Effective Factors of Social Customer Knowledge Management (SCKM) in Organisations: Study of Electronic Service Providers in Iran

Abstract

Nowadays, appropriate management strategies and competitive advantage for most organisations need developing an integrative architecture based on customers’ knowledge. One of the most important parts of this architecture is the process of Electronic Customer Relationship Management (ECRM) through social media. This study, shows these four interactions, including ECRM systems, types of customer knowledge, Knowledge Creation Processes and Social Media. In other words, this research examines the effective factors on SCKM framework due to concepts of KM, Knowledge (for/from/about) customer, Customer Knowledge Management (CKM), ECRM and Social Media. This research uses a combination of qualitative and quantitative approaches. First, the conceptual framework has been developed based on the grounded theory method. Then, the extracted model has been examined and confirmed by Structural Equation Modelling (SEM) and Confirmatory Factor Analysis. So, effective factors of Social Customer Knowledge Management (SCKM) among Iranian electronic service providers have been presented. They include effective parameters for determining the level of SCKM acceptance in six main dimensions: Causal Conditions (five effective factors), Phenomenon (one effective factor), Strategies (seven effective factors), Context (three effective factors), Concequences (two effective factors) and Intervening Conditions (four effective factors). The developed model can be used as a scientific, theoretical and fundamental framework for maturity assessment of organisations with the aim of establishing SCKM systems.