Are We Loyal To The Card Or To The Merchants?udFactors Influencing Customer Loyalty In Multimerchant Loyalty Card Programs In Malaysia

摘要

Loyalty program is a new generation of Customer Relationship Management (CRM) strategyudand CRM is one of the vital aspects of the Integrated Marketing Communication (IMC). Thisudstudy aims to understand the usage pattern of loyalty program among the cardholders andudseek to examine factors influencing the customer loyalty in the multi-merchant loyalty cardudprogram in Klang Valley in terms of its perceived benefit, trust, commitment and satisfactionudbased on the main constructs of the Social Exchange Theory. Two levels of customers loyaltyudwere examined namely the loyalty towards the program and the loyalty towards theudmerchants involved in the program. Data were collected from 230 cardholders of Bonuslinkudand BCard in Klang Valley, Malaysia via the online survey technique and data was analysedudusing descriptive analysis, Pearson Correlation and Multiple Regression analyses. Results ofudthe Multiple Regression analysis showed that customer benefit, customer commitment andudcustomer satisfaction are the best predictor variables of the customer loyalty towards theudloyalty program. However, none of the independent variables were found to significantlyudpredict the customers loyalty towards the merchants involved in the program, which furtherudindicate greater customer loyalty towards the loyalty program not to the merchants.