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Procedia Economics and Finance 37 (2016) 366 371

FIFTH INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON MARKETING AND RETAILING (5TH

INCOMaR) 2015

The Relationship Between Marketing Mix And Customer Loyalty In

Hijab Industry: The Mediating Effect Of Customer Satisfaction
Norsyaheera Abd Wahaba, Lailatul Faizah Abu Hassanb, *, Siti Asiah Md Shahidc, Siti
Noorsuriani Maond
a,b,d

Faculty of Business and Management, Universiti Teknologi MARA, 40450 Shah Alam, Selangor Malaysia
c
Institute of Business Excellence, Universiti Teknologi MARA, 40450 Shah Alam, Selangor Malaysia

Abstract
In today's business market, there are so many new entrants in the same industry, selling and providing the same products and
services. Therefore, business providers need to compete with one another in order to survive in the industry as there are so many
competitors. Business providers need to focus on the customers' needs and preferences to maintain and retain the long term
relationship. In order to make customer satisfied, business providers must know the elements in the marketing mix that they need
to practice in order to attract customers especially through their buying behaviour. Thus, the objective of this study is to examine
the relationship between marketing mix and customer loyalty, and the mediating effect of customer satisfaction in hijab industry.
The study setting focused on female customers who are wearing and buying any hijab products at Shah Alam outlets.
Questionnaires adapted from prior studies were distributed and 234 usable questionnaires were collected from this study. It is
expected that findings from this study will contribute to the existing literature to both theoretical and managerial approaches in
order to better understand the pattern of the marketing mix, customer satisfaction and customer loyalty, especially in hijab
industry settings.

2016
2016 The
TheAuthors.
Authors.Published
Publishedby
byElsevier
ElsevierB.V.
B.V.This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).
Peer-review under responsibility of Faculty of Business Management, Universiti Teknologi MARA.
Peer-review under responsibility of Faculty of Business Management, Universiti Teknologi MARA
Keywords: Customer satisfaction; customer loyalty; Hijab industry; marketing mix

* Corresponding author. Tel.: +6-035-544-4712; fax: +6-035-544-4693.

E-mail address: [email protected]

2212-5671 2016 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).
Peer-review under responsibility of Faculty of Business Management, Universiti Teknologi MARA
doi:10.1016/S2212-5671(16)30138-1

Norsyaheera Abd Wahab et al. / Procedia Economics and Finance 37 (2016) 366 371

1. Introduction
The business market is growing rapidly and becoming more competitive as there are many similar products and
services delivered in the same market (Aisha, 2013). With the rapid growth of the new entrants in the business
market, switching behaviour among customers was high and organisations have to increase efforts in order to retain
their customers (Alden, 2012). Demands on a scarf or hijab have been rapidly raised in the industry; Muslim females
have the inclination to buy several of the brands of hijab in the market to complement their attires (Ahmed, 2012).
Hijab providers would want to consider the designs, patterns, fabrics, colours, labels, and brands, whether in
physical shop or through online to attract its customers. Therefore, the businesses need to compete with one another
in order to stand out from other competitors and to survive in the industry (Aisha, 2013). Thus, knowledge on this
topic can help business providers in hijab and the fashion industry to maximise returns, prevent customers remorse
and diversify their products in order to develop customers satisfaction that influence the customers to continue
doing business and become loyal customers.
2. Literature Review

2.1. Customer Loyalty

Customer's re-purchase behaviour is estimated as a basic requisite for loyalty that is followed by satisfaction
(Punniyamoorthy & Raj, 2007; Chang, 2010). Pritchard, Havits, and Howard (1999) claimed that understanding
why customers become loyal is important in business as it will become a development of a strategy for business
providers to perform and deliver excellent services and products to the customers. By understanding the importance
of customer loyalty, an organization can build a commitment in terms of capturing its existing customers to
recognize and re-purchase the services or products provided by the organization (Oliver, 1999; McMullan &
Gilmore, 2008; Abu Hassan, Wan Jusoh & Hamid, 2013). Every organization needs to measure the degree of its
marketing mix strategy that will contribute to customer satisfaction as well as customer loyalty (Ibidunni, 2011).
2.2. Marketing Mix
Marketing is a set of steps that deliver value that could be remembered by customers and can create a relationship
with customers as well as providing benefits to the organization (Armstrong & Kotler, 2011). Bay, Petrizzi and Gill
(2008) confirmed that when an organization applied marketing mix in their business, it will help them to increase
the sales and profits of their organization, hence, achieving their marketing level. Elements in marketing mix,
namely product, price, place, and promotion (4P's) are the controllable tools that will reflect to customer's
satisfaction (Shankar & Chin, 2011). A clear understanding of elements in marketing mix will help business
providers to influence potential and current customers to continue doing business and become loyal customers. In
this context, hijab and fashion industry can use marketing mix elements in order to capture the factors that will lead
customers to buy the hijab or a scarf from that particular organizations instead of other competitors (Sable, 2013).
2.3. Customer Satisfaction
There is a relationship with nature between satisfaction and loyalty that have been studied by many researchers
and were confirmed that customer satisfaction is the mediating variable that might change the customers, whether
they will become loyal or not (Patterson, Johnson & Spreng, 1997; Bennett & Rundle-Thiele, 2004). Previous
studies have also found that one of the major determinants of customer loyalty is customer satisfaction which is in
every business and market, customers need to be satisfied before they can become loyal (Parasuraman, Zeithaml &
Berry, 1988; Lin & Wang, 2006). It is important for providers in hijab and the fashion industry to deliver excellent
services and products so that they will get a good reputation as well as to give satisfaction to the customers.
Therefore, customer satisfaction is clear to be used as the mediating variable that will influence hijab customers to
become loyal to an organization.

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2.4. Conceptual Framework

There are four elements that served as independent variables under the marketing mix which consist of product,
price, place, and promotion. Meanwhile, the dependent variable reflects the outcome of the research study, which is
customer loyalty and the mediating effect is customer satisfaction. Those elements are used as the study setting in
investigating the relationship among marketing mix, customer satisfaction, and customer loyalty as illustrated in
Fig. 1.
Marketing Mix
x Product
x Price
x Place
x Promotion

H1

H2
Customer Satisfaction

Customer Loyalty

H3
Fig. 1 Conceptual Framework

2.5 Hypotheses
Based on the review of the related literature, the following research hypotheses are developed:
H1 Marketing mix is positively associated with customer satisfaction.
H2 Customer satisfaction is positively associated with customer loyalty.

H3 Customer satisfaction mediates the relationship between marketing mix and customer loyalty.

3. Research Methodology
This is a correlational study, which answers questions about the relationship among variables (Salkind, 2012,
Sekaran & Bougie, 2013). For this study, convenience sampling technique was used in order to obtain data from the
respondents. The population at Shah Alam outlets is 600 customers. Thus, based on the Krejcie and Morgan table,
the sample size required for this study was 234 (Krejcie & Morgan, 1970). Therefore, questionnaires that were
adapted from prior studies were distributed to approximately 250 female customers. The study setting focused on
female customers who are wearing and buying any hijab products at Shah Alam outlets.

4. Results and Discussion

4.1. Demographic Profile of the Respondents
234 usable questionnaires were returned, yielding a response rate of 93.6%. Respondents of this study consisted
of female customers who are wearing and buying any hijab products at Shah Alam outlets. From the data collected,
the majority of the respondents were in the age group category of 20 to 29 years old (39.3%). Meanwhile, the least
age group category was 50 years old and above (8.1%). In addition, most of the respondents were single (51.3%),
the majority of them worked (58.5%) and 34.2% of the respondents bought hijab twice a month.
4.2. Correlation Analysis among Variables
This section discusses the findings on the correlation among independent variables and depending variable.
Table 1 represents the interpretation of the correlation coefficient based on Cohen (1988).

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Norsyaheera Abd Wahab et al. / Procedia Economics and Finance 37 (2016) 366 371
Table 1: Designation of strength of association based on the size of correlation correlation based on Cohen (1988)
Degree of Correlation
R Values
Small correlation
r = -0.10 to -0.29 and +0.10 to +0.29
Medium correlation
r = -0.30 to -0.49 and +0.30 to +0.49
Large correlation
r = -0.50 to -1.00 and +0.50 to +1.00

The interpretation of the correlation coefficient in Table 1 were used to understand the relationship between
marketing mix and customer satisfaction. It also were used to explain the relationship strength in terms of value of
the Pearson correlation (r) and the direction of the relationship of the variable that were used in this study. Based on
the results illustrated in Table 2 below, it can be seen that the correlation between marketing mix and customer
satisfaction is (r=0.367, n=234, p<0.05) which indicates that there is a positive, medium and significant relationship
between marketing mix and customer satisfaction. The first variable in marketing mix which is product has the
correlation of (r=0.170, n=234, p<0.05) which indicates that there is a positive, small significant relationship
between product and customer satisfaction. The second variable is price, with (r=0.177, n=234, p<0.05) also
indicates that there is positive small significant relationship between price and customer satisfaction. The third
variable of marketing mix that is place has (r=0.268, n=234, p<0.05) which explains that there is positive small
significant relationship between place and customer satisfaction. Lastly, the forth marketing mix which is
promotion has (r=0.288, n=2.34, p<0.05), shows that there is positive small significant relationship between
promotion and customer satisfaction. The last but not least, the results indicated that there is a positive, medium and
significant relationship between customer satisfaction and customer loyalty with (r=0.420, n=234, p<0.05). These
coefficients show that all variables are associated with one another.

Table 2: Correlational Analysis among Variables

Variables
Mean
SD
1
Product
3.9558
.58795
Price
3.8333
.65385 .349**
Place
3.9487
.57713 .089
Promotion
3.6453
.74856 .190**
Customer Satisfaction
4.1026
.65566 .170**
Customer Loyalty
4.0615
.62589 .295**
Notes: ** Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (1-tailed).
* Correlation is significant at the 0.05 level (1-tailed).

.172**
.127*
.177**
.340**

.145**
.268**
.178**

.288**
.168**

.420**

4.3. Hierarchical Regression Analysis with Mediator

A mediation analysis was conducted using Baron and Kenny (1986) approach. In the first step the effect of the
independent variables on the mediator variable was examined. The second step examined the influence of the
independent variable on the dependent variable, without the mediator. Finally, the last step was taken to investigate
the influence of the combination of the independent variable and the dependent variable, with a mediator.
The first step stipulated that place and promotion were the significant predictors of customer satisfaction with
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This finding was supported by Moraga, Parraga and Gonzales (2008) that satisfied customer mediates loyalty as they
must be satisfied with the business provided before they become loyal customers. Moreover, Bloemer and Ruyter
(1998) mentioned that customer satisfaction has often been studied that it is confirmed as an antecedent of customer
loyalty. Results of the Hierarchical Regression Analysis are demonstrated in Table 3 below.

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Norsyaheera Abd Wahab et al. / Procedia Economics and Finance 37 (2016) 366 371
Table 3: Hierarchical Regression Analysis on Mediating Variable
Variables
Customer
Satisfaction

Product
Price
Place
Promotion
Customer Satisfaction
R
R2
F
Sig F Value

Customer Loyalty

.078
.083
.213
.231

Without
Mediator
.183
.247
.107
.052

.390
.152
10.249
.000

.414
.172
11.866
.000

With
Mediator
.156
.219
.034
.007
.343
.521
.272
17.013
.000

5. Conclusion
The fact that customer satisfaction is really important in order to get loyal customers, it is indeed important that
marketing mix and its elements can help business providers to know the factors that their customers are looking for
when buying a hijab. The aim of this study was to investigate the relationship between marketing mix and customer
loyalty in hijab industry, as well as the mediating effect of customer satisfaction. Therefore, business providers in
hijab industry will know the marketing needs, they need to focus to attract the customers in hijab selling as well as
to keep them loyal. Meanwhile, this study endeavours to make both theoretical and practical contribution to the
literature, and also provides several implications for future research. Findings from this study will assist
policymakers, marketing practitioners, planners and government change, as needed, in strategies, rules and
procedures, and to improve the provision of customer satisfaction and customer loyalty in service industries.

6. Future Research
This research was conducted at hijab outlets in Shah Alam, and may not be generalizable to other outlets.
Therefore, more hijab outlets need to be investigated. It is also suggested that other related factors of the marketing
mix to be included in the future researches to produce more constructive findings to nourish the measured
relationship. In addition, it is suggested to use the interview to get in-depth information on the study. It is expected
that respondents can easily express their views and experiences verbally using their own words and impressions to
answer questions. Through facial expressions and gestures, it is believed to provide deeper understanding and better
outcomes of the phenomena studied.

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