Exploring relationship intention and the duration of customer support in the South African banking industry

Abstract

Because it is generally more expensive to attract new customers rather than retain the existing ones, service providers are investing in resources to establish successful customer relationships. In identifying and targeting customers who are willing to engage in a relationship, service providers often rely on the length of time for which customers have supported them. However, relationship marketing strategies would be better directed at customers with relationship intentions, who are more receptive to relationship building. The purpose of this study was first to investigate South African banking customers’ relationship intentions and then to determine whether the duration of their support influences their relationship intentions. Non-probability convenience sampling was used to gather data from 276 respondents in the greater Johannesburg metropolitan area. The results indicate that the relationship intention measurement scale was valid and reliable and that respondents with different relationship intentions viewed the five sub-constructs constituting relationship intention differently. The study also established that the duration of the respondents’ support did not influence their relationship intentions. It is recommended that, instead of focusing on customers who have supported the bank for longer periods, they specifically target customers with relationship intentions when building customer relationships.