CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIP MANAGEMENT AND FIRMS PERFORMANCE: A CASE STUDY OF SMALL AND MEDIUM SCALE ENTERPRISES IN BENIN CITY
ABSTRACT
This study was carried out to examine the impact of Customer relationship management on firms’ performance. The main objective was to examine the effect of Customer relationship management on firms’ performance in small and medium scale enterprise in Benin City. The study adopted the descriptive survey design using percentage and regression. The population of the study comprised of all small and medium scale enterprise in Benin-City and a sample of ten small and medium scale enterprise were selected and data was collected by means of questionnaire. Data for this study was analyzed using percentage and regression model. The findings of the study revealed that there is a positive relationship between Customer relationship management and firms’ performance and that components of Customer relationship management such as information technology infrastructure, business architectural capability, superior capability of customer relationship and Human analytics of customer relationship management positively affects firms performance. The study recommended that firms should focus on building a solid Customer relationship management culture in other to positively improve its performance.
CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
- Background
Developing customer relationship has historical antecedents going back into the pre-industrial era. Much of it was due to direct interaction between producers of agricultural products and their customers. Similarly, artisans crafted customized items for each customer. Such direct interaction led to relational bonding between the provider of the good and the customer. Much recently however, the tightening of competitive conditions in markets that have become more globalized and the development of information and telecommunication technologies have contributed to a large extent to the rapid development and evolution of customer relationship management (CRM) allowing producers to directly interact with end users.
The emergence of customer relationship management can be traced back from 1990 as opined by many authors (Parvatiyar & Sheth 2001; Stoklasa 2011; Rababah, 2011). Almost all authors agreed that relationship management (RM) is the origin of CRM. In addition to that, Parvatiyar and Sheth (2001) assert that growing intermediation process is one among the factors that gave room for the emergence of CRM. They further affirmed that, introduction of computer and telecommunication technologies contributed a lot towards the development of CRM. Total quality management (TQM) is another single-minded factor in developing CRM as it focus on improved quality and reduces cost which in turn gave room for relationship management to exist between customers, suppliers etc. The main motive for development of CRM is for the purpose of shifting business focus from transactional marketing (1950 -1970) to relationship marketing. Similarly, Paul and Gery (2003); Chen and Popovich (2015) affirmed that prior to evolution of CRM, there exist two main market; sales force automation SFA and customer service CS but with the existence of CRM in all enveloped all issues relating to retaining customer, CS and SFA inclusive.