Business Research Methodology
The role of Customer Relationship management in maximizing the customer satisfaction: The case of Amazon.com
Abstract
The major confront the management has to handle in today’s globalized world is to serve and uphold good bonding with the king- the customer. The customers were taken for granted in past years because they were not so much demanding nor had any optional way of supply. Radical transformation has taken place in today’s world because the dynamic business environment is featured by increasing in competition, high customer choice and economic liberalization. The good relations with customers is considered as the essence of the successful business and the major objective of CRM is to gather the data regarding every contact a company has with consumer through entire channels and store it in the customer relationship management system to help the company to understand the action of the customer. The case study of Amazon has been taken in this research to evaluate the importance of CRM in e-commerce industry. The research methodology has been considered to demonstrate the way of collecting the data regarding the research topic.
Introduction
Customer satisfaction is essential element in the business to increase the revenues of the company that is why it is vital for the customer relationship management of the organization to maximize it for attaining the goals of the company. It is considered as the strategy which is taken in use to learn more regarding the needs of the customers so as to create a strong bonding with them (Han and Ryu, 2009). There is software of CRM that facilitates the organization to create a database regarding its customer that all stakeholders such as customer service provider, salespeople and management can assess the information to find out the needs of the customer with product and offering (Battor and Battor, 2010). The entire concept of customer relationship management in satisfying the customers of Amazon will be elaborated under this research with taking help of journals articles, books and online sources to make relevant and authentic arguments and discussion. Research methodology will be described with showing different approaches, collection method, data analysis and research design, along with that, action plan will be made to define each activity in a systematic manner so that research can be implemented in more significant way.
Research question and research objectives
The research questions are emphasized below to show the importance of the research:
Research objectives
Literature review
According to Purnama, (2015), customer relationship management is inclusive approach to build, sustain and improve the relationship with customers. The profitable customer of the company can be retained with the help of customer relationship management because it is the process of adapting customers’ behavior over time and learning from each interface and change to strengthen ties with them. it has been stated by Verhoef, Reinartz, and Krafft, (2010), that having good understanding of the customer relationship management can be deemed as an activity that includes the whole human resources to preserve existing customers, along with that, it is the strategy to develop and sustain relationships with customers and it can be found as an attempt to decide the needs of the customers. It has been analyzed that the role of technology has significant role in customer relationship management, initially, it is creating a database of customers arraying from the operating system up to the transaction. After that, to evaluate that the consumer is efficient, what things would be preferred by them, how often. Third, execute the activities of marketing, customer service, and sales by integrating various channels of communication (Linoff and Berry, 2011).
According to Heller and Parasnis, (2011), the loyalty of customer has a noteworthy function in a company, the longer the company maintain the loyal customers, the greater the income developed. It is considered as the major reason for a company to retain the customers. It has been found they when companies spend less on attaining the new customers, the company can also invest its money in improving the products and services of the company. It would be helpful in facilitating customers to be more loyal. The execution of the customer relationship management in the business can change the entire process of the business that has been placed for a long time. The customer can be satisfied with the products and services of the company due to the effective implementation of CRM. Satisfied customers are deemed as profitable to an organization not only due to they are likely to make repeat purchases but also they initiate to promote the organization by using word of mouth. Hence, it is apparent the CRM has the potential to improve the market share of the organization for bringing in more consumers (Zhao, Huo, Flynn, and Yeung, 2008).
According to it will not be an overstatement if it is said that Amazon has an effective policy of CRM to make satisfy customers and it has been developed for over the span of 20 years now. According to Casaló, Flavián, and Guinalíu, (2008), Amazon has millions of customers that are loyal towards the company due to most trustworthy and preferred online shopping portal. It is well managed because of the effectual and properly framed CRM policy within the organization. Amazon is a well reputed company that provide a number of products and services to the customers all in one place (Kassim and Abdullah, 2010). The most amazing thing with Amazon is that it has maintained the good bonding with the customer for a long time without having face to face interaction with them. The company provide recommendations which are reflected to the customer based on their last purchase facilitates the customer in opting the products and makes shopping convenient and easy which is probable with a click of a button. The company CRM system is effective as it offers its customers to utilize interface for storing the details of their purchase or desire to purchase in future by which they can smoothly purchase in future (Phan and Vogel, 2010). It has been analyzed that the clever use of data make the customer feel special and valued and the customer can be attracted in a significant manner by applying this kind of innovating strategy within the business. It has been found that the reason behind the success of CRM in Amazon have their own in-built software. The CRM system of the company is the major cause behind all the effective features offered by them to the customers. The software of the company has the ability to capture the information of each customer regarding to their personal data like past purchase, location and as per the visiting time of customer on different sites, the company customized the need. According to Mudambi and Schuff, (2010), CRM assists the customer to get the responses of their issues or concerns even before the level of human intervention comes. Customers of Amazon have access to entire information regarding to the ordered product, time of delivery, stage of the delivery, and mode of payment, return policy and many more. The CRM policy of Amazon definitely decreases the requirement and cost of having customer service staff.
It has been found that CRM is used by Amazon for the purpose of collection of Data, personal data storage, and recommendations. In the context of a collection of data, it has been found that the customers have to make an account on the portal of Amazon to do shopping which makes it convenient for them to make potential purchases. It has been analyzed that this account facilitates in developing an opportunity for target marketing that is customers of Amazon can be emailed with promotions and offers which is relied on their last purchases (Ryu and Han, 2010). Along with that, it has been found that the when a customer makes an account, they have to fill their personal information such as address, account information, contact and personal details which are stored by Amazon to approach them. In the context of recommendations, Amazon is leading the way to recommend product features. At the time of logging by the customer in the account of Amazon, it has been recommended by Amazon to the customers a variety of products to the customer in which he may be interested to buy. These recommendations are made by the company as per the evaluation of the past purchasing behavior of the customers. The most interesting thing with the company is that the return policy of the company is entirely based on the online and in case of any concerns regarding the products; the customer can call the customer service executive to get a refund (Chua and Banerjee, 2013).
Methods
There are two methods of collecting the data such as qualitative method and quantitative method. For this research, both methods are taken as a combination for gathering the information (Grove, 2011).
Research philosophies
The role of research philosophy in the research is huge as it develops the better understanding and knowledge of the research regarding the concern of the research. The choice of effective research philosophy is helpful in guiding the research to recognize the process of information gathering, evaluating and utilization of the research process. There are three types of research philosophies like positivism philosophy, realism philosophy and interpretivism philosophy. Positivism philosophy shows the factual knowledge regarding the observation and measurements that is helpful for the researcher to uncover the truth based on information of statistical data (Yusuf, Adams and Dingley, 2014). Interpretivism philosophy is being used in this research because it helps the researcher to access the perception and views of participants. This philosophy will be helpful for the researcher to make a valid conclusion regarding the customer relationship management on Amazon. On the other hand, the realism and positivism are not related to the philosophy of the research to resolve the issue of the research due to no a requirement of using a highly structured methodology like hypothesis creating and proving and examination of the outcomes regarding the generalization.
Research approaches
Research approach is essential for the research to justify the opted research design and methods. There are two kinds of research approaches such as inductive and deductive that facilitates researcher to rationalize the use of specific data collection method for research project. The use of deductive approach is effective with the philosophy of positivism; on the other hand, inductive approach is suitable with the interpretivism philosophy. The hypothesis is created with the help of deductive approach with the help of theories. It is necessary for the researcher to gather the various kinds of information as well as data to adopt or eliminate the hypothesis regarding the research issues. The inductive approach will be considered by the researcher to expand subjective knowledge regarding the research issues (Donner, 2008). The reliability, as well as validity of the research, will be increased with the help of this deductive approach.
Research strategies
The researcher will use interview and survey to gather the information regarding the research topic. It is because with the help of these strategies researcher would be enabled to gather an adequate amount of information and data regarding customer relationship management in increasing the customer satisfaction. Survey strategy enables the researcher to accumulate the data in less time or cost that increased the reliability of the research among the stakeholders (Van Doorn, et. al., 2010). While the use of interview strategy facilitates the researcher to meet with person personally who participate in the interview to get their perceptions and views regarding the research issues.
Choices
There are various alternatives available which can be used by the researcher to complete the research program. The selection of alternative will be done after evaluating the requirement of the research program.
Data collection
There should be proper data collection method because it enables the researcher to enhance the knowledge regarding the issues of the research. Primary and secondary are two kinds of data collection method. Primary data has the feature of fresh data which collected first time through researcher. The survey, questionnaire, action research and group discussion can be considered to gather the primary data. Secondary data can be collected by using various kinds of article journals, books, and online sources. For this research study, the combinations of primary and secondary sources have been considered to gather the information regarding the research topic.
Data analysis
There are several methods of analyzing the data such as content analysis, thematic analysis, and statistical analysis. The statistical data analysis method will be chosen by the researcher that enable the researcher to show the descriptive statistics of that data entailing regress, cross tabulation, and correlation that would be helpful in interpreting the meaning behind the responses of the participants. MS Excel and SPSS Software will be used in making a better understanding of the gathered data in which graphs will be presented with information.
Ethical consideration
Ethical consideration is a vital factor for the research to make sure that the research is valid and reliable. The researcher has taken prior permission to the participants for an interview and personal information of them will be spoiled which information is given by the researcher to them. There can be some issues regarding plagiarism which will be eliminated by the researcher to provide authentic and reliable in-text references in each paragraph.
Validity and reliability issues
Reliability is necessary for implementing the research as it delivers the important message to the readers. The issues inconsistency within the research can bring the issues of the reliability issue. There should be proper accuracy in the outcome otherwise it brings validity issues in the research.
Resource requirements
For conducting the research, the researcher would require a place to conduct the survey and interviews. Along with that researcher would require a fund to use software for the survey. The human resource would require collecting the information.
Time plan
Gantt chart Conclusion It has been concluded that the good relations with customers are considered as the essence of the successful business. It has been found that the execution of the customer relationship management in the business can change the entire process of the business that has been placing for a long time. The research has covered the various approaches and strategies to gather the information in which researcher has used the combination of qualitative and quantitative research method and primary and secondary sources to gather the information regarding the research topic.
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Serial no. |
Activities |
Duration (week) |
Description |
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1) |
Selection of the topic for the research |
2 |
The topic will be selected for the research |
|
2) |
Preparing research plan |
3 |
Plans will be created in this step |
|
3) |
Completion of the shaped plans |
2 |
Plans will be made as per the shaped plan |
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4) |
Data collection |
3 |
Data collection method will choose for the completion of research. |
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5) |
Data analysis |
3 |
Data will be analyzed in this time frame. |
|
6) |
Conclusion and recommendations |
1 |
The conclusion will be drawn as per the analyzed and interpreted data. |
Conclusion
It has been concluded that the good relations with customers are considered as the essence of the successful business. It has been found that the execution of the customer relationship management in the business can change the entire process of the business that has been placing for a long time. The research has covered the various approaches and strategies to gather the information in which researcher has used the combination of qualitative and quantitative research method and primary and secondary sources to gather the information regarding the research topic.
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