Customer Relationship Management Plan for Hotel

Customer Relationship Management Plan for Hotel The Sao Paulo Case ABSTRACT The paper sets out to produce an outline customer relationship plan for a Brazilian hotel which has recently been taken over by a globally branded hotel chain. It begins with a review of selected literature which contains knowledge, techniques and ideas relevant to a customer relationship plan. Terms are defined within this section. The final section contains the action plan, which derives from ideas in the literature review section. 1. Introduction This report will consist of a concise, integrated customer relationship plan for Sao Paulo senior management with the specific aims of: reducing customer switching maintaining stakeholder relations in the service quality value chain Within this plan there will be: an identification of the gaps in Sao Paulo’s current approach to relationship marketing planning a description of internal and external relationships which impact the hotel proposed marketing objectives to help relaunch and reposition the hotel brand suggested developments of the brand an outline service quality management programme an outline CRM system an outline integrated marketing communications programme an outline internal marketing communications programme Input for the plan will be taken from the case material and the literature review which follows in section 2. 2. Literature Review This section will review the literature in a structured way. The first part will draw on lecture notes, text books and journal articles to clarify and explain aspects of: strategic marketing and branding relationship marketing and customer relationship management service quality management The second part will draw on three cases: The Ritz Carlton case Bergstrom Hotels Sao Paulo Hotel 2.1 Strategic Marketing and Branding Piercy defines strategy as simply being about: Being best at doing those things which matter most to customers Building shareholder value by achieving superior customer value Finding new and better ways of doing things to achieve the first two[1] If one accepts this no-nonsense definition it underscores the need for all companies to: Understand who your customers are and what matters to them Know how they perceive your service levels and what you must do to improve your performance Design and implement communication and management processes which make your strategy work In other words you need a plan. The planning process is described in the lecture notes as beginning with a Mission Statement and ending with implementation and measurement control. Before customer relationship objectives (the focus of the action plan below) can be identified and agreed the mission statement needs to be clearly understood as do the dynamics of the current market place. A SWOT analysis and Marketing Audit are effective tools for clarifying the company’s current position in the market, its performance so far and for suggesting possible changes in strategic and tactical moves. In a services business this will lead to the development of a customer relationship plan, which will be underpinned by a detailed understanding of the various internal and external stakeholders with whom one needs to develop and build relationships.[2] 2.2 Relationship Marketing and Customer Relationship Management â€Å"Relationship marketing concerns the shifting from activities of attracting customers to activities concerned with current customers and how to retain them. †¦At its core is the maintenance of relations between a company and its suppliers, channel intermediaries, public and customers.†[3] Focusing on retention is considered to be significantly more profitable than conversion of non-customers. CRM is a system to make relationship marketing work. The US writer, George Day sees CRM as a customer-responsive strategy, which seeks to give companies competitive advantage by: Delivering superior customer value by personalising the interaction between company and customer, Demonstrating trustworthiness Tightening connections with customers Achieving co-ordination of complex capabilities (functions, resources) within the company[4] Park Plaza International uses its new CRM system and global database to: â€Å"promote the hotels as a group, rather than an individually networked system, with targeted promotions and one-to-one marketing†¦.Through company profiling we will be able to identify who the biggest backers of the group are and who should be given special treatment, so that we can target our promotions accordingly†[5] Hwang and Chi[6] ,in their recent empirical study, highlight the fact that service personnel are the most important resource in the service sector and also the primary marketers. By helping to achieve customer satisfaction service personnel upgrade the entire performance of the organisation. The message to management is that they should engage in aggressive internal marketing to achieve and maintain a synergy of staff satisfaction and improved organisational performance. 2.3 Service Quality Management Customers will be loyal to a hotel, or a branded hotel chain, if they are satisfied with the quality and value offered. It is therefore important for service providers to know what influences these customer perceptions. Johnston suggests two approaches to understanding customers’ perceptions and judgements of service quality: The rational approach The incident-based approach[7] The rational approach suggests that customers consciously or unconsciously use a weighted average, so that a high score on one attribute or factor may offset a low score on another, to arrive at an overall evaluation of personal satisfaction. The SERVQUAL approach is based on the work of Parasuraman, Zeithamel and Berry[8] and sets out to measure customers’ perceptions of quality across 5 dimensions: Tangibles: physical facilities, equipment, appearance of personnel Reliability: abilities to perform the promised service dependably and accurately Responsiveness: willingness to help customers and provide prompt service Assurance: knowledge and courtesy of employees and ability to inspire trust and confidence Empathy: caring, individualistic attention provided by firm to customers A third approach suggests that any single incident, delighting or satisfying, could, whatever the weightings given to the other transactions, result in an overall feeling of dissatisfaction or delight. Another writer argues that â€Å"investment of time and money in quality improvement should concentrate on those areas of your business where the effort will have the greatest benefit†[9] Effort should not necessarily be directed to areas where you are worse than the competition if those factors are not so important to customers. 2.4 The Ritz-Carlton Case R-C has a total quality approach to the business. They fix causes not problems, i.e. they think about processes and systems to prevent problems and to ensure continuous quality. They set up a system to understand the real needs of their customers, to ensure delivery of these needs, to make it work continuously and to communicate all this to the market – not just an image-driven approach, but one which was conscious of the â€Å"experience† which customers were seeking. 2.4 Bergstrom Hotels[10] Bergstrom set up a total quality approach and system which was driven by senior management but acted on and supported by teams across the organisation. Vital components of the system are: training of all staff in internal customer relations, culture, process improvement and problem-solving, setting up and development of a data-base based on customer and employee surveys to drive improvement, open lines of communication and regular performance evaluation. Recognising staff contributions to quality of service was a key final element. The case demonstrates that significant quality improvements can be achieved without significant investment and ongoing cost. 2.5 Sao Paulo Case Sao Paulo is a recently refurbished hotel which is operating in a highly competitive market (with much price cutting) and unstable economy. It has recently been taken over by a hotel chain with a global brand name and a reputation for high service quality and the ability to build long-term relationships with stakeholders. It needs now to reposition itself in the Brazilian market such that it is clearly differentiated in stakeholders minds from the competition. Service must be the main differentiator, so an integrated customer relationship plan needs to be developed. 3. Action Plan for Improving Customer Relationships 3.1 Gaps in current approach Sao Paulo needs both to retain the loyalty of its current customer base and to grow via new customer and intermediary relationships. Growth will probably come via extended use of new services (e.g. restaurants and bars) by current customers and attracting new, more focused customer segments. This needs to be spelt out in its overall mission and made explicit with regard to individual stakeholders. 3.2 External and Internal Stakeholders Apart from the different customer segments important external stakeholders are: tour operators, airlines, travel agents and the many web-based hotel discounters. Local SP-based organisations such as the city hall and tourist office may also be influential in the communication of the hotel brand to intermediaries and potential customers. The current relationship-building approach appears to be re-active and now needs to become focused and pro-active. Important internal stakeholders are hotel employees – front-office staff and sales staff – and franchisees in the restaurants and bars. All need to be aligned with the culture of the refurbished and repositioned hotel. 3.3 Relaunching and Repositioning of the Brand The SP hotel is now part of a global chain. Its service level will need to be aligned with the core brand values of GHG and these values will need to be communicated to all stakeholders and acted upon by internal stakeholders if the communicated brand image is to be consistent with delivery on the ground. Proposed marketing objectives are to: grow the current customer base by 20% by increasing spend per customer and by improving retention by 10%; focus on excellent, caring service at a fair price. 3.4 Service-Quality Programme A customer survey should be carried out to establish which service attributes are important to customers. This should be linked to an assessment of the cost of correcting what goes wrong. The survey should be ongoing and reinforced by regular staff interaction with customers so as to identify any areas of dissatisfaction. Overall customer relationship objective will be to: create in the minds of all customers an experience of being cared for by warm, friendly staff who have your best interests at heart and will do all that they can to offer you speedy and professional assistance. This will be translated into specific CR objectives for the different stakeholders, all of whom will need to participate in service quality training programmes: Franchisees: communicate always in your words, dress and body language that you are a member of the SP team. Front-office staff: make the customer feel welcome, respected, valued and at home. Sales staff: communicate, warm, professional, helpful manner at all times, backed up by prompt follow-up. Service standards: FRONT DESK: Always smile at customers Address by name wherever possible Apologise for even slightest delay Never keep customer waiting without apologising Always do what you promise to do Be sensitive to cultural differences Keep desk and hall area clean at all times Always ask if you can be of further assistance – sincerely Never argue with a customer Try always to exceed expectations Service blueprint: Sales staff to CORPORATES (process service mix): Tangibles Dress smartly, speak warmly and professionally, ensure  that all promotional materials are packaged and presented professionally Reliability Be punctual, deliver what you promise Responsiveness Exceed customer expectations with your response times  and look always for creative solutions to difficult problems Assurance Be confident about the hotel and its qualities but radiate  courtesy at all times. Avoid over-familiarity and use of christian names, unless requested to do so Empathy Avoid any remarks/comments about religion, race,  culture. Be particularly sensitive to cultural differences and help people with language difficulties. Never make fun of anyone. Apologise for even the most minor errors Service guarantee for empowering FRONT-LINE STAFF: If a customer arrives after 19.00 and requests a rate  reduction you may offer him/her a room at a rate 20% below normal rate This service quality approach is in line with the realignment of the brand as a warm and caring hotel which offers fair prices. 3.5 CRM System A CRM system needs to be developed for the global chain. It would aim to profile customers both in order to communicate with them more effectively and to ensure that service features are adapted to meet individual requirements where possible. It should be seen as a support for the warm and caring approach, not a replacement. The communications programme would need to be consistent with, and integrated into, the CRM system. 3.6 Internal Marketing Programme Staff are at the heart of hotel service and underpin customer perception of quality. Training programmes must be run to ensure that all staff are aligned with the culture and attitudes of the hotel, are aware of service guidelines and have the requisite skills and knowledge. An appraisal and suggestions system will be introduced to help staff maintain requisite standards. Incentives will be introduced to encourage maintenance of these standards. BIBLIOGRAPHY Books Barwise P. and Meehan S. (2004), Simply Better, Harvard Business School Press Cerasale M. and Stone M.(2004), Business Solutions on Demand, Kogan Page Johnston R. and Clark C. (2001), Service Operations Management, Prentice Hall Piercy N. (2002), Market-led Strategic Change, Butterworth Heinemann Journal Articles Breiter D., Tyink S. and Corey-Tuckwell S. (1995), Bergstrom Hotels; a case study  in quality†, Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management, Vol.7 No. 6 Brown T. (1997), â€Å"Using norms to improve the interpretation of service quality  measures†, Journal of Services Marketing, Vol.11, No.1, p.80 Day G. (2000), â€Å"Tying in an Asset†, in Understanding CRM, Financial Times  Editorial article, „CRM in Hotelsâ€Å", in Leisure Hospitality Business, September,  2001 Hwang I. and Chi D. (2005), â€Å"Relationships among Internal Marketing, Employee Job  Satisfaction and International Hotel Performance†, International Journal of  Management, Vol.22 No.2 Parasuraman A., Zeithamel V. and Berry L. (1988), â€Å"SERVQUAL: a Multiple Item  Scale for Measuring Consumer Perceptions of Quality†, Journal of Retailing,  Vol.64, No.1 Spring Footnotes [1] Piercy N. (2002), Market-led Strategic Change, p. 273 [2] Lecture Notes – Key Issues from the Marketing Audit to Prioritise Actions in a Relationship Services  Marketing Plan [3] Jobber D. (2004), Principles and Practice of Marketing, McGraw-Hill, p. 117 [4] Day G. (2000), â€Å"Tying in an Asset†, in Understanding CRM, Financial Times [5] Editorial article, „CRM in Hotelsâ€Å", in Leisure Hospitality Business, September, 2001 [6] Hwang I. and Chi D. (2005), â€Å"Relationships among Internal Marketing, Employee Job Satisfaction  and International Hotel Performance†, International Journal of Management, Vol.22 No.2, p.291 [7] Johnston R. And Clark G. (2001), Service Operations Management, Prentice Hall, p. 102 [8] Parasuraman A., Zeithamel V. and Berry L. (1988), â€Å"SERVQUAL: a Multiple Item scale for  Measuring Consumer Perceptions of Quality†, Journal of Retailing, Vol.64, No.1 Spring [9] Brown T. (1997), â€Å"Using norms to improve the interpretation of service quality measures†, Journal of  Services Marketing, Vol.11, No.1, p.80 [10] Breiter D., Tyink S. and Corey-Tuckwell S. (1995), Bergstrom Hotels; a case study in quality†,  Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management, Vol.7 No. 6

True Happiness in The Sirens of Titan by Kurt Vonnegut and Hans Weingar

True Happiness in The Sirens of Titan by Kurt Vonnegut and Hans Weingartner's The Eduakators A large parcel of the population has as their ultimate goal in life achieving well-being. Unfortunately many try to achieve it through the wrong means. For instance, in The Sirens of Titan, by Kurt Vonnegut, Malachi Constant thinks he is truly happy, but what he really does is fulfill his hedonism, satisfy his shallow needs, without truly searching for a higher form of well-being. Not only does a life focused on hedonic satisfaction not achieve true happiness, it also leads, along with the urge to accumulate, egocentrism, and greed, to an unethical life. The Sirens of Titans depicts this kind of life, which is also represented throughout The Edukators, directed by Hans Weingartner. Both Malachi Constant and Hardenberg believe that money is the solution to all of their problems while ignoring the problems their own lifestyle is causing to other people and society as a whole. Happiness, our own and other people’s, is achieved by focusing our lives in the right things. Even though hedonic satisfaction is necessary for living a happy life, focusing only on hedonic pleasure will have the opposite effect. If you focus on money and the things it can buy as the source for your well-being, you are excluding a series of factors that are necessary to achieve a true state of well-being. The following passage from the article â€Å"On Happiness and Human Potentials: A Review of Research on Hedonic and Eudaimonic Well-Being† clearly details that: Drawing from the eudaimonic view and from SDT, Kasser & Ryan (1993, 1996) related money and materialism to well-being. They predicted that people who place a strong value on wealth... ...se’s life. The only way humanity can achieve true well-being is if abdicates its urge to accumulate and refocus its mostly hedonic ways to a more eudaimonic way of life. Works Cited The Edukators. Dir. Hans Weingartner. IFC Films, 2004. Mill, John Stuart. Utilitarianism. Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Company, 1979. Nenno, Nancy P. â€Å"Postcards from the Edge.† Light Motives: German Popular Film in Perspective. Eds. Halle, Randall and McCarthy, Margaret. Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 2003. 61-84. Reed, Peter J. "Kurt Vonnegut, Jr." Dictionary of Literary Biography. ed. 1978. Ryan, Richard M., and Edward L. Deci. "On Happiness and Human Potentials: A Review of Research on Hedonic and Eudamonic Well-Being." Annual Review of Psychology 52 (2001): 141-166. Vonnegut, Kurt. The Sirens of Titan. New York: Dell Publishing, 1998.

Employment Selection and Training Development Essay

One would think that the employee selection process would be simple, but it is not. Two cases will demonstrate what is not, and what the correct way to approach a hiring situation is. There are specific ways to handle each situation that will minimize the risk to the company during the selection process. These alternative solutions will prevent the companies from ending up in court for discrimination in the hiring process. Speedy Delivery Service (SDC) The first case example chosen to demonstrate improper employment selection practices is Speedy Delivery Service. SDC would prefer not to hire women to perform deliveries for them. To discourage women from applying, SDC has decided to show extremely large, bulky, heavy packages to the women that are interested in the job. The prospective female applicants are lead to believe the job requires them to carry these object up multiple flights of steps without assistance, therefore discouraging them from applying for the job. Male applicants are not shown this same demonstration, therefore encouraging the male applicants (Moran, 2008. Ch. 2). The strategy that SDC is using in this case will increase the risks for the company to be charged with discriminatory hiring practices. This is a prime example of gender discrimination. Employers cannot overstate the physical requirements for a job. The misrepresentation of physical requirements goes against Title VII of the Civil Rights Act. It is fine for employers to test for prospective employees abilities to perform required activities, as long as the tests are the same for each individual. Whether the prospective employee is male, or female the test have to be identical. Once SDC has chosen potential new hires, they can have prospective employees demonstrate that they have the capability to meet the physical requirements to perform the deliveries. If a female prospect has the same potential as a male prospect, they should be given the opportunity to have the job. If the females are not chosen, SDC must be able to explain why the female was not chosen. Long and Short Long and Short is worried about hiring a prospective employee that has children. They are need of someone that can work a specific schedule and  are concerned that if they choose a parent, the hours will be limited. Long and Short chooses to ask the prospective employee if they have children. If Long and Short does not hire this individual, there is a possibility that they will assume it is because they have children. This opens the company up to a huge risk of discriminatory hiring practices (Moran, 2008. Ch. 2). When hiring for a specific shift, or if worried about whether a new hire can work the required schedule a company can clearly find out this information. Without making specific request referencing children, Long and Short could simply ask about restrictions on the days or hours that a prospective employee can work. If for example, the position is for an evening shift and the prospective employee states that they can only work dayshifts, then the company has every right not to hire this individual. As long as each prospective employee is asked the same exact questions referencing availability for shifts, there is no discrimination. In asking a generic question to each prospective employee, the risk to the company is reduced. Conclusion Proper employment selection processes can decrease the risk of a company being sued for discriminatory hiring practices. The primary practice is to ensure that all prospective employees are tested the exact same, and asked the exact same questions. You cannot make testing processes lean towards or against a specific race or gender. The hiring process requires each individual to have the same opportunity to obtain employment. If it is shown that the testing practices exceeds the need for the job, then this is a discriminatory practice and the company will be in a higher risk. Therefore, it is the job of the hiring team to ensure that proper hiring practices are followed. References Moran, J. (2008). Employment Law (4th ed.). Retrieved from The University of Phoenix eBook Collection.

Case Study Who Is Your Community, And How Will You Get...

Glodie Motanga Dr. Hardesty SW408-001 01 October, 2015 Case Study 2 Who is your community, and how will you get them interested? My community will mostly be identify by low and middle class future and current students from all universities and colleges across North Carolina. The reason why I selected these people are, first, even though current students from low social class get pell grant, they still have to take loans from school to allow them afford for other school expenses. The same scenario also applies with middle class students. Then, the third people that will be included in my community will also be upper class student who had finished college because I figure out that they would not want to spend all of their money paying for loans with a high interest rate. Since I found out that most of my friends and other organizers are afraid of the decision that BOG is about to make, I will first get them interested. I will take a stand to discuss what is going on, and ask them to join me with any ideas that they may have to reach out to other students on and off campus that we know. In order to meet our goal, me and other members in Student Power Union need to work hand to hand. Who is your target in this scenario? What is your demand? My target is banks because they depend on the monthly payments made by students. As that being that, we do not only rebours banks money as the way we borrowed it, but we are charge for interest rates. We also know that our payments to banksShow MoreRelatedCase Study : Who Is Your Community, And How Will You Get Them Interested? Essay934 Words   |  4 PagesGlodie Motanga Dr. Hardesty SW408-001 01 October, 2015 Case Study 2 Who is your community, and how will you get them interested? My community will mostly be identify by low and middle class future and current students from all universities and colleges across North Carolina. 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