| Summary: | The purpose of this study is to address the low adoption rate of customer relationship management (CRM) technology among small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in Singapore. Such an understanding will be useful for SMEs' managers, IT consultants, vendors and government agencies in drawing guidelines on how to encourage and
motivate widespread adoption of CRM technology to empower Singapore's SMEs to compete in the global business environment. The study examines the effect of eight independent variables on the intention to adopt CRM. A review of the literature shows that innovation characteristics: relative advantage, compatibility, complexity and cost effectiveness; organisational characteristics: top management support and information
technology (IT) knowledge; and environmental characteristics: government support and competitive pressure are significant factors in influencing SMEs'intention to adopt CRM technology.
Utilising a portion of Rogers' model of innovation diffusion together with organisational and environmental variables, a theoretical model was established to test the factors that influence SMEs' intention to adopt CRM technology. An online questionnaire survey was conducted among 251 SMEs and a total of 60 valid responses were obtained. Data
analysis using linear multiple regression showed that significant relationship exists between 2 factors, namely, relative advantage / compatibility as a single construct and top management support, and the intention to adopt CRM. Top management support emerged as the most important factor in terms of relative importance, and this was followed closely by relative advantage / compatibility. Competitive pressure, government support, complexity / cost effectiveness and IT knowledge appeared insignificant, with the overall regression explaining 44.6 percent of SMEs' intention to adopt CRM technology.
The finding from this study shows that besides innovation characteristic: relative advantage / compatibility, other factors such as organisational characteristic: top management support, and individual characteristics: CEOs' innovativeness and CEOs' attitude towards adoption of IT are also important to help understand SMEs' intention to adopt CRM technology in Singapore. Researchers need to keep these factors in mind when considering any study on factors influencing the adoption of an innovation.
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