SERVICE BRANDING STRATEGIES AND CUSTOMER PATRONAGE OF TELECOMMUNICATION FIRMS IN RIVERS STATE.

Abstract

The study examined the relationship between Service Branding Strategies and Customer Patronage of Telecommunication Firms in Port Harcourt, Rivers State The study addressed two (2) Objectives, answered two (2) research questions and tested two (2) hypotheses. The correlational research design was adopted in this study. The population consisted of 40 managers from four (4) telecommunications companies in Port Harcourt. The study used census sampling and studied the entire population. The reliability of the instrument was determined using the Cronbach's alpha test with the aid of Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) version 27, and it stood at 0.78, higher than the benchmark of 0.70. Descriptive and inferential statistics were used to analyze the data that were gathered for this study. The Pearson Product Moment Correlation Method was used to test various hypotheses formulated with the aid of the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) version 27.0. From the bivariate and multivariate analysis carried out, it was discovered that service branding strategies showed a positive and significant relationship with customer patronage of telecom firms in Rivers State. From the result of the analysis carried out, it was discovered that service quality, and service positioning strategy showed very strong and significant relationship with customer loyalty and repeat purchase of telecom firms in Rivers State. Based on the findings, the study concludes that service branding strategies (service quality and service positioning strategy) are significant predictors of customer patronage of telecom firms in Rivers State. The recommends amongst others that telecom firm in Rivers State especially those that are struggling to improve their customer patronage should adopt service branding strategies as it would improve their patronage level and telecom firms in Rivers State particularly those that are experiencing low level of customer patronage should adopt service positioning strategy as it would increase their level of customer patronage.