Building Telecoms Service Quality for Brand Loyalty

Service firms dependent on high technological infrastructure operate within a different service context from typical professional service firms. As a result, there is a tendency for such service firms to deviate from the existing (customer-centric) schools of service quality definition and measurement. This becomes difficult to operationalise within the context of brand loyalty. This led the researchers to review the extant literature in the relevant subject areas with the aim of finding out whether there has been a shift in the definition of service quality for high-tech dependent service firms. Following this, a pilot study consisting one-on-one interviews and a field survey was conducted. The aim was to gain insight on the understanding of key technical managers of a telecoms operator (MTN) in Lagos, Nigeria. On the other hand, the field survey (of MTN customers) carried out was aimed to juxtapose customer perception, based on the findings in the literature, with the orientations of the managers. The results indicate a disconnect between managers’ orientations and the perception of their customers. While managers believe that their customers are loyal to their brand due to operational efficiency provided, customers indicate very high switch-over tendencies to the firm’s competitors irrespective of operational efficiency. Suggestions on how service quality can be operationalised for brand loyalty were given as well as areas requiring further research.