition of Terms
Customer: This is a person who patronizes a business or shop, buying its products and possibly engaging in further dealings.
Customer Satisfaction (CS): This relates to the measure in which customer’s expectation of a business product is realized or surpassed.
Customer Relationship Management (CRM): It is a concept that explains the various technologies, processes, strategies and people involved in maintaining a relational framework for the customer over a specified duration.
