The telecommunications industry is one of the most dynamic industries and Vodafone, being a telecommunications provider in the top five of the world has to act accordingly to keep this position. Customers’ requirements get more demanding (Jones, et al., 2005) and without customer centricity, corporations are condemned to get pushed out of the market. Due do globalization and digitalization, customers have almost unlimited access to information and to serve them, it is crucial to understand how the human species acts - and here Behavioral Economics comes into play: While classical economics teaches us about the Homo Economicus, the creature that acts entirely rationally, Behavioral Economics complements this assumption with other sciences such as psychology in order to draw a more realistic picture. The customer of Vodafone is not the Homo Economicus, he is rather a person full of irrationalities and biases. To develop products and services which address the needs and requirements of the actual human species, it is crucial to understand how we actually act. If a corporation like Vodafone understands irrationalities in the human behavior, it can build a competitive advantage towards competitors that still act as if their customers were Homo Economicus. After rolling out the theory in the Literature Review, the case study will give first insights in the research and application of Behavioral Economics before conducting a survey in order to get insights about the irrational purchasing behavior and to find out how Vodafone can increase the perceived quality of its products and services.
Date of Award | 25 Oct 2016 |
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Original language | English |
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Awarding Institution | - Universidade Católica Portuguesa
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Supervisor | Pedro Celeste (Supervisor) |
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- Mestrado em Gestão: Programa Internacional
Vodafone and its approach to understand and serve the irrational customer: a behavioral economics perspective
Koëhler, A. T. (Student). 25 Oct 2016
Student thesis: Master's Thesis