About the Author s. The Author s. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. Orientation: Addressing employee needs in a competitive market for independent financial advisor IFA skills is becoming increasingly important in the South African long-term insurance industry to strengthen IFA commitment and reduce their turnover intention.
In addition, the study also explores the moderating role of brand commitment on the employee satisfaction and turnover intention relationship in the South African long-term insurance industry. Motivation for the study: Numerous scholars have investigated internal marketing in multiple contexts in a business-to-consumer setting B2C. However, no previous study on internal marketing explored its linkage to outcomes such as perceived value, employee satisfaction and turnover intention among IFAs in the South African long-term insurance industry.
The measurement and structural models were measured through structural equation modelling. Main findings: Perceived value positively influences employee satisfaction, while the latter has a positive relationship with turnover intention. Furthermore, brand commitment moderates the employee satisfaction-turnover intention relationship. Keywords: internal marketing; perceived value; employee satisfaction; brand commitment; turnover intention; independent financial advisors; long-term insurance industry; South Africa.
Operating within a highly competitive, turbulent market, the South African long-term insurance industry relies heavily on experienced, skilled client-facing employees to provide high-quality customer service and build trust with clients Kruger The long-term insurance industry ensures the continued financial freedom of South African policyholders, while employing over 11 citizens as sales representatives or independent financial advisors IFAs who work for financial services providers in the South African long-term insurance industry South African Government ; Van Tonder This study specifically examines IFAs who are employed by a single financial services provider, rather than brokers who distribute products from multiple providers.
This focus is crucial as scholars such as Hung, Lee and Lee argue that a committed and effective sales force, like IFAs, represents a competitive advantage, especially in environments where customer demands are growing and sales pressures are increasing. Ullah and Ahmad introduced the concept of internal marketing programmes to deliver additional benefits to employees by engaging with them and increasing the connection with their employers. The effective use of internal marketing may assist in retaining IFAs by presenting a combination of internal marketing elements designed to increase the value IFAs perceive the financial services providers as offering.
