CUSTOMER CHOICE

The South African banking landscape has been characterized by changes sincethe late 1990’s. Within this environment this priority banking arena has alsobecome highly competitive and this is driven by a limited n umber of availablepriority banking clients. The ability to innovate is seen as a highly competitiveadvantage by all the role-players within this sector.The purpose of this study was to investigate factors that customers felt wereimportant in determining their choice of priority bank. The study focused on theexisting clients of priority banks and investigated the factors that would have aneffect on retaining them as clients of their current priority bank.A qualitative research methodology was empl oyed and made use of in-depthinterviews as this allowed a more flexible approach to interviewing and alsoenabled the ability to probe a greater range of information in the interview process.The general consensus amongst those interviewed felt that cust omer service,characterized by personal interaction was deemed to be important as a means toretain priority banking clients by their institutions. In order to ensure that theseinstitutions also provided flexibility to their clients, increased usability of their selfservicechannels was deemed to be important. Advertising and sponsorship wereacknowledged as harnessing the image of the brand and ensuring it remainsdominant within clients’ mind space but it was evident that they had minimalinfluence to leveraging off as a source of competitive advantage