CUSTOMER SERVICE STRATEGIES AND MARKETING PERFORMANCE OF AUTOMOBILE FIRMS IN SOUTH-SOUTH NIGERIA
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Abstract
The study investigated customer service strategy and marketing performance of automobile firms in South-South, Nigeria. The researcher adopted the correlational research design. The population of the study consisted of customers of 197 automobile dealers registered with the Ministry of Commerce and Industry in the six (6) states of South-South, Nigeria 2017/2018 edition. See appendix 3 for list of automobile dealers. The sample size of 132 was used.er The researcher adopted the convenience sampling technique in selecting members of the sample. The customers’ of 132 automobile dealers in South-South, Nigeria who must have had buying relationship with the dealers for at least 15 years were accessible for the study. The study adopted convenience sampling technique. The validity of the scale adopted in this study was presented for content and construct validity. To ascertain the authenticity of the instrument, the questionnaire was submitted to experts with knowledge on the subject in the Department of Marketing, University of Uyo, Uyo, and a business consultant in order to ensure that the questions raised adequately represent the exact view of what it is intended to measure before the final copy of the questionnaire was administered to respondents. The data obtained was used to compute reliability coefficient as shown .971>/71 which implied that the instrument used was highly reliable. All hypotheses were tested at 0.05 level of significance with p<0.05 indicating statistical significance. To enhance data analysis, Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS, version 22.0) was used to analyze the data. The results of the study showed that customer service influenced the metrics of performance of automobile dealers. The results implied that when marketing strategies is adequately implemented and improved upon, it will enhance customers satisfaction, loyalty, retention, patronage and more specifically, long-term financial performance for the automobile dealers. Based on the findings of the study, the study concluded that marketing strategies play important role in the performance of automobile dealers and should be employed as a broad commercial logic for meeting customers’ needs at a profit and also as a tool for gaining sustainable competitive advantage in the target market. The study recommended among others that automobile dealers should leverage on the knowledge acquired through their relationship with customers in the use of customer service strategy to shape offerings, reap customers’ lifetime value and achieve competitive advantage for the organization.
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