Dimitris K. Kardaras

The state of CRM adoption by the financial services in the UK: an empirical investigation

In recent years, organisations have begun to realise the importance of knowing their customers better. Customer relationship management (CRM) is an approach to managing customer related knowledge of increasing strategic significance. The successful adoption of IT-enabled CRM redefines the traditional models of interaction between businesses and their customers, both nationally and globally. It is regarded as a source for competitive advantage because it enables organisations to explore and use knowledge of their customers and to foster profitable and long-lasting one-to-one relationships. This paper discusses the results of an exploratory survey conducted in the UK financial services sector; it discusses CRM practice and expectations, the motives for implementing it, and evaluates post-implementation experiences. It also investigates the CRM tools functionality in the strategic, process, communication, and business-to-customer (B2C) organisational context and reports the extent of their use. The results show that despite the anticipated potential, the benefits from such tools are rather small.

Content presentation personalisation and media adaptation in tourism web sites using Fuzzy Delphi Method and Fuzzy Cognitive Maps

Highlights? We propose an approach that utilises fuzzy logic for content presentation personalisation and media adaptation. ? The proposed approach deals with the subjectivity inherent in web design choices and in customers perception of services priorities. ? It considers advantages by applying Fuzzy Delphi Method and Fuzzy Cognitive Maps. ? A prototype has been built and evaluated for the applicability and effectiveness of the proposed approach. Web sites become more powerful when they can adjust to their users needs. Web personalisation refers to adapting both the content and the presentation of web sites, so that to deliver the maximum effect to the user in the most appropriate way. A main objective of web personalisation is to adapt the presentation of the web content in a manner that increases the users perceived quality. This paper focuses on the applicability of fuzzy logic techniques to content presentation and media adaptation. More specifically, it applies Fuzzy Delphi Method (FDM) and Fuzzy Cognitive Maps (FCMs) in order to highlight the services features that are most preferred by the customer and to adapt presentation media and layout. Fuzzy logic is utilised to deal with the subjectivity inherent in web design choices and in customers perception of services priorities. FDM is used to capture the experts knowledge regarding media adaptation with respect to hotel service quality. A prototype that adapts the web site presentation according to customer preferences has been developed and evaluated.

E-service adaptation using fuzzy cognitive maps

An e-service is an activity or series of activities that take place during the interaction between a provider and a customer through an electronic channel. Increasingly e-services are being realised using the technology of Web services. Meeting the e-service quality expectations in a Web service implementation is essential for delivering a tailored experience to customers. However it is not straightforward to attribute quality expectations for an e-service to quality of service (QoS) characteristics for its constituent Web services. This paper proposes a solution to this problem that uses fuzzy linguistic techniques to map the customers fuzzy expectations from the e-service to Web service QoS variables. By using this approach various quality aspects of the service can be tailored for individual customers and efficient e-service customisation can be achieved

Exploring the potential of virtual communities as a business model in banking: the customers' view

Virtual Communities (VCs) are expected to become a new business model that may spawn opportunities for the new digital economy. The business potential of VCs is mainly in terms of increased trust among their members combined with quality services that may improve customer loyalty. This paper reports the findings of an empirical study that was carried out in the financial sector in the UK. This study also investigates the profile of potential members of a financial VC, and discusses the required services. The results are useful for both academics and practitioners who develop and manage VCs.

A Multicriteria Model for Personnel Selection in Maritime Industry in Greece

The quality of staff is of paramount importance in all businesses. However, in maritime industry it is crucial due to the nature of the business itself. Employees lives could be exposed to risk, let alone that huge assets are in stake, if poor decisions are made. Employing quality and professional human resources requires a personnel selection process that would evaluate the best suited personnel, dealing with the consideration of both qualitative and quantitative criteria. However, despite the significance of the maritime industry worldwide, research is needed in order to investigate the criteria upon which maritime management could rely when selecting their human resources. This paper aims at developing a multi-criteria model for personnel selection in the maritime industry, based on the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP), chosen for its ability to incorporate multiple subjective opinions into a solid decision model. A novel criteria ranking technique based on Correspondence Analysis (CA) was added to the process in order to select the most highly evaluated criteria through a powerful data-driven method which does not rely on a-priori scales. Data was collected by interviewing experts from 14 maritime companies in Greece. The resulting model was validated by comparing its results against previous cases of successful employment. The results indicate that criteria such as trustworthiness, responsibility, capabilities in decision making, team spirit and communication skills are among the most important traits that companies look for.

The Role of Virtual Communities in the Customization of e-Services

Virtual communities are groups of people with similar interests who meet online and together act as a learning environment, place for social support, or as bodies for influencing public opinion. In this paper, the authors identify characteristics of a virtual community that influence its members to customize e- services provided to or received by the virtual community. The authors propose a theoretical framework of factors influencing service customization in a virtual community that has been validated with two case studies conducted in health-focused virtual communities. The findings confirm that the quality of the learning environment, social support, and the virtual communityA¢â‚¬â„¢s ability to influence public opinion, positively contribute to the perceived usefulness and active participation in the community by its members. In turn, these factors were found to have a positive influence on customization of e-services by the members, based on the communityA¢â‚¬â„¢s suggestion. The research also suggests several areas of focus to enhance e-service customization through virtual communities.

A Process Modelling and Analytic Hierarchy Process Approach to Investigate the Potential of the IoT in Health Services

E-health’s ultimate vision is to empower stakeholders, such as patients, families and societies to engage in the decision-making and management of their own health status. The proliferation of the Internet of Things (IoT) is expected to change the way that health services are designed, implemented and delivered. However, little research has been done to investigate the IoT potential in the health sector. The IoT represents a significant technological field with enormous implications for both patients and health organizations. This paper combines process modelling and the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) multicriteria analysis method in order to investigate and assess the potential of the IoT in health services quality. First, this paper, utilizes process modelling in order to capture the workflow of delivering health services to patients. It suggests that workflow modelling provides the conceptual foundation for the systematic consideration of the opportunities stemming from the IoT deployment. Further, this paper utilizes the AHP, in order to measure the potential of the IoT opportunities that can be identified along the workflow, in terms of its contribution to health services quality. An AHP questionnaire was structured and data were collected and analyzed from a group of health care experts. The results advocate the wide use of IoT in health services and argue for the applicability of the suggested approach as a means for medical organizations to design and deliver quality health services.

An Approach to Modelling User Interests Using TF-IDF and Fuzzy Sets Qualitative Comparative Analysis

Modelling and understanding user interests are particularly important tasks for designing services and building systems for customized solutions in web personalization and recommender systems. User generated content (UGC) constitutes a significant source of information for capturing user interests. This paper, suggests an approach to user profiling that analyses the Term Frequency (TF) and the Inverse Document Frequency (IDF) of selected tourism services by utilising the Fuzzy set Qualitative Comparative Analysis (FsQCA). It analyses a sample of customer reviews that are collected from tourism web sites. This paper considers the amount of money that customers spent during their hotel stay, as the outcome set in the FsQCA analysis. The results produce causal combinations of services that are necessary and sufficient for building customer interests models that best lead to the outcome and argue for the applicability of the FsQCA in modelling user interests.

Evaluation of websites’ compliance to legal and ethical guidelines: A fuzzy logic–based methodology

Privacy issues are a top priority in web design. However, websites’ evaluation methods do not consider legal and ethical issues. This article proposes a fuzzy logic–based methodology for evaluating websites’ compliance with legal and ethical principles. Using fuzzy Delphi and fuzzy numbers, the methodology develops the Fuzzy Legal and Ethical Compliance Index (FLECI) that addresses the inherited vagueness of the evaluation process and calculates websites’ conformity to legal and ethical guidelines. To illustrate the proposed methodology, this research collects data and then evaluates and classifies 100 websites with respect to their privacy policies using fuzzy equivalence. This article provides a foundation for the development of comprehensive website evaluation methods that include privacy and ethical issues in their evaluations. Future research can investigate the applicability of the proposed methodology and the fuzzy numbers calculated in this article in websites across industries and cultural activities.

Multicriteria Evaluation of the Internet of Things Potential in Health Care: The Case of Dementia Care

The Internet of Things (IoT) is a rapidly developing field and has the potential to significantly impact the healthcare industry. However, little research has been done in to investigate the IoT potential for seniors with chronic diseases and special needs, such as dementia and Alzheimer patients. It is crucial for decision makers, such as health care services providers, governments, clinics, etc., to be able to assess different types of IoT applications in relation to the specific nature of dementia. This paper utilizes the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) and attempts to develop a multicriteria model in order to evaluate the potential of various IoT technologies applications in dementia care. Six IoT-based healthcare services were selected and compared against two conventional services (i.e. family-based healthcare and assisted living facility), in terms of their effectiveness, safety and patient perspectives. An AHP questionnaire was structured and data was collected and analysed from a group of 12 experts in dementia, who had previously agreed to participate in this study. The results indicate the potential of IoT technologies. However, the importance of conventional dementia care services is still highly appreciated. The design and development of IoT-based services for dementia patients should take into consideration the fact that cognitive dysfunction is an obstacle for using new technologies, thus further development is necessary and new functionality need to be implement for the IoT to be competitive.