An empirical analysis to study the impact of service quality attributes on customer value, satisfaction and loyalty in mobile telecommunication services in Dehradun

Abstract

The Indian mobile telecommunication services market is entering a new transition period. This has been brought about by the market for mobile telecommunications reaching maturity, the launching of mobile number portability. In response to cut throat competition, the industry is changing its tactical focus away from attracting new customers, towards retaining existing consumers through the promotion of customer loyalty along with importance customer value and satisfaction. The objective of the present research is to examine service quality attributes along with a measure of customer value and satisfaction to find out the direct and indirect effect on customer loyalty. Furthermore, the study sought to identify the most important attributes of service quality in current industry setting (mobile telecommunication industry), which may be used to re-examine characteristics of the industry as experienced by customers. The sample size of 411 mobile telecommunication services consumers was drawn from Dehradun in Uttrakhand, the northern state of India with the help of multistage sampling method. Sample element for the study was consumers of mobile telecommunication service providers residing in various parts of Dehradun. Reliability analysis for the research instrument was performed by calculating Cronbach s alpha value (0.952 overall). Descriptive analysis was used to explain the demographics of the sample. Exploratory factor analysis was used to find the factor structure of thirty two service quality variables. As a result, eight factors (Employee Performance, Transmission Quality, Competitiveness, Credibility, Reliability, Support Attributes, Operational Efficiency, and Convenience) were extracted using the method of principal component analysis. The eight factors extracted in case of service quality explained 69.694% of the variance. The correlation analysis results show that all the eight dimensions are highly relevant for service quality attributes in mobile telecommunication services sector