• Journal of KIISE:Computing Practices and Letters
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• v.6 no.3
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• pp.348-355
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• 2000

Loyalty is a bonus point that a customer earns in reward of purchasing goods of a shop or a manufacturer. The management of loyalty such as issuing, accounting, reimbursing is carried out by the loyalty system. Traditional loyalty systems were proprietary. As a result, the systems are not interoperable with each other. However, our loyalty system allows a group of merchants join together and use the same IC card to operate their own loyalty programs. Data and counters can be shared or totally isolated, using secret codes and keys. The loyalty pool system communicates with the loyalty service providers over the Internet and performs the management of loyalty in fully automated manner. This paper describes the functional architecture and internal behavior of the loyalty pool system along with the communication protocols.

• Journal of the East Asian Society of Dietary Life
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• v.21 no.2
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• pp.298-309
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• 2011

The purpose of this study was to test whether sales promotions of strategic alliances affected brand switching intention and brand loyalty in family restaurants. The types of sales promotions included monetary benefits/non-monetary benefits, and immediate benefit (benefits immediately after consumers agreed to accept promotion)/delayed benefits (benefits received at a later time). For this purpose, a questionnaire survey was completed by 355 customers of family restaurants in Daegu between December 15, of 2009 and January 31, 2010. The study-findings indicated that (1) monetary benefits (application opportunity for gift certificate benefits and price discount benefits) were found to affect brand switching intention and brand loyalty; (2) brand switching intention was partly affected by non-monetary benefits (mileages accumulations benefits, presents benefits, and samples benefits), and (3) brand loyalty was partly influenced by non-monetary benefits (mileages accumulations benefits, presents benefits and electronic newsletter benefits). This study also found that (1) brand switching intention and brand loyalty were partly affected by immediate benefits (sample benefits, presents benefits, and price discount benefits; (2) brand switching intention was partly influenced by delayed benefits (application opportunity for gift certificate benefits and mileages accumulations benefits), and (3) brand loyalty was affected by delayed benefits (application opportunity for gift certificate benefits, mileages accumulations benefits, and electronic newsletter benefits). Based on these findings, family restaurants should use sales promotions as a tool for decreasing brand switching intention and increasing brand loyalty.

• Journal of Distribution Science
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• v.20 no.8
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• pp.59-67
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• 2022

Purpose: This study identifies how twelve key success factors of distribution strategies for community enterprises in Thailand achieve higher performances. Research design, data, and methodology: The samples in this study were 400 entrepreneurs throughout the country. The instrument for data elicitation was a questionnaire. The descriptive and inferential statistics for data analysis were percentage, mean, standard deviation, T-Test, F-Test, multiple regression, and multiple correlations. Results: The results revealed that, overall, the samples showed high opinions on online distribution strategies in all aspects. In detail, the three highest factors were as follows: 1) electronic satisfaction, 2) product characteristics and electronic trust, and 3) the quality and success in online distribution. In detail, the three highest aspects of online distribution success were customer loyalty, financial performance, and work management, respectively. The online distribution strategies influencing community enterprises' success were electronic trust, electronic loyalty, social information, electronic satisfaction, and online distribution tools, which had a statistical significance of 71. Conclusions: This research has made an essential contribution to community enterprise entrepreneurs should focus on and adopt these 8P+4ODS concepts to increase sales, maintain brand loyalty of existing customers, get new customers, develop learning, and improve the working potentials of community enterprise entrepreneurs.

• Journal of Global Scholars of Marketing Science
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• v.10
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• pp.165-185
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• 2002

The extant study on virtual store loyalty has not been comprehensive and has focused on identifying limited variables such as design, product value, contents, communication, security, that have influence on virtual store loyalty. Their limited perspectives have frequently yielded empirical studies with fragmented results and contributed to the research with low explanation. This paper thus examines the effects of virtual store image, satisfaction and trust on loyalty. The study results confirm that virtual store image have significant effects on satisfaction, trust, and loyalty. Also, satisfaction and trust directly influence vitrual store loyalty. This study contributes to the understanding of the role of virtual store providers in online shopping situation.

• Journal of Global Scholars of Marketing Science
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• v.19 no.4
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• pp.57-63
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• 2009

With an exponential increase in electronic commerce (e-commerce), marketers are attempting to gain a competitive advantage by emphasizing service quality and post interaction service aspects, which leads to customer satisfaction or behavioral consequence. Particularly for apparel, service quality is one of the key determinants in encouraging customer e-loyalty, and hence the success of apparel retailing in the context of electronic commerce. Therefore, this study explores e-service quality (E-SERVQUAL) factors and their unique effects on e-loyalty for apparel online shopping based on Parasuraman et al' s (2005) framework. Specific objectives of this study are to identify underlying dimension of E-SERVQUAL, and analyze a structural model for examining the effect of E-SERVQUAL on e-loyalty for online apparel shopping. For the theoretical framework of service quality in the context of online shopping, literatures on traditional and electronic service quality factors were comparatively reviewed, and two aspects of core and recovery services were identified. This study hypothesized that E-SERVQUAL has an effect on e-loyalty; customer satisfaction has a positive effect on e-service loyalty for apparel online shopping; and customer satisfaction mediates in the effect of E-SERVQUAL on e-loyalty for apparel online shopping. A self-administered questionnaire was developed based on literatures. A total of 252 usable questionnaires were obtained from online consumers who had purchase experience with online shopping for apparel products and reside in standard metropolitan areas, in the United States. Factor analysis (e.g., exploratory, confirmatory) was conducted to assess the validity and reliability and the structural equation model including measurement and structural models was estimated via LISREL 8.8 program. Findings showed that the E-SERVQUAL of shopping websites for apparel consisted of five factors: Compensation, Fulfillment, Efficiency, System Availability, and Responsiveness. This supports Parasuraman (2005)'s E-S-QUAL encompassing two aspects of core service (e.g., fulfillment, efficiency, system availability) and recovery related service (e.g., compensation, responsiveness) in the context of apparel shopping online. In the structural equation model, there are five exogenous latent variables for e-SERVQUAL factors; and two endogenous latent variables (e.g., customer satisfaction, e-loyalty). For the measurement model, the factor loadings for each respective construct were statistically significant and were greater than .60 and internal consistency reliabilities ranged from .85 to .88. In the estimated structural model of the e-SERVEQUAL factors, the system availability was found to have direct and positive effect on e-loyalty, whereas efficiency had a negative effect on e-loyalty for apparel online shopping. However, fulfillment was not a significant predictor for explaining consequences of E-SERVQUAL for apparel online shopping. This finding implies that perceived service quality of system available was likely to increase customer satisfaction for apparel online shopping. However, it was not supported that e-loyalty was determined by service quality, because service quality has an indirect effect on e-loyalty (i.e., repurchase intention) by mediating effect of value or satisfaction in the context of online shopping for apparel. In addition, both compensation and responsiveness were found to have a significant impact on customer satisfaction, which influenced e-loyalty for apparel online shopping. Thus, there was significant indirect effect of compensation and responsiveness on e-loyalty. This suggests that the recovery-specific service factors play an important role in maximizing customer satisfaction levels and then maintaining customer loyalty to the online shopping site for apparel. The findings have both managerial and research implications. Fashion marketers can establish long-term relationship with their customers based on continuously measuring customer perceptions for recovery-related service quality, such as quick responses to problem and returns, and compensation for customers' problem after their purchases. In order to maintain e-loyalty, recovery services play an important role in the first choice websites for consumers to purchase clothing. Given that online consumers may shop anywhere, a marketing strategy for improving competitive advantages is to provide better service quality, maximize satisfaction, and turn to creating customers' e-loyalty for apparel online shopping. From a researcher's perspective, there are some limitations of this research that should be considered when interpreting its findings. For future research, findings provide a basis for the further study of this important topic along both theoretical and empirical dimensions. Based on the findings, more comprehensive models for predicting E-SERVQUAL's consequences can be developed and tested. For global fashion marketing, this study can expand to a cross-cultural approach into e-service quality for apparel by including multinational samples.

• Journal of Distribution Science
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• v.17 no.9
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• pp.93-102
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• 2019

Purpose - Capturing the shifting consumer behavior perspective on online transportation network performance in Indonesia, this study aims to empirically examine the impact of electronic customer relationship management (e-CRM) and e-service quality on customer e-satisfaction and e-loyalty. Research design, data, and methodology - A quantitative approach was applied, and then we determined the respondents who met the predetermined criterion by using purposive sampling method. In total, 167 online transportation customer in Indonesia participated in this electronic questionnaire survey. To tested the collected data, Partial Least Square (PLS) - (SEM) analytical tools were employed. Results and Findings - There are five hypotheses proposed in this study and state that only one hypothesis is rejected, The dominant relationship between variables in the hypothesis is shown in the variable relationship of e-service quality on e-satisfaction. CRM, Service Quality, Satisfaction and Loyalty implemented comprehensively in cyberspace provides a clear picture for academics but also for practitioners who are struggling in the service industry that specifically appoints online transportation business. The findings of this research provide both managerial and theoretical implications to maintain customer e-loyalty in online transportation network business environment in Indonesia.

• The Journal of Information Systems
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• v.16 no.4
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• pp.107-129
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• 2007

The purpose of this study is to examine the effect of logistics service quality and relationship orientation factors on customer satisfaction and loyalty in the electronic commerce context. Based on extensive review of relevant literature, nine components of logistics service quality(i.e. information quality, ordering procedures, ordering release quantities, timeliness, order accuracy, order quality, order condition, order discrepancy handling and personnel contact quality) and six components of relationship orientation(i.e. trust, bonding, communication, shared value, empathy and reciprocity) are introduced in this study. And a conceptual model is developed and five research hypotheses are empirically examined using structural equation modeling. The findings indicate that logistics service quality and relationship orientation are positively and significantly associated with customer satisfaction, and customer satisfaction is the antecedent variable of customer loyalty in the Internet Shopping Mall. In addition, a significant impact of logistics service quality on relationship orientation of the customer is revealed. Implications of these findings are discussed, and limitations of the study as well as further research directions are addressed.

• Asia pacific journal of information systems
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• v.33 no.2
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• pp.342-366
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• 2023

This study attempts to extend the customer value - customer satisfaction - customer loyalty framework by introducing key constructs of scarcity messages as a major environmental stimulus and the urge to buy impulsively as its response in the context of group-buying social commerce, across countries including Korea and China. More specifically, this study proposes that scarcity messages influence customers' value perception (i.e., utilitarian value and hedonic value) and thereby influencing customer satisfaction and further customer loyalty. Moreover, the study suggests that scarcity messages and utilitarian and hedonic values arouse the urge to buy impulsively. In the Korean sample, the results show that scarcity messages increase both utilitarian and hedonic values as well as the urge to buy impulsively, which in turn leads to customers' satisfaction and further loyalty. Besides, customer satisfaction is determined by utilitarian value, not hedonic value. In the Chinese sample, utilitarian value-related relationships are insignificant. More specifically, scarcity messages only influence hedonic value which increases the urge to buy impulsively. Besides, customer satisfaction is determined by both utilitarian and hedonic values, but not by the urge to buy impulsively.

• Asia pacific journal of information systems
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• v.23 no.3
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• pp.105-129
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• 2013

This study draws important factors in electronic Word-of-Mouth (eWOM) and examines how these influence the building of customer loyalty. eWOM is viewed as social communication between customers and sellers, and thus the communicative action theory is applied. With the theory, we identify reviewer and seller as influential players on customers, and derive important factors such as correctness and veracity of reviews from the reviewers' action, and information compactness and adequacy from the seller's action. We propose these constructs as antecedents of customer loyalty and further hypothesize their curvilinear impacts as follows: the marginal impacts of veracity and correctness will decrease as veracity and correctness increase, and the marginal impacts of compactness and adequacy will increase as compactness and adequacy increase. The result indicates that only the seller's action has a curvilinear impact, whereas the reviewer has proportional positive impact on customer loyalty. This study indentifies important factors in eWOM from a critical social theory perspective and validates them using the positivistic approach. For practitioners, it discusses the important factors in eWOM with the identification of the individuals who are responsible for these factors.

• Asia pacific journal of information systems
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• v.20 no.2
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• pp.157-180
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• 2010

Rapid development of information technology has generated a new industry and market. In particular, network technology such as the Internet and other computer networks made transaction activities switched from traditional offline commerce to e-commerce. Among them, digital content is bit-based object which is created and distributed through electronic environment. In particular, many entertainment contents such as the music, the movies, and the computer game softwares are main products. Although digital content commerce has high potential demand, it lacks the consideration about the factor related to maintaining existing customer such as customer loyalty and switching costs. There has been a number of research on customer loyalty and other factors affecting it in the traditional electronic commerce environment, but there is a lack of research which examines the characteristics of digital content. The study about the effect of switching costs on customer loyalty in digital content commerce is necessary because the customers of digital content commerce market are from those of other e-commerce market or traditional offline commerce market. In addition, customer loyalty and switching costs are important factors because they may build up greater customer retention. For that reason, this study focused on examining the relationships among switching costs, antecedents for switching costs, and customer loyalty in online digital music service industry. The study has three major purposes: (1) to find antecedents of switching costs on digital content commerce and examine effect of antecedents for switching costs; (2) to identify effect of switching costs on customer loyalty in digital content commerce and examine moderating effects of alternative attractiveness; (3) to identify the differences of antecedents for switching costs by contents transmission type(streaming service and downloading service). And, the online digital music service industry is selected in this study since there are many users and transactions incurring. To accomplish these purposes, a survey questionnaire was developed and distributed to 256 informants. Survey instrument was developed based on previous research and pre-established survey items. Total of 206 surveys are collected and used in the data analysis. Among the respondents, 56.8% is male and 43.2% is female. Also, 86 responses were streaming service user group and 120 responses were download service user group. These data was analyzed using regression analysis. Major findings of empirical analysis can be summarized as follows. First, switching costs have positive effect on customer loyalty in digital content commerce environment. Second, the influence of switching costs on customer loyalty increases under conditions of high alternative attractiveness. Third, DRM convenience and breadth of use have positive effect on switching costs. The findings imply that the digital content provider should pay more attention to switching costs in addition to customer satisfaction in order to attract customers. Also, increasing the convenience of DRM use by securing the convenience of user interface and expanding the support device and increasing the service use scope by providing diverse value-added service helps to create a switching barrier. The result of the study can become a practical use in marketing strategy for maintaining existing customer. In particular, switching barrier is very important under conditions of high competition in the online music service market. This study can be used as a basis for further studies about customer retention in digital content commerce.