Social Networking Sites Continuance: An Application of Extended Theory of Planned Behaviour

Social networking sites (SNSs) have become popular in India with the proliferation of Internet. SNSs have gained the interests of academicians and researchers. The current study is an endeavor to understand the continuance of social networking sites in India. The study applies an extended version of theory of planned behavior. Additional factors privacy concerns and habits were incorporated into the standard theory of planned behaviour. A survey was conducted in a Central University in India. Overall, data was collected from 150 respondents. PLS-SEM was used to test the proposed model. All the hypotheses except the moderating role of habits between intentions and continued use of social networking sites, were supported by the results. Habits were found to affect continued use of social networking sites indirectly through continued intentions.

Exploration of Product Centric Factors in Telecom Industry

Telecom industry is one of those industries which has changed dramatically during the past decade. With more and more players entering in this industry, competition is ever increasing. The war between these players is slowly shifting from the price to the augmentation. This paper aims at exploring such factors which influence a customers preference of one telecom service provider (TSP) over the other. It is a descriptive research where study has been conducted among the consumers of different telecom service providers (TSPs). By reviewing the existing literature in this domain, we explored different factors which affect the consumers decision to prefer one telecom service provider over the other. A consumer targeted questionnaire was designed where consumers were asked about the factors they consider (with their relative importance quantified using Likert scale), before buying a new network connection to know the relative importance of the various factors. Factor Analysis was performed to club various variables into distinct factors. Statistical techniques then helped in identifying the relative importance. From the Factor Loading matrix the following five factors were generated:- Overall service quality, Point of Purchase Differentiator, Promotion Measures, Tariff Plans and Size of the Network. Further study in the behavioural perceptions of consumer shows that the most important factor in influencing the customer buying behavior is Service Quality. The second most important factor is cost and various plans offered by the telecom service provider. Network connectivity was considered by almost all the respondents and consumers prefer the largest network player. The study also found that promotional measures dont influence the customers as expected.

Flexible Spectrum Management: Approaches for India

Radio spectrum for commercial mobile services continues to be scarce. Countries around the world have recognized the importance of efficient utilization of this scarce resource and have initiated regulatory and policy steps towards flexible approaches to spectrum management, including sharing of licensed spectrum, and releasing unlicensed spectrum for mobile services. Technologies for shared access and the associated standardization activities have also progressed towards possible large scale deployments. In this paper, we analyze the evolution of spectrum management policies using a causal model and indicate how the markets can lock in to either centralized or flexible approach. We also cite a use case of a flexible spectrum management approach using spectrum band fill option and indicate its suitability to the Indian context.

Wrist Wars: Smart Watches vs Traditional Watches

Wearable technology is the latest buzzword doing rounds in Technology forums with humongous growth expected in next few years. Of various devices, Smart Watches have shown most promise. A lot of companies have already launched Smart Watches or have indicated an interest to explore this area. In this paper, we try to understand the following: Definition of Watch and how a Watch has changed over years, What are the Mechanism to keep time. How does a watch function. What is a Smart Watch? Its Past and Present, What are features that Smart Watch provides. How useful are these features? Target Segment for Smart Watch. What factors could dictate decision of consumer to buy Smart Watch? What is the outlook for Smart watch Market? How would Traditional watches fare once Smart watches become mainstream, Authors Conclusion around Smart Watches ability to disrupt the Traditional Watch market.

Innovative Product Management Driving Enhanced Customer Experience Management (CEM)

Customer Experience Management (CEM) has been a buzzword in both demand and supply side dynamics of the Telecom value chain. However emphasis is being given around CEM, it never feels just enough! Telecom ISPs are looking to generate more awareness of revenue generation and realization, so that it not only is about the increase of top line but also about consolidation of various products and services, almost being an aggregator at one stage to deliver with the help of a single service delivery platform. In other words, what is commonly known as VAS-Value added services in the industry. The key to this is real innovation, of newer ideas and productizing these concepts to market. For innovative product management, Telcos are opting to look for value added services, value added delivery as well as enhanced business models and operational frameworks. This is primarily done to carve out an innovation which leads to a differentiator non-existent in the market. A very common, yet unique one such concept can be the Balanced Scorecard perspective and mapping these different perspectives into various domains of a Telecom business. These are obviously very common in present days and widely used by all Telcos to arrive at a definitive decision for any strategic cause. It can be mapped to perspectives ranging from financial, customer-centricity and orientation, internal process management, functionality & delivery, lastly internal learning & growth. We need to understand the context of innovation of products & services under all of these above perspectives. This will give us immense clarity in creating such a differentiated offering to render enhanced Customer experience for better sustainability and thus thriving on market competition. Each layer of a Telco enterprise set up follows specific blueprint, whether its the business or operations or technology. This will ensure that all company strategies which are focused towards creating and delivering differentiated offerings and delivery are being realized appropriately hence the delta of perception versus reality is minimized to a great extent. This would definitely increase customer experience in all possible forms. Product life cycle management which forms the heart of CEM, should be certainly driven by cost of sale as well as price of product. Both of these parameters should be populated through a Balanced scorecard from a financial perspective to decide on a go-no go decision for concepts to be marketed in a Telco. These need to be realized through specific derivatives of business processes following best practices to ensure enhanced customer experience and better delivery of services to the end customer. Perhaps, the most important

Analyzing the Indian Subscriber Behavior Towards Mobile Social Media - A Data Monetization & Customer Engagement Perspective

The Indian Mobile Services Industry is going through a paradigm shift in terms of their business model-moving away from a Voice centric business to a Data focused business. Mobile Operators are looking at new and innovative avenues to increase the data penetration or the contribution of non-voice revenue (currently hovering around 11%) with respect to their overall service revenue. A similar paradigm shift is also being witnessed in the manner in which communication and social interaction happens-with Social Media emerging as a front runner when compared to hitherto popular communication mediums: email and instant messaging service. The immense popularity of social media has attracted advertisers and enterprise users to effectively engage their prospective as well as existing customers using social media. In emerging markets like India, Social Media has been used for customer engagement and monetization. Every day innovation in the mobile social media space is defining a win-win monetizing model for all the players in the value chain-device manufacturers, technology providers, telecom operators, and social media players. Operators are recognizing the need to investigate the subscriber behavior and aspirations relating to Mobile based Social Media. The extra-large investments in next generation high-bandwidth technologies like 3G & Broadband Wireless Access (BWA) will provide the required momentum to the mobile operators as subscribers resort to user generated content over social media. The paper analyzes the subscriber behavior to ascertain the avenues for customer engagement and monetization using this channel.

Management of Service Gaps by Infusion of Technology

The purpose of this research paper is to study infusion of technology in services marketing, and to investigate role of technology as an enabler to manage service gaps. Service gaps are theorized to be arising from internal organizational inconsistencies, and affect service quality perceptions of the customers. The research design comprised of bibliometric analysis, citation count, and review of literature in services marketing in relation to its engagements with technology aspect. The major findings point to, extensive use of technology by service firms to minimize internal and external service gaps. Various technologies are contributing towards interlinking stakeholders by creating seamless service processes. Newer technologies has potential of efficiently interlinking stakeholders, thus improving service quality by minimizing external (customer) and internal service gaps. Technology though being adopted by service industry extensively, its implication in relation to service gaps model has not been discussed by researchers.

On the History of Telecommunication: Patents, Disputes and Rivalries that Shaped the Modern Telecommunication Industry

From the smoke signals of Africa to the futuristic thought based mode of communication, the present research surveys an era covering hundreds of years of development that assisted mankind to overcome barriers of long distance communication. The research is conducted through the eyes of patents highlighting landmark inventions that shaped the modern telecommunication industry. Clearly, the later day inventors stood on the shoulders of their predecessors to develop their innovations. Patent laws that denied Samuel Morse a patent for his telegraph in the European market and the benevolence of Nikola Tesla to allow Guglielmo Marconi to use his radio patents thus costing Tesla to die in abject poverty are only some of the findings of the current research.