THEORETICAL BACKGROUND
2.1 Customer-focused The customer-focused marketing process includes the collection, interpretation,
analysis, and dissemination of customer information [33], and this process should ultimately have a positive effect on corporate performance [4-6]. Research on the customer-focused perspective during the past 30 years has obtained considerable knowledge verifying the effectiveness of this marketing outlook. For instance, it has been shown that communication has always been the basis of customer-focused marketing work, and the enhancement of interactivity can make communication an even more valuable element of marketing [34]. In addition, a customer-focused organizational structure has been shown to promote the “acquisition and dissemination of market information and the coordination of customer value,” which implies that the shift from a market-oriented to a customer-focused organizational structure requires changes to a company’s accounting and information systems and human resources management if it is to achieve optimal results [35]. Companies making the shift from product-orientated organizations to customer-focused organizations will find that this will enhance their sense of responsibility in customer relationships, improve their sharing of customer information, and make it easier for them to expand sales [36]. A customer-focused strategic environment will emphasize non-financial performance measures, which is because information concerning quality, flexibility, and reliability can enable managers to make better-informed decisions [37]. A greater degree of marketing exploration will weaken the relationship between marketing exploitation and customer-focused marketing capabilities, suggesting that a company should not attempt to maximize marketing exploration and marketing exploitation, because this will have a negative impact on its customer-focused marketing ability [38]. Use of a customer- focused approach to the selection of celebrity endorsers is better able to predict the success of the spokesperson marketing campaign than solely employing a product- centered approach [39]. Employees’ process thinking will influence operational performance and customer-focused performance via the effect of process mapping and process standardization and improvement [40]. When a company simultaneously strives for high levels of customer-focused brand management capability (BMC) and customer relationship management (CRM), it can concurrently strengthen the relationship between its market orientation, marketing mix capability, and new product performance [41]. Customer-focused performance elements include a customer service orientation and quality oriented measures [42]. Furthermore, when the selection of sales
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indicators is inconsistent with a customer-focused strategy, this may cause the company’s sales to fall [43].
In summary, past research on a customer-focused orientation has explained the results of basic marketing work, organizational structure, marketing capabilities, use of endorsers, performance, market orientation-marketing mix capability-new product performance, and other organizational and marketing strategies. In addition, a customer-focused company must strive to satisfy customers’ needs [44] and develop corporate activities in accordance with customers’ needs [45] if it is to boost its operating performance, and this is the essence of marketing strategies [45]. However, this study found that only a few studies concerning customer-focused marketing strategies mentioned customers’ needs; for instance, Rust [45] suggested that customer- focused management is the most effective means of boosting customer satisfaction and income, which is because insights concerning customers’ needs and wants will typically pervade the organization from the bottom up. Wuyts, et al. [46] noted that customer- focused companies possess intrinsic motivation to satisfy customers’ needs, but if customer support has been outsourced to an external service provider, this intrinsic motivation will be weakened; but if both the external service provider and its customer company are customer focused, they will be even more effective at satisfying customers’ needs and enhancing customer satisfaction. Soliman, et al. [47] suggested that the widespread application of the concept of value network advocacy will cause customer-focused companies to pay greater attention to the development of adaptive networks supporting customers’ needs. But while this minority of studies expressed how satisfying customers’ needs and wants will boost customer satisfaction, they fail to provide any marketing strategy assessment models that can be used to measure the key attributes of customers’ needs and wants. It is well known that, except when going out of their way to respond to a survey, customers seldom have opportunities to express their real wants and needs [48]. Because of this, when a company drafts marketing strategies, it must have a customer-focused MADM model developed on the basis of its customers’ needs and wants, and must use this model to precisely gauge the key attributes of its customers’ true needs and wants. Only marketing strategies drafted on the basis of the key attributes of customers’ real needs and wants can effectively boost customer satisfaction and corporate performance.
2.2 Marketing strategy Although scholars defined “marketing” in various ways, they hold similar opinions.
Among all, the definition contributed by Association [49, p.1] is one of the earliest and friendly-quoted: “Marketing is the process of planning and executing the conception, pricing, promotion, and distribution of ideas, goods and services to create exchanges that satisfy individual and organizational objectives.” Strategy is derived from an ancient Greek phrase ( ) , which is pronounced as stratēgema [50, p.653]. The word means an action, especially a planned action. Since the ancient times, strategies are used in the military. Xenophon in Athens first noticed the connections of strategies used in the military and in the business. Xenophon suggested that businessmen should allocate resources and organize activities effectively, just like the army, to obtain profits strategically. But not until the 20th century did Xenophon’s analogy of marketing strategy get attention [51, p.31]. Marketing strategy is constructed. It is the center of the marketing, and the core principle of marketing implementation [18]. More importantly, empirical studies perfectly demonstrate that marketing strategies would affect performance. [e.g., 8, p1]. In sum, this study defined marketing
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strategy as the systematic analysis, resources allocation, action planning, and performance evaluation, the four core principles, conducted by the corporations to gain profits. The evaluation and selection process of the four core principles requires well- designed models to provide fair measurements.
Most past research concerning marketing strategy models has focused on the conceptualization of marketing strategy making [e.g., 10, 52], the causal relationships and correlations between marketing strategy variables [e.g., 8, 10, 53, 54], the interactions between variables [55], and the optimization of marketing strategies [56]. In comparison, relatively few studies have used MADM models to investigate the key elements of marketing strategies. Analysis of these key elements can let companies know which elements they should improve as a first priority if they wish to ensure customer satisfaction [57, p458], which suggests the importance of this analysis. However, it appears that no studies have constructed fully customer-focused MADM models for use in the investigation of the key elements of marketing strategies, and the aspects of those few MADM models used for that purpose simultaneously embody both customer-focused and company-focused perspectives. For instance, in the research of Shafia, et al. [27], only the aspect of customer relationship management is based on a customer-focused perspective, while the balanced scorecard aspect is based on a company-focused outlook; in the research of Cahyadi [28], only the aspect of customer networking is consistent with a customer-focused perspective, while the aspects of innovation capabilities, managerial competency, human capital, and company reputation are based on a company-focused perspective. This study believes that, when drafting marketing strategies, an MADM model that is customer-focused and addresses the levels of customers’ hierarchy of needs must be used to investigate the key elements of marketing strategies, which will ensure the precise measurement of customers’ needs.
2.3 SIVA marketing mix Whereas different scholars defined marketing mix differently, the general
consensus indicated that marketing mix was part of marketing strategies [58, p.65]. Marketing mix is the fundamental structure of any marketing strategies as it connects strategies and marketing activities to guarantee the success of a product, a service, a brand, or a company in a target market [59, p13]. Despite multiple challenges and other models and instruments, the sustainability of the marketing mix after the diversity, changes, and updates it went through, proves its significant role in marketing strategies [59, p21]. Ever since McCarthy [60] proposed the 4Ps (product, price, place, promotion) marketing matrix, scholars have argued that the 4Ps marketing matrix was still mostly about the corporations [61, p.6-7]. As it contradicts to the customer-focused perspective advocated in marketing area, 4Ps marketing mix has received criticism from scholars, such as Lauterborn [62], Möller [63], Popovic [64], , Goi [65], and Festa, et al. [66]. Accordingly, Robert [67] adopted the customer-focused perspective and correspondingly developed the 4Cs (Customer needs ; Cost ; Convenience ; Communication) marketing mix.
Although the focus of marketing concept has already been shifted from 4Ps to 4Cs, from corporations to customers since the last century, the customer-focused 4Cs still fails to deep dive into customers’ thinking by merely understanding customers’ needs from corporations’ perspective. Since the 21st century, with advanced technology and widespread use of internet, customers can learn the information of products and services through websites and social media. Moreover, customers can send messages to product
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or service providers directly to express their needs. Newell [68] suggested that customers can dominate the trading process and communications with the autonomy given by technology. Dev and Schultz [29] argued that the dominant power no longer belongs to the manufacturers in the 4Ps agenda or the customers in the 4Cs scenario, but the “customer dominant”, which implies that customers send out dominant demands. Only the customer dominant perspective could help deepen customer-focused marketing concept. Given that, Dev and Schultz [29] proposed the SIVA marketing mix to enhance the establishment of “customer dominant” marketing strategies as the new marketing concept in the 21st century. SIVA consists of four dimensions—solutions, information, value, and access. The goal of SIVA model is to create high customer satisfaction and retention.
SIVA marketing mix is aimed to show that corporations should identify and satisfy customers’ needs and desires more precisely. Instead of focusing on products, corporations should develop and manage the solutions that customers need; should provide complete information instead of promotions; and make the solutions accessible to customers whenever they need [69, p.124]. The evolution of marketing mix from the seller-oriented 4Ps and customer-focused 4Cs to customer-dominant SIVA is shown in Figure 1.
SIVA has a solid theoretical basis [70], and is established on the basis of and supported by real marketing concepts. SIVA can help uncover customers’ needs and wants, and can boost the profitability of a marketing organization [71]. When products or services are characterized in accordance with SIVA, this will place the focus on customers’ needs, and also facilitate the definition of those marketing strategies that can be adopted by the enterprise[72]. A SIVA marketing mix can facilitate social marketing [69, 73], and can promote active, collaborative partnerships between marketing personnel and customers, which will yield even better value-in-use [69]. But in spite of the fact that research concerning SIVA has pointed out that it can facilitate the co- creation of value with customers because of its focus on customers’ needs, and thereby boost customer satisfaction, what kinds of key attributes can enhance customer satisfaction? Past research on SIVA lacks any explanation of this aspect.
After reviewing the evolution of marketing mixes across different eras and examining the customer-dominant SIVA marketing mix, it is clear that a marketing strategy which could help improve corporate performance should treat the deepening into customer thinking as the key element. This study therefore chose to use a SIVA marketing mix that can deepen customer thinking, and combine that marketing mix with a theoretical framework of hierarchical human needs to develop a MADM model that can be used to develop marketing strategies, which will be used to evaluate key attributes able to boost customer satisfaction.
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