Driving forces of supermarke's consumer trust

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Driving Forces of Supermarket’s Consumer Trust and Loyalty: An Empirical Study in Malaysia

Muhammad Khalilur Rahman (Corresponding author)

Graduate School of Business, Faculty of Business and Accountancy, University of Malaya

50603 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

Tel: +60103626718, E-mail: [email protected]

Abdullah-Al-Mamun

Faculty of Economics and Management Sciences, International Islamic University Malaysia

53100 Gombak, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

Abstract This paper is assessing and developing the customer‘s trust and loyalty of retailing Giant supermarket

in Malaysia. The study tries to elaborate an instrument to measure the customer‘s trust and loyalty in

this context. A total of 137 participants are conducted using structural equation modeling (SEM)

technique with Partial Least Square (PLS). The findings revealed that service quality and brand image

have significant relationship with customer trust and loyalty, and overall customer trust has positive

impact on loyalty in supermarket. In addition, a customer benefit has the interaction effect on

relationship between service quality and trust, and brand image and trust. The paper is concluded with

an importance performance analysis and a summary of the main results of the study.

Keywords: Service quality, Brand Image, customer trust and loyalty, Customer benefits, Supermarket,

Malaysia

1. Introduction Giant hypermarket is a major supermarket and retailer chain in Malaysia (Rahman, Jalil, Robel, &

Abdullah-Al-Mamun, 2014a). It is a subsidiary of Dairy Farm International Holdings (DFI). Its

headquartered is in Shah Alam, Selangor. The study of consumer‘s trust and loyalty is an important

issue for Giant retailing supermarket. In the modern marketing strategy, customer loyalty is considered

as a strategic tool in assessing and developing customer satisfaction and promoting customer loyalty

(Saili, 2012; Rahman & Jalil, 2014b). Customer loyalty program has been increasingly concerned

interests in both marketing academics and practitioners (Leemheer, Heerde, Bijmolt, & Smidts, 2007;

Rahman, Jalil, Robel, & Abdullah-Al-Mamun, 2014b). In 2006, the total customer loyalty programs

enrollments were increased 1.5 billion in the United States. Similarly, today customer loyalty is

increasing exponentially among Malaysian consumers in retail business. The development speed of

customer loyalty in retail business in developing countries is faster than that in developed countries due

to the rapid growing of the economy. Although, loyalty programs are widely used in retail all over the

world, and retailers have indeed invested a lot of money into loyalty programs, many loyalty programs

do not bring corporate managers their expected customer loyalty. Retailers in United Kingdom such as

Safeway gave up loyalty programs and save company $75 million per annum. At the same time, other

retailers such as E. Leclerc in France still invest millions of dollars per year to implement and promote

customer loyalty programs. Furthermore, there is still an academic debate about the effect of retail

loyalty programs on customer loyalty. Some of extant empirical study have proposed loyalty programs

in retailing had positive impact on customer purchasing behavior (Magi, 2003; Lewis, 2004; Taylor and

Neslin, 2005; Meyer-Waarden, 2007; Ho et al., 2009; Omar et al., 2011). Several investigators found

that loyalty programs in retailing did not generate any impact (Meyer-Waarden, 2006; Leenheer &

Bijmolt, 2008). These two opposite conclusions hinder the proper evaluation of loyalty programs; need

to understand these programs.


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Customer loyalty is a key factor for retailers to achieve long-lasting success and sustainable operation

(Rahman & Jalil, 2014b; Rahman et al., 2014a). Currently, researchers have generally recognized

customer loyalty including behavioral dimension and affective dimension. However, most studies in

retailing have analyzed the effects of loyalty programs on customer loyalty only from behavioral

dimension (Berger et al., 2002; Magi, 2003; Leenheer et al., 2007; Rahman, 2014), and thus ignored

the emotional dimension of loyalty. Due to lack of this study, the paper is to explore the effect of

loyalty programs both on behavioral loyalty and affective loyalty. Previous studies on customer loyalty

have empirically confirmed that customer value was a precursor to loyalty in service sector (Woodall,

2003). From a customer point of view, the prerequisite for them to participate in loyalty programs is

that their expected benefits are superior to their expected costs (Mauri, 2003). Hence, retailers aiming

at improving customer loyalty through loyalty programs should ensure that these programs could create

and deliver superior customer value to their customers. Due to the limited resource of firm and the high

costs of creating customer value, it is crucial for firms to investigate the effects of each dimension of

customer value on loyalty and allocate resource accordingly.

In addition, some related investigations have examined the positive relationship between perceived

value of loyalty programs and customer loyalty (Yi and Jeon, 2003; Li et al., 2003; Rahman, Haque &

Jalil, 2014). Customer benefits, service quality and brand image as relationship marketing approaches

to customer loyalty that could improve customer trust and succeed customer loyalty program (Chen,

2010). According to past study it found that service quality, brand image (Jalil & Rahman, 2014) and

customer benefits affect the mediating role of customer trust in loyalty programs. Based on the

conceptual research model and previous study of Malaysian retail supermarket, this paper will examine

the mediating role of customer trust or customer commitment for loyalty programs and analyze the

importance degree of each dimension of customer trust in loyalty programs. This paper develops a

conceptual research model on the assessing and developing customer loyalty programs. Furthermore, it

proposes the hypotheses regarding the mediating variable of customer trust relationship with customer

loyalty (Fig. 1).

Figure 1. Conceptual Model

Giant is operating under the retail industry. Giant‘s mission was always been to offer a wide variety of

products at the lowest possible price. There is a slogan ―everyday low prices, big variety and great

value‖. Although they have low price product but customers are not fully satisfied. They have so many

management problems which are unable to satisfy customers‘ wants and needs. Cleanness and

freshness of products and service quality are very important but their products and services are not

cleanness and freshness. Customers are usually feeling comfort in their shopping. If customers are not

feeling comfort they will not buy regularly but if they feel comfort they will continue to shop in

supermarkets. They do not have well organized pricing system to enable their customers to easily

locate product price. Therefore, service quality is essential for the customer loyalty, if customers are

found any difficulties they can move and shift to other shop. Customers usually come and go out by the

some moment to purchase something from the retail supermarkets. The pricing tag of product is very

important for customers; it is very confusing and problem to customer that there are some of the pricing

tags at the supermarket are not properly pasted on the storage rack and products. Some of the Giant

Supermarket outlets are not properly maintained. These outlets are quite dirty and disorganized. They

Service

Quality

Brand

Image

Consumer‘s

Benefits

Consumer‘s

Trust

Consumer‘s

Loyalty H1a

H2a

H3

H1b

H2b


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have lack of employees‘ benefit, customers‘ benefit and insufficient of customer service counter.

2. Objective of Study Millions of people are interested to shop in supermarket. In Malaysia, many people have middle level

and lower income. They want to buy low cost price products and services. With their low income, they

do not afford to buy expensive products and services. The objective of this paper is: (i) to examine how service quality and brand image may achieve consumer‘s trust and loyalty.

(ii) to determine the moderating effect of consumer‘s benefit between consumers‘ service quality

and trust, as well as consumer‘ brand image and trust.

(iii) to recommend how service quality, brand image, customer benefit and trust may adopt

pragmatic strategy to ensure higher customer loyalty.

People of Malaysia are multicultural, most of the people are not wealthy, many people are poor, but

they are interested to shop in supermarket with lower price and good quality product and services.

Today in Malaysia has many hypermarket and supermarket. They offer lower price product and service

but they are unable to customer trust and loyalty due to inefficiency service quality. Recently

Malaysian retail supermarket is developing their service quality but still now they are not able to

customer loyalty. Specially, Giant retail supermarket should developing good service and lower pricing

strategy in their business strategy. They also should provide high efficiency and good quality service to

poor customers for the customer trust and customer loyalty. This research is very significant since a

few people have done research on this topic to assessing and developing customer loyalty program in

retail supermarket business. This research will help us to test the hypothesis that Giant retail

supermarket provide maximum trust and loyalty to more customers. Finally, this research will help us

to determine whether actually service quality, brand image, customer benefit and customer trust make

more customers satisfied or not. This will be done by collecting primary data through questionnaires as

stated in the methodology of this research and the data will be collected only from the Malaysian

customers. Any strategy is adopted to improve the quality of service, it remains to be examined

whether consumers are satisfied or not. The areas and the factors that are contributing to the

satisfaction or dissatisfaction in services are also unclear, thus making it difficult to identify effective

marketing strategies to maximize customer trust and loyalty in all aspects.

3. Literature Review 3.1 Consumer Loyalty Program

Customer loyalty programs play an important role as a marketing strategy. It is conducted to the

customer satisfaction through repurchase buying behavior. In the retail marketing strategy, a loyalty

program offers the positive motivational influence and reward to its customers with the objective of

assuring more loyal customers to company (Lacey, 2003; Yi & Jeon, 2003; Leenheer et. al., 2007;

Omar, Aziz, & Nazri, 2011; Saili, Mingli, & Zhichao, 2012; Rahman, Haque & Jalil, 2014). It could

association customers with a company and maintains a positive impact in the relationships between

customers and company by various incentives. In the past decade, loyalty programs have been

implemented almost beyond national boundaries. Retailing loyalty program have focused on analyzing

the impact of loyalty programs on the behavior of local customers from a company point of view. For

example, through an investigation of the Swedish customers in department industry, the study by Magi,

(2003) found loyalty programs only had partial impact on customer expenditure. In American retailing,

some researchers have found loyalty programs had positive impact on share of purchase, purchase

amount, revenue and orders of customers (Lewis, 2004; Taylor & Neslin, 2005). However, other

scholars argued loyalty programs did not have any impact on market share, repeat purchase rate,

purchase volume, total purchase expenditure and purchase timing (Meyer, 2007). This debate of

empirical studies demands a thorough solution for the validity of loyalty programs, that is, conforming

whether loyalty programs could really engender and maintain customer loyalty. Superior perceived

effectiveness of loyalty programs is necessary for firms to develop customer loyalty. An effective

loyalty program should be viewed valuable by customers. Service quality and brand equity of customer

loyalty programs depended on forms of rewards, and the relativity between rewards and products or

services. According to study Saili et al., (2012) enriched their study by measuring perceived

effectiveness of loyalty programs through three dimensions: cash value of rewards, probability of

getting rewards and desire for rewards. The study Yi and Jeon (2003) stated that customers perceived

effectiveness of loyalty programs to assess and develop the effectiveness of loyalty programs


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comprehensively. Perceived effectiveness of loyalty programs refers to tradeoff between interests that

customers obtain from loyalty programs and costs that customers pay for participating loyalty

programs.

Many scholars have defined customer loyalty with different concept; most of them explored and

measured customer loyalty from two aspects: loyal behavior and loyal attitude (Saili, 2012, Abdullah et

al., 2012). Customer loyalty may measure from the actual purchasing behavior of customers (Rahman,

Haque & Jalil, 2014). Attitude mainly measures loyalty on the basis of customer preference to specific

product. Purchase behavior is the main component of loyalty which reflects the possibility of

transacting with the same provider again (Jones et al., 2003). Previous studies about customer loyalty

have measured from proportion of purchase (Baloglu, 2002), frequency of purchase and past activities

of consumer (Ho et al., 2009). Actual loyalty between company and its customers is built on the basis

of long-term relationship and emotional connection between them. Customer will pay a strong

attention on retailers if their shopping experience meet their expectation and satisfy their fundamental

needs. Customer loyalty plays an important role in an organization‘s success. Customer loyalty is

defined as a deeply commitment to repurchase the preferred products and services consistently in the

future (Bloemer & Odekerken, 2002). Li & Green (2011) stated that customer loyalty is challenging to

achieve for marketers and to explain by researchers. Customer loyalty is the result of successful

marketing strategy that creates competitive value for consumers (Oliver, 1995; Bloemer & Odekerken,

2002).

3.2 Service quality

Customers‘ satisfaction and dissatisfaction, royalty and retention are conducted with the service quality

of the goods and services of the company (Li & Green, 2011). The customers‘ purchase behavior is

related to the product service that is offered by the company to satisfy their valued customers. Price is

not the primary differentiating factor for consumers, rather they trust on quality services. Consumers

are focused on quality service and findings specialized items. Therefore, company should provide

everyday discounts to the customers for their purchase frequently. Customers‘ evaluations of the

service quality are quite difficult to be developed in the retail marketing strategy. Service quality has a

tangible link to customer‘s trust, as in fact, the consumer‘s trust is represented by the service quality in

one way or another. Service quality has a significant impact to the customer‘s trust which directly

affects the customer‘s loyalty in supermarket.

3.3 Brand Image

Brand image offers a significant perspective on the understanding of consumer decision making (Jalil

& Rahman, 2014). The study by Azevedo & Farhangmehr (2005) found that consumers can decide not

to buy a product or not to shop at a particular store if they feel that the actions are not consistent with

their own perceptions of themselves. They will always need symbols to help them sort out the

complexities of daily life as they use products to express their social identities. Consumers search for

products which have images that are compatible with their perceptions of self-brand image (Jamal &

Goode, 2001). In the retail context, actual self-image congruity as the degree of match between a

shopper‘s actual self-image and a store image, and the ideal self-image congruity is the degree of match

between a shopper‘s ideal image and a store image. Self-image congruity affects the consumer‘s

purchase motivation because people have a motive to behave consistently with their self-perceptions.

They also prefer products with images that match their own self-image. The study by Azevedo &

Farhangmehr (2005) and Yang and Peterson (2004) argue that brand attitudes are the most abstract and

highest level of brand associations.

3.4 Customer’s Trust

Trust is the willingness to rely on an exchange partner (Prasarnphanich, 2007). Trust consists of two

distinct dimensions such as credibility and benevolence. Credibility refers to the extent to which the

buyer or supplier believes that the other party has the required expertise to perform the job effectively

and reliably. Benevolence refers to the extent to which the buyer is genuinely interested in the other

partner‘s welfare and motives to seek joint gain. This benevolence dimension is consistent with the

issue of privacy and security concerns that vendors do their best efforts to protect customers‘ personal

information and prevent any personal losses due to their interaction with the vendors. Trust can be

defined as a willingness to depend on an exchange party when someone has confident to that party. The

study by Abdu et al. (2012) pointed out that trust refers to an advantage received by consumers in long-

term relational exchange with the organization. Many researchers have suggested that trust acts as a


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mediating variables in the satisfaction-loyalty relationship. However, Taylor et al. (2004) stated that

trust acts as a basis of loyalty creation. Trust is a precursor to commitment which eventually will lead

to customer loyalty. Trust plays an important role in creating loyal customer. Customer loyalty plays a

significant role in many businesses. Therefore, if the company can sustain their customer well, the

customers will have less attention to switch to its competitors and keep being loyal to the company and

eventually lead to high profitability. Commitment is defined as an enduring desire to maintain a valued

relationship. It consists of three components such as instrumental component where one party takes

some actions to demonstrate commitment. Attitudinal component signifies an enduring intention by the

parties to develop and maintain the relationship. Finally, the temporal component suggests commitment

in something only over the long term and in a consistent manner.

3.5 Customer benefit

There are plenty of studies on the relationship between firms and customers. However, most of these

studies are investigated from the enterprises perspective. The marketing literature over the past decade

has begun to focus on the motivation and desire of establishing and maintaining long-lasting

relationship between customers and service providers. Customers should perceive the relationship

valuable to stay in a long-term relationship. Besides core benefits, such as product and service quality,

firms should offer additional benefits to their customers, including social, psychological, economic and

other benefits. Many scholars have called these benefits ―relationship benefits‖ and defined this

concept as interests‘ customer perceived from long-term relationship with service provider (Marzo-

Navarro et al., 2004; Vazquez-Carrasco & Foxall, 2006). In this way, benefits customer gaining from

relationship with company has been separated from core service of firms. It stresses the differentiation

between interests provided by company and effectiveness perceived by customers.

In 1995, Berry and Bitner have first explored the dimensions of relationship benefits through

theoretical analysis in consumer service context. Berry suggested that relationship benefits should be

composed of customized service benefits, risk reduction benefits and social benefits; whereas, Bitner

recognized that besides social benefits, relationship benefits should include the benefits which could

simplify personal life and save switching cost for customers. The relationship between customers and

individual sales could bring convenience and better purchase decisions to customers. However, these

studies analyzed only from the level of theory that put forward the three dimensions of relationship

benefits by empirical studies: confidence benefits, social benefits and special treatment benefits.

Confidence benefits refer to a series of psychological factors, which are related to reduction of

customer perceived anxiety and risk after transaction. This type of benefits could not only make

customers trust the service provider but also make providers maintain their commitment to customers

(Gronroos, 2007). Therefore, it has been viewed as a key factor of successful relationship. Social

benefits including sense of belonging, empathy, understanding, familiar, personal knowledge, social

support and even friendship are derived from long-term relationship between employees and

customers, and associated with interpersonal links between them. Special treatment benefits consist of

economic interest customers obtaining from the relationships with firms and the benefits of customized

service, because saving money is the main motive of customer to make relationship transaction.

4. Methodology 4.1 Data Collection

Data was collected of this study through self-administered questionnaires from Malaysian Giant

supermarket consumers in the Kuala Lumpur area of Malaysia. Kuala Lumpur area is the economic

hub and a large portion of population buys their preferred commodities from supermarkets. The study

is concerned with the customer trust enhances the development of customer loyalty in the Malaysian

Giant supermarket context. In this study, male and female customers were selected in both gender since

the perception, customers‘ belief, customers‘ attitudes and level of experience may differ in terms of

customer trust and loyalty. Non-probability sampling mechanism is used in this study since participant

can be selected based on personal judgment (Zikmund, Carr & Griffin, 2012).

4.2 Instrument

Partial Least Squares (PLS) based structural equation modeling technique is used to estimate the

structural model. PLS is well suited in this paper since the constructs are measured by a single item,

and PLS provides accurate estimates of interaction effects (Booker & Serenko, 2007). Data was

collected between November 2013 and February 2014. In this study, 5-point likert scale is used to

understand the level of satisfaction and dissatisfaction of Malaysian supermarkets‘ consumers.


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4.3 Sampling and Response Rate

The original sample size of the study is 190 participants are considered to data analysis representing

response rate 52. 86%. The response rate was also considered acceptable compared to other similar

studies. The study Ho (2008) received 153 completed questionnaires out of 500 questionnaires which

lead to response rate of 30.6%. Therefore, the response rate of 56.57% obtained from this study is still

considered acceptable.

5. Analysis and Discussion 5.1 Demographic Information

The sample included 52% female and 48% male with 33% participants aged below 24 years, 57% of

the participants aged between 25 and 40 years, and 10% of participants aged above 40 years. The

participants of the current study were well educated, in that 46% completed secondary/Diploma degree

while 34% attained undergraduate degree and 20% university degree. In terms of respondents‘ income

level, 57% and 43% of the respondents spend less than RM200 and RM201–RM400 respectively.

5.2 Measurement Model

The measurement model (Fig. 2) shows the first and second order constructs. The results R-square

value of customer trust is 0.287 proposing that 28.7% of the variance in customer‘s trust can be

explained by service quality and brand image. Furthermore, the R-square value of customer loyalty is

0.471 proposing that 47.1% of the variance in customer loyalty can be explained by the service quality,

brand image and customer‘s trust.

Figure 2. Measurement Model

Footnote: SQ= Service Quality, BI= Brand Image, TRT= Trust, CL= Customer Loyalty

Table 1. Hypothesis Test

Hypothesis Relationship Coefficient Std. Error t-value

H1a Service quality -> Trust 0.4150 0.1332 3.1158**

H1b Service quality -> Customer loyalty 0.7253 0.1093 6.6383**

H2a Brand image-> Trust 0.1647 0.0876 1.8801*

H2b Brand image -> Customer loyalty -0.1506 0.0889 1.6940*

H3 Trust -> Customer loyalty 0.2937 0.0922 2.8600**

Significant level *p<0.05, **p<0.01


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Table 1shows that service quality has significant relationship on customer trust and customer loyalty,

therefore, H1 and h4 is highly accepted at p<0.01. The findings revealed that brand image has positive

impact on customer trust and loyalty whereas H2 and H5 are accepted. Overall, customer trust has

significant relationship with customer loyalty. Thus, H3 is accepted at p<0.05.

Table 2. Discriminant validity using AVE

Constructs BI CL SQ TRT

Brand Image (BI) 0.8147 Customer Loyalty (CL) 0.3131 0.8258

Service Quality (SQ) 0.6394 0.629 0.7811 Trust (TRT) 0.4301 0.5221 0.5203 0.7879

The above Table 2 presents the discriminant validity for the constructs. The findings revealed that

diagonals (in bold) represent square root of the AVE are higher than other indicators of the constructs

that indicate the discriminant validity of all constructs. Fornell and Larcker (1981) stated each

construct‘s square root of AVE should exceed the correlations of the construct with the other constructs.

Table 3. Cross loading

BI CL SQ TRT

BI_1 0.8854 0.2993 0.6055 0.4228

BI_2 0.8636 0.3137 0.5649 0.3834

BI_3 0.7567 0.1729 0.4625 0.2602

BI_4 0.7624 0.1640 0.4186 0.2670

BI_5 0.7972 0.2725 0.5130 0.3683

CL_1 0.2437 0.7676 0.5605 0.4497

CL_2 0.2883 0.8837 0.5651 0.4380

CL_3 0.1782 0.8300 0.4455 0.3939

CL_4 0.3192 0.8363 0.5119 0.4466

CL_5 0.2548 0.8075 0.4957 0.4188

SQ_1 0.4841 0.5579 0.8218 0.3760

SQ_2 0.5571 0.5092 0.8352 0.4286

SQ_3 0.5343 0.5065 0.8180 0.4208

SQ_4 0.5142 0.4644 0.7899 0.4367

SQ_5 0.3949 0.4068 0.6204 0.3690

TRT_1 0.3148 0.4453 0.3866 0.8272 TRT_2 0.3781 0.4186 0.4574 0.8520 TRT_3 0.348 0.4191 0.4200 0.7743 TRT_4 0.3109 0.3583 0.3711 0.6880

The above Table 3 shows the cross loading for each item. The analysis of the cross-loadings support for

the discriminant validity as such reflective indicator loads highest on the constructs. The findings

illustrated that all items showed sufficient convergent and discriminant validity as the loading of each

item is greater than all of its cross-loadings.

Table 4. Results of testing convergent validity and reliability

Constructs Items Factor Loading Cronbach’s Alpha AVE CR Service Quality SQ_1 0.8218 0.8365 0.6102 0.8856

SQ_2 0.8352

SQ_3 0.8180

SQ_4 0.7899

SQ_5 0.6204

Brand Image BI_1 0.8854 0.8750 0.6638 0.9077

BI_2 0.8636

BI_3 0.7567


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BI_4 0.7624

BI_5 0.7972

Customer Trust TRT_1 0.8272 0.7935 0.6208 0.8668

TRT_2 0.8520

TRT_3 0.7743

TRT_4 0.6880

Customer Loyalty CL_1 0.7676 0.8830 0.6821 0.9146

CL_2 0.8837

CL_3 0.8300

CL_4 0.8363

CL_5 0.8075

For convergent validity, the average variance extracted (AVE) needs to be examined. The above Table 7

shows all the AVE values were ranged from 0.7935 to 0.8830. The internal reliability was assessed

through composite reliability (CR) which is ranged from 0.8668 to 0.9146. The standardized factor

loading of all items are greater than 0.60 that is recommended by Hair et al. (2010). The cronbach‘s

alpha values are ranged between 0.7935 and 0.8830 that suggested a high level of internal consistency

reliability (Hair et al., 2010). Finally it is concluded that the all categories are achieved their

recommended level that meet the higher the convergent validity and reliability.

Table 5. Moderating Effect

Relationship Sample Std. Error t-statistic

SQ * CB -> CT 0.2305 0.0890 2.5898*

BI * CB -> CT 0.1956 0.0947 2.0654*

Significant level *p<0.05, **p<0.01

Above Table 5 shows the moderating effects. On the basis of the results regarding the moderating

effects of customer benefits has significant relationship between service quality and customer trust in

Malaysian Giant supermarkets loyalty. Furthermore, the moderating effect of customer benefits has

also significant relationship between brand image and customer trust in Malaysian Giant supermarket

loyalty.

Figure 3. Moderating Effect of Customer Benefits between service quality and trust

The above Figure 3 shows the moderating effect of customer benefits illustrated by graphical

presentation. The Interaction Effect of customer benefits on Relationship between service quality and

customer trust in Malaysian Giant supermarket loyalty. The supermarket with high level customer

benefits was rated as highly to present service quality. The low of their customer benefits appear to be

less emphasizing on service quality.

1

1.5

2

2.5

3

3.5

4

4.5

5

Low Service Quality High Service Quality

Cus

tom

er T

rust

Moderator Low Customer

BenefitsHigh Customer

Benefits


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Figure 3. Moderating Effect of Customer Benefits between brand image and customer trust

In this study, Fig. 4 shows the relationship between brand image and customer trust in Malaysian Giant

supermarket shows a difference slope in different level of customer benefits. The company with high

level customer benefits was rated as highly to present brand image. The company with low of their

customer benefits appears to be less emphasizing on brand image in customer trust in Malaysian Giant

supermarket customer loyalty.

6. Conclusion

Giant retail supermarket in Malaysia can acquire customer trust and loyalty. However, there might have

some factors which may contradict customer trust and loyalty in Giant retail supermarket, for example,

they may adopt deceitful strategy, such as they write online or in the advertisement the good service

quality or good private brand image of products, but customers might not be got good service and

product quality in their stores. Thus, customers can move to other supermarket. The findings of the

research can provide the real scenery of the Giant retail supermarket in assessing and developing

relation to customer trust and customer loyalty. Based on the literature and findings of this study, it is

concluded that assessing and developing customer loyalty program is very important. Although,

customer trust and customer loyalty program does not guarantee repurchase on the part of the

customers but still it plays a very important part in ensuring customer trust and loyalty. With regards to

the challenges that managers or corporate level of the Giant retail supermarket in Malaysia should find

out the following research question which is: ―What kind of benefits do customers seek when they

engage in relationships with retail supermarket and how relationships can strengthen Giant retail

supermarket customer trust and loyalty?‖ The review of relevant literature in the fields assessing and

developing of customer loyalty, relationship and service marketing, customer benefits will be

determined as moderator that has relationship between service quality and trust, and brand image and

trust in Giant supermarket customer loyalty in Malaysia. Giant retail supermarket can make trust their

customers by providing social, psychological, and functional benefits. Effective relationships can also

lead to Giant retail supermarket customer loyalty program. Especially, concrete management decision

of good service quality, customers benefit, brand image and consumer trust can improve customer

loyalty.

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