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Sustainability of (small and medium-sized enterprises) SMEs in a globalized economy depends on several factors. According to available studies, effective Customer Relationship Management (CRM) is one of the factors affecting the competitiveness of SMEs in a positive way. This paper is focused on creating customer databases and on using the CRM strategy in SMEs in Slovakia. The aim of the paper is to cluster SMEs in Slovakia based on using customer databases and CRM and to identify differences in clusters according to the selected attributes. The outputs of the research focused on marketing communication and on creating the CRM strategy in Slovak enterprises are presented in the paper. Quantitative nonexperimental research using the questionnaires was conducted at the end of 2017 and throughout the year 2018. The research results are based on the responses of 1009 Slovak SMEs. Basic descriptive statistics, K-means cluster analysis, Analysis of variance (ANOVA), and Tukey HSD test were used to process the data. The resulting clusters show three typical attitudes of Slovak SMEs to creating the database, using the CRM and its effectiveness. Moreover, attitude to the application of ethical principles and holistic, integrated, and socially responsible marketing are presented in the clusters. Following the results, the fact that SMEs can be divided into the three following clusters with equal size can be stated: 1st cluster (in 92.2% and consisting of micro- and small-sized enterprises), customer databases are created for the purpose of marketing communication; 2nd cluster, consisting of the highest percentage of medium-sized enterprises and enterprises with foreign equity participation using the customer databases and CRM; and 3rd cluster characterized with smaller-sized enterprises with domestic property not focused on marketing communication and using the customer databases. The research results provide the basis for further research and support for small and medium-sized enterprises. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Employee performance and their new ideas, as well as their efforts to promote the company in positive ways help build the values of an enterprise. Properly motivated managers, white-collar, and blue-collar workers use their performance to affect the business efficiency, and therefore the success and sustainability of the enterprise. Selecting the right structure of motivation factors, especially those aimed at job category and gender, is the main role of enterprise management. The aim of this study is to analyze and define differences in the perception of the preferred level of motivation in terms of gender and job category. The questionnaires were given to randomly selected employees working in Slovak enterprises in order to ensure variability and randomness of respondent selection which is necessary for relevant data acquisition. Following the average, the order of the importance of motivation factors of 3720 respondents was defined. The Student's t-test and Tukey's HSD test were used. We confirmed that there are statistically significant differences in the perception of the motivation in terms of job category. Moreover, we proved the significant differences between genders in the job category of blue-collar workers. We did not observe differences between genders in the other job categories studied. The results reported should be accepted and implemented in motivational programs by the employees of human resource departments as a way to keep up with strategic human resource management. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Creating an effective marketing strategy according to current trends is a key process needed to achieve sustainable growth that can result in attracting a great number of existing as well as potential customers. Moreover, an enterprise's success is affected by the aforementioned process. The aim of the paper is to determine the clusters of small and medium-sized enterprises operating in the Slovak Republic and the use of marketing communication tools in the future. The research into marketing communications and customer relationship management (CRM) building in companies was carried out in Slovakia in the years 2017 and 2018. In total, 1,009 small and medium-sized enterprises from Slovakia participated in the research. Following a K-means clustering algorithm, three clusters were determined. Descriptive statistics, cluster analysis using K-means clustering, and an analysis of variance (ANOVA) were used to identify no statistically significant difference in terms of the size of enterprises. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]