Understanding customer satisfaction based on the way they evaluate service delivery

With the development of society, the service industry has become the pillar of the world economy. People's demand for service products is getting higher and higher because people are becoming increasing lazy. Through this research, an immigration organisation showed most customers are not satisfied with the price of service, so the aim of the research is to understand customer satisfaction through their interaction with the service provider. This paper used qualitative method and unstructured interviews. Six interviewees obtained through email were used. The results showed that most customers are satisfied with member engagement in service delivery and credibility of the business, and that the organisation should improve staff response to customers’ questions. There are some recommendations. Firstly, that the company needs to have a strategy for training staff to improve customer satisfaction. Secondly, the organisation needs to think about how they can improve credibility because it is essential to customer satisfaction. Finally, the company needs to improve communication quality to reduce customer waiting time by increasing staff numbers for customer satisfaction

Trust between service provider and customer in online environments

Nowadays online shopping is getting more and more popular in China. However, opportunities and challenges are coexisting, and the growth of e-commerce is also inevitable. In e-commerce online, trust has become a significant factor hindering development. A New Zealand organisation faces a lot of competitors. In order to increase its market share and remain competitive in the market, the organisation needs to have more loyal customers who repeatedly purchase their products. Therefore, the organisation should find an appropriate way to form or create trust with customers, to retain them. This research investigates how trust has been created in an online environment between an organisation and its customers. A qualitative method was adopted in this research and data collected using semi-structured interviews. The collected data was analysed adopting a thematic analysis method. The research findings show that a two-way communication system is the core factor in forming trust in the online environment. This research suggests that the organisation should consider two-way communication seriously, and develop that as a useful tool to build trust between them and customers; not just as a communication tool but as a tool for trust formation

Challenges of the multicultural workforce which effect business growth and service

This research is based on the multicultural workforce of a local cleaning organisation. The main question of the research is what are the challenges faced by this multicultural organisation for making good relationships between employer and employee? The aim of the research is based on the challenges and effects of multicultural organisations on the growth of business and quality of services. The research methodology used is qualitative and the data collection method was interviews. Results of the research are based on thematic analysis methods and direct toward communication barriers, teamwork, cultural values or thinking of diverse employees. The multicultural workforce helps in the growth of the business and improves the service quality of the business

Unfolding the role of marketplace resources in forming entrepreneurial narratives

The narrative perspective has discussed the role of entrepreneurs as mindful actors who contextualise innovation through their relational, temporal, and performative efforts. Although the agency of material elements is recognised in the narrative perspective, the materials’ role is reduced to be controlled and mobilised by entrepreneurs with some existing possibilities of showing resistance. This reductionist approach toward materials has restricted our understanding of the ways materials actively impose their agency, form narratives, and contextualise innovations along with entrepreneurs. This study adopts ANT (Actor-Network Theory) as a lens and explores the role of materials in entrepreneurship process. Specifically, it explores how materials (non-human actors) interact with entrepreneurs, impose their agency, challenge the efforts of entrepreneurs in contextualising innovation, and in turn shape the emerging entrepreneurial narratives

Future behaviour given New Zealand’s smoke free future

The number of smokers in New Zealand has decreased, but there still are lots of people who smoke daily. The question is, how current smokers are going to form their smoking behaviour to face a smoke-free future. This research uses qualitative methods and interviews as a tool, because it needs deeper information from smokers. As a result, eight smokers have been interviewed as participants, and based on their answers, some interesting points were found. Smokers are not able to quit smoking by themselves, and they are expecting more help from the government. They are open to believable alternatives to smoking. Their recommendations for the government is they should be more active and provide certified alternatives to smokers. The businesses which sell tobacco products should follow the government to change their product mix. Over all, a new, certified alternative for smokers is expected by government and the smokers

From "participant" to "friend": the role of Facebook engagement in ethnographic research

Engaging with participants on Facebook during ethnographic fieldwork has become increasingly prevalent in research, especially when exploring complex and sensitive consumption issues (Chenail, 2011; Piacenti et al., 2014). Such engagement not only provides a complementary medium of communication but also provides a context and a source of data from which emic and etic interpretations can be made (Baker, 2013; Dogruer et al., 2011). Despite, extant literature focuses predominantly on "how-to" aspects of integrating Facebook in ethnographic research (Baker, 2013), thus, creating a need to amiliorate epistemological and methodological issues of integrating Facebook in ethnographic research. For example, further research can help ethnographic researchers to understand the ways in which Facebook, as a methodological tool in ethnographic research, can encourage close rapport with participants leading to rich and thick interpretations of complex phenomena. The purpose of this paper, therefore, is to theorise epistemological and methodological implications of integrating Facebook in conventional ethnographic research. Accordingly, we present three research questions. Firstly, how to engage with participants on their Facebook profiles to build a productive rapport with them during ethnographic fieldwork? Building on friendship theories (Owton and Allen-Collinson, 2014; Tillmann-Healy, 2003), we suggest that Facebook engagement encourages rapport building by enabling researchers to gradually develop dialogical researcher-participant relationships by paying close attention to aspects such as practice, pace, context, and the 'ethics of friendships' (Tillmann-Healy, 2003). Secondly, what challenges inherent to conventional ethnographic research does increased rapport enable researchers to overcome? We propose that Facebook helps overcome three challenges inherent to conventional ethnography: 1) negotiating access and immersion, 2) developing multiple perspectives, and 3) providing rich and thick interpretations. Thirdly, how Facebook engagement enables the navigation of these challenges? Our findings contribute to consumer and cross disciplinary ethnographic literature (Baker, 2013; Piacenti et al., 2014) and provide evidence that utilising Facebook allows researchers to overcome such challenges by expanding the researcher's field, improving participants' trust and confidence of the researcher, bringing both insider and outsider perspectives, and diluting the power hierarchy often found in participant-researcher relationships. However, we also propose that our contributions have implications beyond conventional ethnography and are relevant to wider netnographic(Kozinets, 2010; 2015) and social mediaoriented ethnographic research (Postill and Pink, 2012). Our proposed framework could be useful for netnographic researchers seeking to build a close rapport with participants as it sheds light on epistemological and methodological issues about one of the popular social networking sites that provides, as Kozinets (2015, p. 35) classifies, a "hyving social experience". In addition, we also contribute to an emerging body of cross-disciplinary literature on "friendship as method" (Owton and Allen-Collinson, 2014; Ellis, 2007; Glesne, 1989; Tillmann-Healy, 2003) by theorising the role of Facebook engagement in inspiring and sustaining 'friendships' with participants during ethnographic research. We have structured the paper as follows: Firstly, we engage with cross-disciplinary literature on ethnography, netnography, theories of friendship, and Facebook. Secondly, we introduce the research methodology, and the overarching ethnographic research process. Thirdly, we draw from our ethnographic fieldwork to illustrate how integrating Facebook facilitates friendships with participants and allows us to investigate deeper and richer details of their everyday lived experiences during important transitions, in our case, the transition from single to marital status. Finally, we discuss some of the important ethical/moral implications of "friendship as method" and the complexities of integrating Facebook in ethnographic research and elaborate on the ways in which we addressed such complexities

Materials Matter: How Non-human Actors Shape Consumption Practices and Experiences in Consumption Communities

This thesis investigates the role and agency of materiality in a consumption community through adopting a consumer culture theory (CCT) perspective. Prior research in consumer culture tradition has explored consumption communities through focusing on consumers and producers. The role of consumers in consumption communities has been examined in relation to value co-creation and innovation processes (Brodie et al., 2013; Laroche et al., 2012; Schau et al., 2009) and concept of power as communal resistance (Dalli 2008; Goulding and Saren 2009; Muñiz and Schau 2005). Research has also revealed the role of producers as suppliers of community resources and demonstrates how brands can link networks of consumers (Cova 1997; Cova and Cova 2002; Diamond et al. 2009). However, little is known about the role and agency of materiality in formation and maintenance of consumption communities. Despite recognising the role of materials and non-human actors in consumption communities, there is a lack of insight and theoretical understanding about how they interplay with consumers and in turn influence the dynamic of consumption communities. This thesis seeks to address this gap by examining the interplay between consumers and resources in the community of bag lovers, and attempts to understand the role and agency of materiality in maintaining and shaping community practices and dynamics. Research is conducted by adopting a multi-method qualitative research approach consisting of two stages: a netnography approach (Kozinets 2015) followed by online/offline unstructured interviews. Observatory and participatory capabilities of the netnographic methodology is utilised to capture relations and interactions among actors in the bag lovers’ community. Furthermore, to recognise and explore material and relational aspects of the community, this thesis has adopted Actor-network Theory (ANT) as a lens for exploring dynamics of the bag lovers’ community. This research brings to light the role and agency of materiality in the bag lovers’ community and enables us to better understand the nature and dynamics of consumption communities. It reveals a process of multiple translations that conceptualises the role and agency of non-human actors in stabilising the community. This process consists of three stages including the tendency to pool, the emergence of pooling practices, and the advent of rental services. Each of these stages unpacks the mechanism and logic underpinning consumers’ interaction with non-human actors, and enunciates the agency of materials in shaping community interactions and practices. In the broader consumer research literature, these findings expand our understanding of resource circulation and redistribution, and pooling practices

Fashion Follower Behavior: An Investigation Into The Tendency To Observe Others In Purchase Decision Making

The purpose of this research is to investigate the tendency of consumers in observing the purchase behavior of others as a purchase decision heuristic in order to simplify the process of decision making. The study is conducted in the area of fashion clothing by measuring the consumers\' propensity to observe and its effects on purchase intention and testing the likely effects of individual consumer factors which are consisted of : brand choice overload, consumer self-confidence, and consumer propensity to conform on propensity to observe. The demographic factor of gender is expected to mediate the relationships between consumer self-confidence, propensity to conform, and consumer propensity to observe

Unfolding the role of marketplace resources

The narrative perspective has discussed the role of entrepreneurs as mindful actors who contextualise innovation through their relational, temporal, and performative efforts. Although the agency of material elements is recognised in the narrative perspective, the materials’ role is reduced to be controlled and mobilised by entrepreneurs with some existing possibilities of showing resistance. This reductionist approach toward materials has restricted our understanding of the ways materials actively impose their agency, form narratives, and contextualise innovations along with entrepreneurs. This study adopts ANT (Actor-Network Theory) as a lens and explores the role of materials in entrepreneurship process. Specifically, it explores how materials (non-human actors) interact with entrepreneurs, impose their agency, challenge the efforts of entrepreneurs in contextualising innovation, and in turn shape the emerging entrepreneurial narratives

Unfolding the Role of Marketplace Resources in Forming Entrepreneurial Narratives

Our study contributes to understanding the role and agency of materials in entrepreneurship processes. Through adopting Actor Network Theory as a lens, we explore how materials (non-human actors) shape the process of entrepreneurship. Findings from a multi-method qualitative research approach reveal how materials interact with entrepreneurs, impose their agency, challenge the efforts of entrepreneurs in contextualising innovation, and in turn shape the emerging entrepreneurial narratives. This study expands our understanding of the ways materials actively impose their agency, form narratives, and contextualise innovations along with entrepreneurs