Customer Relationship Management as a Strategic Tool for Competitive Advantage: (A Case of SIC Insurance Company Limited)
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Date
2011-06-06
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Abstract
The upsurge of competition coupled with dynamism and uncertainties within the business environment has brought to light the need for organizations to be more proactive and customer focused to enhance corporate image, business growth and ensure profitability. Customer Relationship Management (CRM) implies an effort to maintain a life time quality relationship with all customers for mutual benefit. It also involves business strategy, people, processes and performances. In this regard, the underlying factors of CRM are the integration of distinctive competences, resources and capabilities. According to the literature review for the purpose of this research, customers are key partners in any business but getting them is difficult. For any company to grow, the customers must be satisfied. This study, therefore, sought to determine how customer service has impacts on premium income and market share by using SIC Insurance Company Limited. Descriptive techniques assisted the researchers to transform raw data into a form that made them easy to present and interpret. They range from descriptive tables that showed socio-demographic characteristics of respondents to tables that show data related to the research questions and objectives. After a careful examination of the major findings of the study, the following were observed. Most customers do not normally stay for more than three years with SIC. Most individual customers are not satisfied with the process of settling claims, little knowledge about the insurance products and means of sending renewal notices. About 48% of customers are not satisfied with the customer service of SIC. There is no complaints department/section in SIC apart from the marketing department. Complaints are mostly made verbally and are not treated with urgency and dealt with promptly and timely. It is therefore recommended that, SIC should set up a department which would be solely responsible for customer service and will undertake the management of the customer complaints and emergencies. SIC should revise the way they notify customers about renewals by using channels that are convenient to the customer. Also, the claim department which is the core of insurance should be a separate entity to handle all claims issues. Conclusively, the project even suggests that investigations must be conducted to find out why the premium income is raising, even though customers are not satisfied with SIC customer service.
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A thesis submitted to the Institute of Distance Learning, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Commonwealth Executive Master of Business Administration (CEMBA), June, 2011