Search results

The University of Basrah has nine colleges situated in five campuses, each with its own library besides a central library. The traditional paper work approach becomes incapable of handling large numbers of books and periodicals. A new computer system (NEC‐800S) has been installed for the University with two database management systems (DBMS):

This paper explores the reasoning surrounding relationship value and quality, and further provides a blueprint on how positive word-of-mouth behaviour can be promoted through different routes.

Survey strategy was employed with focus on quantitatively developed questionnaires. Informants were recruited through mall intercept. All diagnostic tests, path analyses and, by implication, research hypotheses were conducted using the SEM-PLS technique.

All the hypothesized relationships were supported. Relationship value directly relates to trust, satisfaction and word-of-mouth behaviour. Value was also indirectly related to word-of-mouth behaviour through the relationship quality construct, but trust stood-out as a better mediator. Trust and satisfaction also came out as antecedents of positive word-of-mouth behaviour.

The relationship between relationship value and the relationship quality construct remains largely under-researched in literatures. This paper serves as a springboard for future research projects to extend understanding on how both constructs interact especially in a Business-to-Consumer (B2C) level. In addition, the paper offers a comprehensive insight on the behaviour of the relationship quality construct when it is tested as a mediator in a causal–effect model.

This study holds that by engineering superior value, a telecom provider is better positioned to build a sound relationship quality network and stimulate positive word-of-mouth through different routes.

Given the dearth of research on this area, this paper represents the first attempt to map out relationship value as an antecedent of relationship quality and word-of-mouth behaviour on a B2C level, and simultaneously explore the direct and indirect behaviour of both constructs in promoting word-of-mouth behaviour in a non-Western setting.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the relationship between service recovery and relational selling behavior on trust and satisfaction in the banking industry. Specifically, the mediating role of trust and satisfaction on the relationship between service recovery, relational selling behavior and loyalty is empirically examined.

Hypotheses are developed based on the literature review. The conceptual model is tested using SEM on survey data collected from 560 customers of 12 banks in Taiwan, including local banks and foreign banks.

The model test results indicate that the influences of service recovery and relational selling behavior on trust and satisfaction are both significant. In addition, the influences of trust and satisfaction on loyalty are significant.

For bank managers, it is crucial to have well programs to identify service failures and handle recoveries efficiently and effectively. Furthermore, bank managers should place a high value on increasing salesperson’s customer-oriented behaviors to discern potential problems that customer concerns and provide suitable solutions that customer needs. By creating these better customer experiences, greater trust, satisfaction and loyalty can be yielded.

This study aims to provide a superior understanding of the relationship between service recovery, relational selling behavior, trust, satisfaction and loyalty in the banking industry. The research findings can contribute to forming targeted strategies and gaining competitive advantages for bank managers.

The aim of the paper is to shed light on the use of chitosans and chitooligosaccharides as biopreservatives in various foods animal. Foods of animal and aquatic origin (milk, meat, fish, eggs, sea foods, etc) become contaminated with a wide range of microorganisms (bacteria, molds and yeasts) during harvesting, transporting, processing, handling and storage operations. Due to the perishable nature of these foods, their preservation is of utmost importance. Though many synthetic chemicals are available, yet their use is quite restricted due to their hazardous effects on human health.

Within the domain of food industry, traditionally chitosan is used for biopreservation of foods, which is well known for its nutritional and medicinal properties in human nutrition. However, chitooligosaccharides also possess a number of nutraceutical and health promoting properties in addition to their preservative effect and shelf-life extension of foods. In this study, the comparative effects of both chitosan and chitooligosaccharides on preservation of foods of animal and aquatic origin have been summarized.

Though chitosan has been extensively studied in various foods, yet the use of chitooligosaccharides has been relatively less explored. Chitooligosaccharides are bioactive molecules generated from chitosan and have several advantages over the traditional use of chitosan both in food products and on human health. But unfortunately, little or no literature is available on the use of chitooligosaccharides for preservation of some of the foods of animal origin. Notable examples in this category include cheese, beef, pork, chicken, fish, sea foods, etc.

This paper focuses on the effects of chitosans and chitooligosaccharides on the processing and storage quality of foods of animal and aquatic origin, which offers a promising future for the development of functional foods.

The purpose of this study is to identify the effect of halal certification on innovative and market business performance of halal-certified food companies in the Philippines. Through this empirical study, halal-registered and about-to-register companies would have a wider perspective and a realistic view on what to expect from halal certification. The study also hopes to enrich halal certification literature and contribute further to the better understanding of the relationship between halal certification and the business performance.

This empirical study primarily uses a quantitative approach in analyzing the relationship between halal certification and the business performance in terms of innovative and market performance. The primary data are gathered through a survey involving 211 food companies (141 halal-certified and 70 non-halal-certified). The results are analyzed using confirmatory factor analysis, structural equation modeling and independent sample t-test.

First, the analysis highlights that halal certification significantly affects innovative performance of halal-certified food companies. Second, the improvements in innovative performance lead to market performance improvements. Third, innovative performance fully mediates the relationship between halal certification and market performance. Finally, halal-certified food companies and non-halal-certified food companies have significant difference in terms of innovative performance and market performance.

First, the population of this study consisted of only food companies in the Philippines listed in the Bureau of Product and Standard. Second, only the respective quality management representatives of the responding companies were the main respondent. Third, the samples used are from Philippines only. Therefore, the ability to generalize the reported results to all types of industry is restricted. To generalize the results of this study, additional research is desired to test the suggested model in various countries where Muslims are minority.

Understanding the impact of halal certification and its business value through empirical study should provide “about to be registered organizations” a wider perspective and a realistic view on what to expect after halal certification. It will provide factual evidences that may aid halal-certified companies in decision-making with respect to halal certification and whether it complicates or compliments their organizations’ business.

To the best of the author’s knowledge, no research has yet been conducted to investigate the impact of halal certification on business performance in the Philippines. This study, therefore, fills the gap in the research area. Through this empirical study, halal-registered and about-to-register organizations would have a wider perspective and a realistic view on what to expect from halal certification.

The main purpose of this study is to compare e-customer satisfaction in Saudi banks before and during coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic by assessing the e-service quality dimension before and during the pandemic.

To examine e-customer satisfaction among Saudi bank e-customers, data were collected using convenience sampling methods utilizing two questionnaires before and during COVID-19, distributed to Saudi bank e-customers. The sample size of collecting data of 588 bank e-customers was analyzed through a well-known statistical technique, multiple regression and paired sample t-test, using Statistical Product and Service Solutions (SPSS) software and Excel.

It is found that efficiency is the major determinant of e-customers’ satisfaction with banks in Saudi Arabia. The Saudi context is different from other countries. There are differences between the impact of Internet banking e-service quality on e-customer service before and during the COVID-19.

This research has a crucial inference for the managerial level practically. This study has important implications for the banks to satisfy their e-customers by increasing customer service level and enhancing the interaction in the site to solve the e-customers problem immediately by creating an effective support team to encourage the effect of responsiveness. In particular, website managers should review their website framework and create an easily organized site for e-customers.

The research improves past studies' methodology by testing the impacts between the constructs before and during COVID-19. This research is a significant addition to the current literature collection.

Branding in faith-based consumer markets, in which marketing practices, religion, and consumption intersect, is largely unexplored. The purpose of this paper is to investigate how brands integrate religious concerns into their strategies through Halal branding. The central logic of authors’ view is that branding applied in a particular consumer market (i.e., Muslim) could enrich dominant (Western) branding theory.

Although challenging, qualitative research offers a valuable lens in international marketing research in allowing researchers to study organizations and contexts in their natural settings, enabling a more holistic approach, instead of imposing one’s culturally informed pre-conceptions (Boyacigiller and Adler, 1991). In this regard, a multiple case study approach considering Halal cosmetic brands is used. A replication logic is applied in interpreting the data.

Holistic branding is a broader concept than what mainstream theory acknowledges; brand attributes go beyond the functional and emotional, offering insights into a spiritual dimension. The proposed model identifies attributes that reflect the brand’s worldview and contribute to holistic branding: spiritual ethos and belief system, sustainable and eco-ethical philosophy, wholesomeness and inclusiveness.

This exploratory research represents the initial step for faith-based/Halal branding; the discussion is confined to the cases under study. The results are not conclusive and require further empirical research to validate their broader applicability.

The study highlights the need for a comprehensive approach to branding of faith-based products. The Halal market (cosmetics and toiletries) may be attractive to companies that seek to widely develop products targeting faith-based Muslim consumer markets.

The study contributes to an area of growing concern from an academic point of view (i.e. Halal branding) by proposing to add a spiritual dimension to holistic branding. Several questions remain and should stimulate further research. Hence, researchers would be able to understand more clearly the meaning of the religious environment and the impact that environmental forces are likely to exert on business decisions.

The purpose of this paper is to examine how companies can influence customers’ repurchase intention and willingness to recommend through relationship quality (RQ hereafter) constructs by leveraging customer orientation, expertise and information sharing.

The research informants were recruited from a Southeastern Nigerian city. Data analysis was based on 303 qualified cases extracted from the 332 valid responses retrieved from the customers of retail banking services through a bank-intercept method and online survey.

Except customer orientation, all the antecedents of RQ were directly related to trust and satisfaction. Whereas satisfaction was both directly and indirectly related to repurchase intention and willingness to recommend, trust was directly and indirectly related to repurchase intention but was not directly related to willingness to recommend. It was only indirectly related to willingness to recommend through satisfaction and repurchase intention. Trust and satisfaction mediate the link between RQ antecedents and repurchase intention and willingness to recommend. The research model explained 67 per cent of the total variance in willingness to recommend.

The mediating role of RQ in the link between customer orientation, expertise and information sharing and repurchase intention and willingness to recommend remains largely untested in the literature. This provides an avenue for future studies to extend RQ research to the nature of the construct’s behaviour when it is tested as a mediator in the relationship between its antecedents and consequences especially in West Africa where substantive research is scarce.

One of the key measures that retail banks can use to keep customers’ patronage and spur them into making business referrals is to build trust and deliver pleasurable satisfaction by leveraging customer orientation, expertise and information sharing.

As far as could be established, this paper represents the first attempt to simultaneously explore the indirect effects of customer orientation, expertise and information sharing on repurchase intention and willingness to recommend through the constructs of RQ. The paper further demonstrates that the relationships estimated within the model are not moderated by gender and occupation differences.

The purposes of this study are to develop an extended technology acceptance model (TAM) model by adding customer intimacy, perceived risk, trust and Sharia compliance as external variables, in which TAM is used as the evaluation method for the use of e-banking and m-banking by customers of Islamic bank; and to study the role of customer intimacy in increasing satisfaction and encouraging loyalty of Islamic bank customers in using e-banking and m-banking.

Data collection is carried out by the self-administered survey method with Islamic bank customers as target population. Multivariate analysis of variance and multiple linear regression are applied for data analysis.

Customer intimacy not only encourages the emergence of customer loyalty directly, but also affects the factors that determine customer loyalty itself, such as perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use, perceived risk, trust, sharia compliance and satisfaction. In other words, customer intimacy has a direct and indirect influence on loyalty.

This paper offers an extended TAM constructs to study the role of customer intimacy in increasing loyalty by considering various variables, namely, perceived risk, trust, Sharia compliance and satisfaction. Similar research is still very limited in the banking marketing literature, especially in Islamic banks context.

Providing high-quality e-banking services is considered a basic strategy for attracting and retaining customers with electronic-banking platforms. The purpose of this paper is to empirically investigate a comprehensive moderated mediated mechanism for enhancing customer loyalty toward e-banking platforms via e-banking service quality (EBSQ) practices. Reliability, website design, privacy and security and customer service and support are the dimensions of EBSQ.

Data were collected through structured questionnaires from a sample of 1,028 e-banking users in India. To test the hypotheses, a structural equation modeling approach was used.

The findings showed that of the EBSQ dimensions, reliability along with privacy and security enhanced customer loyalty to e-banking. The initial trust in e-banking mediates the effects of EBSQ dimensions on customer loyalty except for website design. The mediation effects of initial trust varied between high and low-involved consumers.

This study was conducted with e-banking users in one country using cross-sectional data. Hence, the model should be replicated among e-banking users in other countries and with the longitudinal data.

Establishing a loyal customer base is an important goal for banks. This study demonstrates which specific EBSQ dimensions banks should emphasize to enhance consumers’ initial trust and loyalty toward e-banking services.

This study suggests a moderated mediated mechanism for enhancing customer loyalty to e-banking, which incorporates initial trust as a mediator and consumer involvement as a moderator. It applies cognitive-motivation-relational theory to link EBSQ dimensions with customer loyalty. Thus, this study enables a better understanding of this theory in the e-banking context.