Research On The Influencing Mechanism Of Corporate Reputation On Customer Relationship

Corporate reputation and customer relationship are the research focus and hotspots both at home and abroad at the present.Reputation,as a strategic asset of the enterprise,can effectively improve business performance through its impact on the customer's purchase and non-purchase behavior. Good corporate reputation has become an important source for the corporate to maintain customer relations and create competitive advantages.Although existing research has confirmed the significant impact of corporate reputation on customer relationship,the impact of the different dimensions of the driving elements of corporate reputation and their role in promoting customer relationship are poorly understood.By far,the means and pathways of corporate reputation's impact on customer relationship have not been sufficiently studied,a complete understanding of corporate reputation on customer relationship mechanism has not yet formed,and the consumers'psychological reaction to the corporate reputation in the formation of the relationship has not been revealed,thus,we are unable to provide valuable guidance on corporate reputation and customer relationship management practices.This paper,on the basis of domestic and foreign research results and interviews, explores the driving elements of corporate reputation from the perspective of consumers in the Chinese context,explores the relationship between the driving elements and different dimensions of corporate reputation,expounds the functioning mechanism of corporate reputation on the quality of the relationship,and develops a comprehensive conceptual framework based on the psychological contract and customer commitment. With the above efforts,a structural equation model is constructed,and an empirical test is conducted with the color TV industry as the research object model.The empirical results have some theoretical reference for Chinese enterprises in corporate reputation management and customer relationship management strategy-making in the context of transformative economics.Specifically,this study is mainly to solve the three problems.Firstly, based on existing research and consumer interviews,it reveals the driving elements of corporate reputation from the consumer's perspective.lt is the primary problem of the management practice of corporate reputation, and also that of this paper.In order to establish and manage corporate reputation,an important prerequisite is to define the driving elements of corporate reputation,and determine which key elements will win reputation for the enterprises.Secondly,it examines the specific impact of the driving elements on different dimensions of corporate reputation. Corporate reputation is an attitude structure including both cognitive components and affective components,including the two dimensions of cognitive reputation and emotional reputation. Specific analysis of the different impact of the driving elements on the different dimensions of corporate reputation will provide more reference to the practice of business management.Thirdly,it introduces the psychological contract and customer identity variables ignored by traditional studies,verifies the different impact of the different dimensions of corporate reputation on the dimensions of relationship quality within the process,thus it reveals the psychological transmission mechanism between corporate reputation and customer relationships.The three parts interlock with each other,the purpose of the previous studies providing a basis for the next research purposes and the next research objective expanding and deepening previous research purposes.The main conclusions and inspiration for practice of this study include:First,the driving elements of corporate reputation from the consumers'perspective mainly cover product and service awareness,personnel qualityawareness,enterprises'social responsibility awareness,innovation abilityawareness and corporate integrity awareness.To build the corporate reputation can focus on the five aspects.Second,it is reasonable to define corporate reputation in two dimensions:cognitive and emotional. Corporate reputation from the consumers'perspective is consumers' psychological and cognitive response based on the nature of enterprises.Corporations blessed with cognitive and emotional reputation,just like people with ability and integrity,appeal to and influence consumers,so as to constitute important intangible assets for the corporations.To build corporate reputation can start with enhancing consumers'awareness on corporate reputation's cognitive reputation (competitiveness) and emotional reputation (appeal). Third,consumer awareness on corporate reputation is largely influence by the perception of the quality of products and services,the perception of innovative ability and the perception of the talent competition. Corporate integrity performance,its socially responsible behavior,products and services have a positive impact on the emotional reputation;this means that consumers not only concerned about their economic interests provided by the companies,but welcome those businesses who have high integrity,and strong sense of social responsibility. Defining the different impact of different driving elements of reputation on cognitive and emotional reputation,it will be feasible to achieve specific reputation management objectives.Fourth,psychological contract and the customer identity is an important intermediary variable between corporate reputation and customer relations.Empirical results show that two dimensions of corporate reputation have a significant and positive impact on psychological contract and customer identity.Psychological contract has a significant positive effect on customer trust and customer commitment. Customer identity has a significant effect on the third dimension of relationship quality-customer satisfaction,customer trust and customer commitment.Corporate reputation has a direct and positive effect on customer trust.Psychological contract and the customer identification play an intermediary role between corporate reputation and customer trust, which indicates that customer identity,built on psychological contract, is the deep-seated psychological motivation for corporation and customer maintaining high-quality relationship.Business management practice should attach importance to the satisfaction of the customer psychological contraband foster consumer's identification with the corporation,thus build a solid foundation for long-term stable relationship between consumers and businesses.Fifth,compared with the customer satisfaction,customer trust plays a more fundamental role in corporate reputation management and customer relationship maintenance.Over the years,many companies have always thought that "customer satisfaction" is the most important in the long-term relationship with customers. However,the empirical results of this study on corporate reputation and customer relationship demonstrates that corporate reputation has no direct impact on customer satisfaction and the satisfaction of the psychological contract does not necessarily lead to customer satisfaction.Corporate reputation not only has a direct impact on customer trust,but also leads to customer trust by means of the psychological contract and the customer identification.That is to say, there exists an impact path:corporate reputation-psychological contract-customer identification-customer trust. Therefore, the establishment of customer trust is the core of the customer relationship management in the context of corporate reputation.Customertrust caused by good reputation means that the customer has confidencein a particular enterprise, is willing to rely on the enterprises andthus forms a positive attitude towards the enterprises,their productsand services.Compared with customer satisfaction,customer trust reflectsthe in-depth interaction between the consumer and business and is thekey to maintain the continuity of relationship between the customer andthe business.Compared with other studies,this study, with the introduction of the psychological contract and the customer identification,explores the functioning mechanism of corporate reputation on customer relationship and enriches the theory of corporate reputation and has a positive role in the expansion and deepening the present theory of customer reputation, to a certain extent making up for the lack of existing research. Innovations of this study are mainly reflected in the following aspects:First,integrate corporate reputation and customer relationships in the framework of relationship marketing, and build,from the perspective of consumers,an overall research model containing the front variable of reputation and outcome variables, Examine the relationship outcomes of corporate reputation,make up the research gap of corporate reputation's impact on corporate relationship performance.Second,introduce the variables of the psychological contract and customer identification of the ignored by traditional studies,constructs the model of the influencing mechanism of corporate reputation on customer relationship; explores psychological transmission mechanism between corporate reputation and customer relationships;provide a new perspective for analyzing the customer relationship mechanism "black box";reveals the deep-seated psychological motivation of the customer relationship establishment. Third, On the basis of customers'social expectations of the business,explores the five driving elements of corporate reputation from the consumer perspective and their impact on cognitive and emotional reputation of businesses;deepen the relevant research of dimensions,cause and effect of corporate reputation.