Customer Satisfaction Survey for LadyLine: case Kajaani and Iisalmi

Abstract

The commissioning party of the thesis was LadyLine fitness centers in Kajaani and Iisalmi. They offer services exclusively for women of different ages. The purpose of the thesis was to create and conduct a customer satisfaction survey for the members of LadyLine in order to investigate whether the customers are satisfied with the quality of the provided services and to identify the aspects of the services that require improvement. In order to better understand the topic, the theory of customer satisfaction, its importance and measurement were studied. In addition, such matters as service quality in fitness centers and motivation to exercise were discussed. The chosen data collection method was a questionnaire which included quantitative and qualitative questions. The questionnaire was sent to the active members of LadyLine gyms in Kajaani and Iisalmi via email. The collected data was used to answer the research questions: “To what extent the customers of the LadyLine fitness centers are satisfied with the provided services? What aspects of the services need to be improved? What affects customer satisfaction? What does customer satisfaction affect?” as well as to test the hypotheses: the perceived quality of services affects customer satisfaction; the perception of goal achievement affects customer satisfaction; customer satisfaction affects the customer’s intention to continue being a member of LadyLine; customer satisfaction affects the custom-er’s willingness to recommend LadyLine to others. The collected data was analyzed with the Microsoft Excel program and the hypotheses were tested using Pearson correlation co-efficient. The number of responses was 117 from Kajaani and 33 from Iisalmi (39% and 16% response rates, respectively). According to the results, the customer satisfaction level in both gyms is relatively high: 92% of the respondents in Kajaani and 88% in Iisalmi were satisfied with the service quality. However, several aspects can be improved, such as cleanliness, air-conditioning, adding certain equipment and group exercise classes to the schedule, improving communication between personnel and customers, and if possible, offering some benefits to long-term customers. Moreover, three hypotheses set for the research have been proved to be true, thus, the perceived quality of services affects customer satisfaction, and customer satisfaction affects the client’s intention to continue being a member of LadyLine and recommend it to others.