A Delphi study on thematic interpretations of al-Qur’ān

Thematic interpretations of al-Qur’ān (TIaQ) or Tafseer al-maudu’iy ( )- has a sensitivity due to the interrelation of Qur’ānic verses with each other. The purpose of this research was to extract the online Qur’ānic search engines (OQSE) and investigate the existing thematic interpretations of al-Qur’ān (TIaQ) based on the alignment with their relevant verses. The OQSEs provide the list of themes and the aligned verses in their websites. The ambiguous thematic search engines have the possibility to mislead the user by retrieving nonaligned verses against a certain subject/theme (query) or the user may not fully understand the interpretations due to the incomplete results. However, this research has underlined a two stages research design to investigate the existing TIaQ in OQSE. The extracting of themes and aligned verses have been done using Cranfield’s Index Device method and a two-round Delphi method has been applied to justify the existing themes and the aligned verses by 20 experts of Qur’ānic discipline. There are 240 themes and 400 verses have been extracted and categorized into 40 thematic groups (TG). The experts’ justification through Delphi method has revealed that the accuracy of ordinated thematic groups in OQSE is 40% (16/40) only and the accuracy of the ordination of themes and verses achieved 35.41% (85/240). Despite the significant outcome of this research, the limitation recommends that the further research should be conducted extracting more themes and aligned verses from OQSEs. Instead of 20 experts in Delphi, future research can concentrate on a big number of experts to investigate all the thematic verses of entire Qur’ān. © 2018 IEEE

REVIEW OF STUDIES WITH UTAUT AS CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK

The main focus of this paper is to contrast and combine results from different studies using the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology(UTAUT) and its extensions, in the hope of identifying patterns among studied results, sources of discrepancy among those results, or other existing relationships that may come to light in the context of these study. Studies from which this paper was prepared were basically derived from Emerald, Science Direct, EBSCOhost databases. Out of 20 studies gleaned 4 were on telecommunication, 5 on banking, 12 were on Education and 5 were on Health. Results from these studies are varying. This paper tabulate thematically and chronologically literature where the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology have been applied. The review identified the Topic, Author, Sample Size, Location where the study was carried and theoretical model used. It also includes the Statistical techniques applied, the objectives of the study and the result

Exploring the drivers of social media marketing in Malaysian Islamic banks an analysis via smart PLS approach

advertisement that could forecast the intention to subscribe to Islamic banking products in Malaysia. Design/methodology/approach – The research framework used in this study is guided by the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT). The questionnaire method was used to collect data from 360 social media users and partial least square (PLS) analysis was carried out for the model’s validation. Findings – The analytical results showed that perceived relevance, informativeness and perceived expectancy were found to have a statistical relationship with the purchase intention of Islamic banking products via a socialmedia platform. Practical implications – The study offers a practical implication in which the findings prove as helpful means for Islamic financial institutions to discover paramount techniques to retain existing customers and at the same time encourage potential new customers to subscribe to their products. Originality/value – Deficiency of research focusing on social media marketing, especially the incorporation of the UTAUT model was observed in the literature. Thus, this paper offers additional literature on social media marketing and elucidates their role in Islamic banking industry, particularly from the Malaysian context. This research is considered to be among the primary attempts to examine the drivers of social media marketing and customers’ intention to subscribe to Islamic banking products in Malaysi

A influência das redes sociais na partilha e transferência de conhecimento sobre novos produtos e serviços

Dissertação de mestrado em Marketing e Gestão EstratégicaA popularidade das redes sociais, a sua utilização, bem como a existência de sites de redes sociais têm crescido nos últimos anos. As redes sociais têm revolucionado a Internet e a forma de comunicar e de interagir entre as marcas e os seus consumidores. A grande concentração de consumidores nestas plataformas e a grande quantidade de tempo gasto por estes nestes sites, tornou as redes sociais bastante apelativas para as organizações. O enorme desafio na promoção de uma rede social é a fonte de conhecimento, ou seja, a vontade de partilhar conhecimento com outros membros. Assim, faz sentido perceber-mos o que leva os consumidores a partilharem e a transferirem conhecimento para outros sobre novos produtos e serviços e, qual a influência que as redes sociais possuem no consumidor para ele partilhar informação. Posto isto, este estudo procurou averiguar quais os factores que influenciam e que motivam os utilizadores de redes sociais a partilharem e a transferirem conhecimento. Recorrendo à literatura sobre redes sociais e partilha de conhecimento, realizou-se um inquérito online a utilizadores de redes sociais e chegou-se à conclusão de que a dimensão estrutural, a dimensão relacional e a dimensão cognitiva influenciam a quantidade e a qualidade de conhecimento partilhado, ou seja, estas três dimensões influenciam a partilha de conhecimento nas redes sociais. O objectivo deste estudo é ajudar os marketers a perceber quais as motivações dos consumidores na partilha e transferência de conhecimento sobre novos produtos e serviços e o que os influencia a realizar essa partilha, para que desta forma possam traçar estratégias mais eficazes e fomentar a partilha e transferência de conhecimento sobre os seus novos produtos e serviços junto dos consumidores. Por último, esta investigação procura contribuir para o aumento teórico no que diz respeito às redes sociais, ao marketing e à partilha de conhecimento.The popularity of social networks, their use and the existence of social networking sites have grown in recent years. Social networks have revolutionized the Internet and how to communicate and interact between brands and their consumers. A large concentration of consumers in these platforms and the large amount of time spent by them on these site, social networks became very appealing to organizations. The major challenge in the promotion of a social network is the source of knowledge, namely the members’ willingness to share knowledge with other members. Thus, it makes sense we understand what drives consumers to share and transfer knowledge to others about new products and services and the influence that social networks have on consumer information to share it. That said, this study sought to determine which factors influence and motivate users of social networks to share and transfer knowledge. Using the literature on social networks and knowledge sharing, held an online survey of users of social networks and came to the conclusion that the structural dimension, relational dimension and cognitive dimension influencing the quantity and quality of shared knowledge, in other words, these three dimensions influence knowledge sharing in social networks. The goal of this study is to help marketers realize the motivations of consumers in sharing and transfer of knowledge about new products and services, and what influences them to accomplish this sharing so this way they can strategize more effective and encouraging sharing and transfer of knowledge about their new products and services to consumers. Finally, this research aims to contribute to the theoretical increase about social networks, marketing and knowledge sharin

Factors influencing the adoption and use of mobile applications for micro-enterprise operations in South Africa

Magister Commercii (Information Management) - MCom(IM)The micro-enterprise sector, although associated with mostly informal businesses, shows promise of potential and transitioning to more formal businesses. With this in mind, the South African government recognizes that prioritized sectorial development is needed to stimulate growth particularly in the micro-enterprise sector. Considering that evidence reveals growth and development in small business practices being closely related to the use of different forms of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs), if and when strategically applied. Therefore recognizing the importance of ICTs the South African government has embarked on various technology related initiatives to facilitate needed growth and development. Despite this, entrepreneurs in the micro-enterprise sector demonstrate a low uptake of ICTs for their business operations, including the use of mobile technologies which are the most common form of ICTs available to micro- entrepreneurs. Many previous studies have investigated the adoption and use of mobile technologies in the micro- enterprise sector, but despite this a low uptake of mobile technologies still exists. For this reason, this study investigates and empirically determines the factors influencing the adoption and use of mobile applications for micro-enterprise operations in South Africa, using the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT) model as a lens. The research population comprised a group of micro-entrepreneurs who all are users of a common mobile application (mentorship-movement application). The main aim of the investigation was to determine (i) the factors influencing the adoption and use of mobile applications for micro- enterprise operation, (ii) if the experience gained and their satisfaction associated with using the mentorship-movement application will influence their behavioural intention to use other mobile applications for business. The study was conducted objectively and used hypothesis testing as the means of investigation. Data was collected through the use of a survey questionnaire. The findings of the study indicate that performance expectancy and effort expectancy positively influences the micro-entrepreneurs behavioural intention to adopt and use mobile applications for micro-enterprise operations. The findings also observed that social influence has no impact on the micro-entrepreneurs’ behavioural intention to adopt and use mobile applications for business. Facilitating conditions and behavioural intention were found to positively influence the use behaviour of the micro-entrepreneurs when it comes to adoption and use of mobile applications for business. Moreover, the findings confirmed that experience and satisfaction in using one mobile application does not influence the behavioural intention of the micro-entrepreneurs to use other mobile applications for business. The factors which have been found to bear influence on the adoption and use of mobile applications amongst micro-entrepreneurs in South Africa have implications for both policy and practice. In particular, the findings of this study may be used to inform the design of the various programmatic interventions which seek to improve outcomes of the micro-entrepreneur sector. This includes interventions by the Department of Small Business Development and that of the Small Enterprise Development Agency (SEDA)