Term Paper on "Relationship Between Customer Satisfaction and Loyalty in 4 Star Hotels in Geneva"

Term Paper 20 pages (5232 words) Sources: 20 Style: APA

[EXCERPT] . . . .

Customer Satisfaction and Loyalty in 4-Star Hotels in Geneva

recognized problem for the hospitality industry is to find a way to keep their loyal customers and earn new once. A lot of hotels create questionnaires to find out if their customers are satisfied during their stay. If the questionnaire score shows a result which is better than good, they will think that the customers are loyal to them and will always return back. Since all hotels are competing for customers, the industry needs to be aware of the competitors, since customers will shop around and stay at the hotel that gives them the best value. It is important to remember that service is something we cannot touch which means intangible. When giving service to a guest there are many ways and every individual does it differently. So service cannot be completely standardized in the same way as manufactured goods. The service delivered will vary on the service provider and the consumer of the service depending on their mood and the situation. Having loyal customers will give profitability in the long run. To always search for new clients is expensive, time consuming and takes a lot of effort (Mittal and Lasser, 1998). According to Mittal and Lasser (1998) "the longer a business firm can keep a customer, the greater the life-time revenue from that customer. Furthermore, while revenues increase from the same customer, the costs of serving him/her decline. Thus, customer retention becomes an important source of long-term business success" (p. 177-178).

2.2 Customers satisfaction:

2.2.1 Definition of customer satisfaction:

Yuksel and Rimmington (1998) "defines customer satisfaction as a post-consumption evaluative judgment concerning a product or service" (p.61). Satisfaction is a need, want and expectation formed by the customer that will be meet when product and service excided their expectations (Choi and Chu, 2000). During a hotel stay the guest has usually already formed an expectation and would match it with what they actually receive from the actual product and service performance. When a customer forms an expectation it is usually based on an earlier incident which will be compared to the existing experience in the service industry (Yuksel and Rimmington, 1998). When measuring customer's satisfaction it is the effort accomplished by the hotel to improve the service quality which will give the property a competitive advantage. Furthermore the customer will give a positive word of mouth and the hotel will gain loyal customers. What may influence the customer's satisfaction could be the availability of the diverse services, this means that the service industries need to stay ahead and not fall behind their competitors (Choi and Chu, 2000). "Failure to pay attention to influential attributes in choice intention may result in a customer's negative evaluation, and may lead unfavourable word-of-mouth" (Choi and Chu, 2000, p. 118).

2.2.2 History of customer satisfaction:

The work of Yuksel and Rimmington (1998) entitled: "Customer-Satisfaction Measurement: Performance Goals" published in the Cornell Hotel and Restaurant Administration Quarterly relates that making a determination of customer satisfaction is fundamental to effective delivery of services." The ability to judge the satisfaction levels of customer and to use that knowledge in an applicable manner provides the hospitality manager with an advantage "...over competitors via such benefits as product differentiation, increased customer retention, and positive word-of-mouth communication." (Yuksel and Rimmington, 1998) Because of the importance of customer satisfaction a great dearth of research has been devoted to the investigation of the process by which "customers form judgments about a service experience." (Yuksel and Rimmington, 1998) Because of this great volume of research much has been learned in relation to customer satisfaction within the services industries. Yuksel and Rimmington hold that in the attempt "to provide a theoretical explanation of the concept, academics have largely focused on conceptual issues and underlying processes, giving less attention to the more pragmatic tasks of measurement." (1998) These authors report a study that examines "the relative validity of six alternative ways of assessing customer satisfaction." (1998) Yuksel and Rimmington state that customer satisfaction "can be defined as a post-consumption evaluative judgment concerning a product or a service." (1998) Yuksel and Rimmington relate that researchers have posited two methods considered basic in the investigation of "confirmation and disconfirmation paradigm and its variants. Expectancy disconfirmation, which is a derivative of adaptation-level theory, states that customers compare actual product and service performance with their prior expectations. If expectations are met or exceeded, the consumer is satisfied. If perceived performance falls short of expectations, on the other hand, dissatisfaction results." (1998) Researchers have further proposed two methods for studying these which are the inferred approach and the direct method. Computation of the discrepancy between expectations of performance and evaluation of outcomes is the inferred approach which makes it a requirement of researchers to "deduce separate data sets relating to customer-service expectations and perceived performance. The scores for performance are then subtracted from those of expectations to form the third variable, the confirmation- disconfirmation score, which is used in subsequent analysis." (1998)

2.2.3 Principles of customer satisfaction

Cultural difference

The work of Choi and Chu entitled: "Levels of Satisfaction Among Asian and Western Travelers" relate a study for the purpose of making an examination of "the genuine needs of Asian and Western travelers by identifying their perceptions and levels of satisfaction with the services and facilities (attributes) provided by domestic hotels in Hong Kong." (2000) Due to the differences in culture between Asian and Western travelers "an understanding of exactly what differences exist between Asian and Western travelers, in terms of their perceptions of Hong Kong's hotels services and facilities is tactically important for hotel operators. Specifically the study aimed to address the objectives of: (1) the development of the underlying dimensions of hotel attributes and; (2) the examination of the relative impact of the derived hotel factors in influencing the satisfaction levels of both Asian and Western travelers." (2000) Studies of consumer behavior have emphasized that "...customer satisfaction is a major issue in the post-purchase period." (2000) Choi and Chu relate that while customer satisfaction was defined by Oliver (1981) as "a customer's emotional response to the use of a product or service....However, it is more likely that customer satisfaction is a complex human process that involves cognitive and affective processes, as well as other psychological and physiological influences." (2000) Choi and Chu relate the work of Wuest et al. (1996) who are stated to have "defined perceptions of hotel attributes as the degree to which travelers find various services and faculties important in promoting their satisfaction with hotel stays. Review of the literature suggests that most travelers would consider the following hotel attributes when making a hotel choice decision: (1) cleanliness; (2) location; (3) room rate; (4) security; (5) service quality; and (6) the reputation of the hotel or chain." (Choi and Chu, 2000) Choi and Chu relate that very little research initiatives "have taken a cultural perspective in relation to traveler's perceptions about hotel attributes." (2000) However, the work of Hoon (1992) noted the existence of a cross-cultural "difference in terms of expectations of hotel facilities and services." (Choi and Chu, 2000) Hoon (2002) relate that approximately 70% of those who travel to Asia were from the Asian region itself. Travelers in the Asia Pacific region "are now more content with mid-range, moderately priced hotels rather than the exclusivity of five-star hotel accommodation." (Choi and Chu, 2000) the work of Bauer et al. (1993) made an examination of the "differences between Asian and non-Asian travelers in relation to their demand for a wide range of hotel facilities. They found that major differences between Asian and non-Asian travelers were that Asian travelers appeared to want more entertainment facilities, for example karaoke, while their non-Asian counterparts appeared to be more concerned with the hotel's health facilities." (Choi and Chu, 2000) Choi and Chu (2000) report a self-administered questionnaire in Chinese, English and Japanese which had been developed on studies that were relevant. In this study the respondents rated the hotels where they had stayed on 33 hotel attributes and on a seven-point Likert Scale ranging from 1 (strongly disagree) to 7 (strongly agree). They respondents could also answer "do not know" if they had no familiarity with the services or facilities of the hotel in which they had stayed. The sample in this study included international travelers who had departed from the Hong Kong International Airport between August 13 and August 23. For the purpose of this study the Asian travelers were travelers that had come from China, Taiwan, Japan, South Korea, or South-East Asia and Western travelers were those that had come from North America, Europe, Australia and New Zealand. Of the 540 travelers invited to participate in this study 402 of the questionnaire were complete and thus able to be used in this study. Of the 402 respondents 222 or 55.2% were Asia and 180 or 45.8% were Western. Most of the respondents had stayed at medium-tariff or high-tariff hotels. 21.6% of respondents were professionals, 21.4%… READ MORE

How to Reference "Relationship Between Customer Satisfaction and Loyalty in 4 Star Hotels in Geneva" Term Paper in a Bibliography

Related Term Papers:

Customer Satisfaction and Loyalty of the High Term Paper

Customer Satisfaction and Loyalty of the High Street Travel Agencies and Online Travel Agencies in China Today

Customer satisfaction and loyalty have become the focus of an increasing amount of… read more

Term Paper 27 pages (7443 words) Sources: 25 Style: Harvard Topic: Business / Corporations / E-commerce

---

Customer Centric Business Design Term Paper

Customer Centric Business Design

The Coca Cola Company

The purpose of this work is to describe how an organization can attempt to provide and control customer value through its value… read more

Term Paper 4 pages (1244 words) Sources: 1+ Topic: Business / Corporations / E-commerce

---

Expanding Hotel Business Term Paper

Expanding Hotel Business

Market plan

Marketing refers to developing and implementation of a plan to identify customers' demands and satisfy them. The major contents and focus of the plan is… read more

Term Paper 8 pages (2344 words) Sources: 7 Topic: Advertising / Marketing / Sales

---

Hotel Brand Satisfaction Dissertation

improving brand awareness and customer satisfaction in the hotel industry. In support of this aim, the study was guided by several research questions: (a) what current branding strategies are being… read more

Dissertation 16 pages (4640 words) Sources: 16 Topic: Advertising / Marketing / Sales

---

Customer Satisfaction and Chili's Restaurant Term Paper

Customer Satisfaction and Chili's Restaurant

How a study is conducted can greatly influence the results that are received from that study (Zikmund, 2003). Because of this, care was taken with… read more

Term Paper 4 pages (1118 words) Sources: 1 Style: APA Topic: Business / Corporations / E-commerce

---

View 100+ more related papers  >>