Managing customer relationships through price and service quality

This paper examines the ways in which a service provider's policies on pricing and service level affect the size of its customer base and profitability. The analysis begins with the development of a customer behavior model that uses customer satisfaction and depth of relationship as mediators of the impact of price and service level on profitability. Based on this model of customer behavior, the system is analyzed as a queuing network from which the properties of the aggregate population's behavior are derived. The analysis reveals the counterintuitive result that a policy that involves a decrease in prices or an increase in service level may lead to a smaller customer base. However, this policy may also lead to higher profits. The novelty of this result lies in the explanation of the phenomenon: that when the customer base decreases due to a change in prices or service quality, companies may experience gains in profit that result not from a decrease in costs associated with serving fewer customers but from an increase in revenues resulting from the indirect effects of the lower prices or higher level of service on customer behavior. The application of optimization techniques to the model developed in this paper yields optimality conditions through which managers can assess the long-term profitability of their pricing and service-level policies.Customer relationship management; operations/marketing interface; two-part tariffs; service operations management; service quality;

Training Management Information System of the Defense Institute of Security Assistance Management: User Satisfaction as a Measure of Its Effectiveness

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effectiveness of the Training Management System (TMS) installed in the Security Assistance Organizations around the world. User satisfaction was measured as an indicator of the system\u27s effectiveness. In order to provide an objective measurement of the system effectiveness, the following research questions were addressed: (1) What is the system effectiveness regarding the level of product quality provided by TMS? (2) What is the level of involvement and knowledge of TMS user related to the information services function? (3) What is the level of user perceived satisfaction with the staff and services provided by support people of TMS? (4) What is the perceived difference in levels of satisfaction between military and civilian for each of the questions 1, 2 and 3 above? (5) What is the impact of experience with the system on questions 1 to 3 above? User satisfaction was determined to be the best possible measure of system effectiveness and it was measured by administering a user satisfaction survey. The data gathered from this survey was analyzed and that analysis provided the basis for concluding that TMS was meeting the users\u27 needs, but that the system effectiveness could be improved by providing training. Recommendations were offered to the TMS staff support and suggestions for further research were also given

Domain size heterogeneity in the Ising model: geometrical and thermal transitions

A measure of cluster size heterogeneity ($H$), introduced by Lee et al [Phys. Rev. E {\bf 84}, 020101 (2011)] in the context of explosive percolation, was recently applied to random percolation and to domains of parallel spins in the Ising and Potts models. It is defined as the average number of different domain sizes in a given configuration and a new exponent was introduced to explain its scaling with the size of the system. In thermal spin models, however, physical clusters take into account the temperature-dependent correlation between neighboring spins and encode the critical properties of the phase transition. We here extend the measure of $H$ to these clusters and, moreover, present new results for the geometric domains for both $d=2$ and 3. We show that the heterogeneity associated with geometric domains has a previously unnoticed double peak, thus being able to detect both the thermal and percolative transition. An alternative interpretation for the scaling of $H$ that does not introduce a new exponent is also proposed.Comment: 7 pages, 4 figure

A numerical study of non structural masonry walls with bed joint reinforcement subject to flexure

This paper presents a numerical investigation of a non structural small masonry wall submitted to a flexion effort in its plan and constructed with ceramic blocks. The effort is due to an excessive deformation of the structural elements. The small walls of ceramic blocks (named here mini-walls) were analyzed under two different situations: without bed joint reinforcement (for reference) and with bed joint reinforcement. In order to evaluate the improvement of structural performance with the proposed strengthening (reinforcement masonry walls) the arrows were measured in the middle of the mini-walls, cracking degree and the steel bars deformation. The program employed to carry out the numerical analyses was DIANA (version 9.1), that uses Finet Element Method (FEM). The strategy adopted was macromodelling and non linear phisical behaviour. The results obtained from the numerical research proved that masonry walls with bed joint showed an increased load at first cracking, better performance in service, increased capacity and more resistant arrow at break. Improvements also in relation to the ultimate limit state, which indicates that it is profit and that bed joint reinforcement can be used in non structural and structural mansory walls

Purely Elastic Flow Asymmetries

Using a numerical technique we demonstrate that the flow of the simplest differential viscoelastic fluid model (i.e., the upper-convected Maxwell model) goes through a bifurcation to a steady asymmetric state when flowing in a perfectly symmetric ‘‘cross-slot’’ geometry. We show that this asymmetry is purely elastic in nature and that the effect of inertia is a stabilizing one. Our results are in qualitative agreement with very recent experimental visualizations of a similar flow in the microfluidic apparatus of Arratia et al. [Phys. Rev. Lett. 96, 144502 (2006)]

Thermodynamic and dynamic anomalies for a three dimensional isotropic core-softened potential

Using molecular dynamics simulations and integral equations (Rogers-Young, Percus-Yevick and hypernetted chain closures) we investigate the thermodynamic of particles interacting with continuous core-softened intermolecular potential. Dynamic properties are also analyzed by the simulations. We show that, for a chosen shape of the potential, the density, at constant pressure, has a maximum for a certain temperature. The line of temperatures of maximum density (TMD) was determined in the pressure-temperature phase diagram. Similarly the diffusion constant at a constant temperature, $D$, has a maximum at a density $\rho_{max}$ and a minimum at a density $\rho_{min}<\rho_{max}$. In the pressure-temperature phase-diagram the line of extrema in diffusivity is outside of TMD line. Although in this interparticle potential lacks directionality, this is the same behavior observed in SPC/E water.Comment: 16 page