RELATIONSHIP MARKETING AND CUSTOMERS’ RETENTION IN THE NIGERIAN TELECOMMUNICATION INDUSTRY

A CUSTOMER-CENTERED APPROACH

Abstract

The study empirically investigated the effect of relationship marketing on customers’ retention in the Nigerian telecommunication industry. The study used relationship marketing proxies vis-à-vis trust, commitment, communication and service quality while customers’ retention served as the dependent variable. This led us to formulate four research objectives, four research questions, and four research hypotheses. Primary data via the use of well-structured research questionnaire administration served as the estimation techniques while the data was analyzed using the Pearson Product-Moment  orrelation (PPCM) Coefficient through the instrumentality of Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) version 23.0. Although, 170 research questions were shared across the field and only 161 was retrieved and used for this study. Findings from the field survey conducted in Warri and Asaba affirmed that trust, commitment, communication, and service quality have a positive high correlation with customers' retention in the Nigerian telecom industry. However, only trust and efficient communication were highly significant using their p-value as an assessor. Hence, the study concludes that a good relationship marketing that meets the expectations of customers can encourage the desire to continue to do transactions, respond to complaints of services, improve a long-term relationship and mutual trust, and keep the communication to flow well. In this light, the study recommends that market makers in the Nigerian telecommunication industry should pay more concentration on problems regarding trust, commitment, communication and service quality.