The impact of internal marketing on employee satisfaction in the Vietnamese telecommunication industry

Internal marketing (IM) has become essential in service industries since employees are considered critical to excel in customer service due to fierce competition. Previous studies have examined and proved the role of IM in retaining happy and loyal customers in a variety of industries. However, little research on IM was conducted in the telecommunication industry in both developed and developing countries. Thus, this paper aims to test the impact of IM elements on employee satisfaction in the Vietnamese telecommunication industry, one of the fastest-growing industries in recent years. We developed a research model based on the social exchange theory and adopted seven IM elements from previous studies. Data was collected from a sample of 362 employees working in the Vietnamese telecommunication industry through an online questionnaire survey and analyzed in SmartPLS 3.0 using the PLS-SEM technique to test the hypotheses. Our analysis results showed that reward had the strongest impact on employee satisfaction, followed by internal communication and vision. The least influential factor on employee satisfaction was training and development. On the contrary, fairness was identified not to have statistical significance on employee satisfaction. Thus, practical implications for managers in the telecommunication industry were proposed to promote employee satisfaction and engagement with the company by using IM practices.