Factors influencing customer loyalty in mobile telecommunications products and services in Australia

Consumer loyalty is considered a critical determinant of repetitive mobile telecommunications business. The Australian telecommunications sector has strong competition among numerous mobile telecommunications service providers because of low switching costs for customers and product price value competitiveness, which lead to high customer switching rates. This situation has led mobile telecommunications companies to recognise that maintaining customer loyalty plays an important role in retaining customers and enhancing business revenue. Customer retention is not an easy task for service providers because of the furious price and marketing competition among the telecommunications market leaders. Thus, customer loyalty is vital for mobile telecommunications service providers both from a financial perspective and mobile service angle. As such, it is necessary for service providers to constantly track the factor of customer loyalty through customer feedback, surveys, reports, research studies and marketing business analysis.<br><br>The mobile telecommunications sector in Australia is expected to grow in the coming years because of continuous technology evolution. Therefore, it is important for mobile businesses and other retail stakeholders to gain insights into the factors influencing consumer loyalty. Thus, the aim of this research was to explore the factors influencing customer loyalty in the context of mobile telecommunications products and services. The research classified the key prototypes and antecedents of customer loyalty, and gained insights regarding the nature of their relationships with consumer loyalty in the presence of moderators (e.g., age, gender and experience).<br><br>There is no single framework in previous studies which has demonstrated a comprehensive framework for investigation of the factors impacting customer loyalty in mobile telecommunication sector in Australia. The relationship between customer experience and customer loyalty has been investigated in this research. In previous studies more emphasis was on service quality and customer satisfaction. This study has included a new factor customer experience for further investigation. Moreover, the behavioural intention factor from unified theory of acceptance and use of technology (UTAUT2) model has been contexualised into customer loyalty for the investigation of these dependent and independent variables. The relationships between dependent variables such as facilitating conditions, performance expectancy, effort expectancy, social influence, price value, hedonic motivation, habit, customer satisfaction and customer experience, and dependent variable customer loyalty have been hypothesise in this study. The framework is underpinned by unified theory of acceptance and use of technology (UTAUT2) and marketing-mix theory.<br><br>The research employed a positivist and quantitative approach. To collect research data, this study used a web-based survey distributed to Australian mobile phone customers, with the help of a marketing company, Research Now. The study sample consisted of Australian customers of mobile telecommunications products and services. In total, 384 responses were received, and the survey was distributed to 1,985 Australian mobile telecommunications customers. The response rate was 19.34 per cent. The collected data was analysed using the SmartPLS tool and partial least squares path modelling (PLS-PM) regression method to answer the research questions and test the research hypotheses.<br><br>Overall, the research findings supported the theoretical framework of this study, which was an extended version of the unified theory of acceptance and use of technology model proposed in this study, with the majority of examined factors found to have a significant effect on consumer loyalty. Specifically, this study found that customer satisfaction strongly affects customer loyalty. Similarly, facilitating conditions, social influence, performance expectancy, hedonic motivation and product price value positively influence customer loyalty. Given that customer loyalty is most strongly affected by customer satisfaction, it seems imperative that mobile telecommunications businesses devote particular attention to ensuring that customers are satisfied with their products and services. These research findings are consistent with those in the existing literature.<br><br>This study provides insights into aspects of moderators - such as age, gender and experience - that have not previously been fully investigated in the field of mobile telecommunications products and services. The behavioural intention phenomenon has been studied from the perspective of consumer behaviour and usage, yet not in terms of consumer loyalty. Therefore, this study sought to fill this gap and undertake research in the field of customer loyalty in mobile telecommunications products and services settings.<br><br>The findings of this study provide important managerial and business implications in the field of mobile telecommunications products and services. The research model will help mobile telecommunications service providers allocate their resources - such as network, infrastructure and customer care resources - according to their relative importance. It is anticipated that the proposed framework in this study will improve perceptions of the factors affecting consumer loyalty and the structural relationships between these factors in the presence of moderators. Additionally, this research should act as a guide for mobile telecommunication businesses to help them better meet customers' requirements, which may eventually lead to an increase in mobile companies' overall sales revenue. Consequently, this research may improve the current parameters to measure customer satisfaction and customer loyalty among mobile service provider companies.<br><br>The results of the quantitative analysis must be understood within the limitations of this study. The sampling population for this research consisted only of Australian mobile telecommunications customers. Moreover, the author of this thesis acknowledges the limitation of limited access to mobile telecommunications companies. Further, implementation of a qualitative research methodology would improve the moderating results. Finally, the population comprised only a subset of all Australian customers; thus, the findings from this research may not be generalisable to all mobile telecommunications users.<p></p>