Evaluating the success of a mobile self-service application using the DeLone and McLean model

Abstract

Background: This study was initiated by the fact that numerous mobile(m)-commerce applications for streamlining customer self-services remain unused on Application (App) stores or that they are briefly used and abandoned by the users. Unused applications can be considered as failed by customers; therefore, there is a need to understand how customers perceive m-commerce applications as successful.

Objectives: To investigate the factors that inform how customers perceive m-commerce applications for streamlining self-services as successful.

Method: Data were collected from customers of an m-commerce application for a telecommunication company in South Africa. An online survey constructed from the DeLone and McLean Information Systems Success model was used to collect data from a randomly selected sample of customers extracted from the telecommunication database. A total of 161 usable responses were received and quantitatively analysed. In total, nine hypotheses were tested to evaluate the success of the m-commerce application using the partial least-squares structural equation modelling (PLS-SEM) analysis.

Results: The nine hypotheses were significant, indicating that the telecommunication m-commerce application can be viewed as successful. The results confirmed that system quality (SQ), information quality (IQ), service quality (SVQ), system use (SU), and user satisfaction (US) were factors that inform the successful deployment of an m-commerce application in this study.

Conclusion: Successful m-commerce applications are essential to improve customer acceptance and use of m-commerce applications.

Contribution: The study identified factors that are perceived as valuable by the customer, which service providers should implement to provide successful m-commerce applications.