Abstract:
Competitive markets stimulate companies to seek customer loyalty and to know how to build and manage it. Higher and fast growth in information technology, affect the telecommunication sector, especially the mobile phone service. This study investigates the influence of product performance variables price, network, other services and customer service on brand loyalty with satisfaction as mediator variable. The objectives of this study are 1. To determine how the product performance and customer satisfaction effect brand loyalty. 2. Explain the effect of the product performance element on performance quality and loyalty. 3. Find out the relationship between the factors effects brand loyalty and aspect of brand loyalty. 4. Establish relationship between product performance, customer satisfaction and brand loyalty. Data collected through personal questionnaire, 240 respondents used for the purpose of this study. Customers of Mobitel and Areeba mobile phone Company in Sudan were the target population of this study. Purposive sampling method used to collect the data from respondent. Factor and reliability analysis performed and regression analysis conducted to test the hypotheses. The findings provided empirical support for the theoretical framework. The results indicate that product performance variables price, network and other services play an important role in getting customer satisfaction; the customer care has no significant relation with satisfaction, because of the nature of telecommunication service and mobile phone service. Mobile phone service depends on the information technology (IT) as basis of providing service for customers. Satisfaction has significant influence on the brand loyalty. This study supports the mediation effect of satisfaction on the relationship between quality and loyalty. According to the results of this research, company can manage, build and create brand loyalty through product performance to increase the customer satisfaction.
