Investigation into the Customer Loyalty and Corporate Image Relationship

Abstract

While extant of academic literature shows that service quality and customer satisfaction are key to building customer loyalty, given these equitable, “Does corporate image create loyalty” is the question this research probes. A primary research was conducted among the mobile communication subscribers. A total of 550 subscribers of mobile communication services in Mumbai, India were approached. Of this, 400 complete and valid responses were collected. Findings suggest that corporate image and the service quality perceived by the customers have a strong relationship with customer loyalty. This implies that both external marketing and interactive marketing dimensions have a direct impact on building customer loyalty. Customer satisfaction was seen to be completely mediating the relationship between service quality and customer loyalty. This research provides a model that can help the managers of service organizations to enhance customer loyalty. Since corporate image positively impacts the customer loyalty along with service quality, it is important for the industry managers to devote equal attention and resources in delivering the promise as well building a good image of the company. Since the service quality impacts the corporate image, an important takeaway for the managers is to ensure that the actual offer matches promises made externally. Most of the previous studies investigating the antecedents of customer loyalty have either focused on the interactive marketing dimension or the external marketing dimension. This study examines the interplay of both the dimension and its impact on customer loyalty.