Customer relationship practices of five star hotels in Bangladesh

Abstract

To keep the customer loyal, today relationship marketing get more and more attention in hospitality industry especially in the hotel business. It is necessary to keep in mind that acquiring new customers is far more expensive than maintaining existing ones. Different researchers prefer different antecedents to achieve this aim. In response, this thesis develops a model of relationship marketing to empirically investigate: (1) the affect of relational bonds (financial, social and structural) on customer emotions; (2) emotions on relationship quality; and (3) the ultimate affect of both relationship quality and emotions on customer loyalty. In particular, this thesis seeks to investigate the role of the emotions variable as a consequence of relational bonds (financial, social and structural), and antecedent of relationship quality. Here empirical findings are derived from a survey of 284 loyal guests at five-star hotels in Bangladesh by using structural equation modeling (AMOS 21.0). The findings of this thesis mostly support the hypothesized relationships proposed in the theoretical model. Specifically, the results revealed that financial, social are important in affecting relationship quality and whereas structural bonds are needed to create positive emotions of the customer. The results also provide strong evidence of the relationship between emotions and relationship quality, which in turn are necessary determinants of customer loyalty. The emotion, which is considered to be an important construct here is used never before to investigate the loyalty of the customers in five star hotels in Bangladesh. By using this construct the model become a complete one within a hospitality context. Findings imply the need of relational bonds in service firms especially in hotels business, to increase the positive emotions of customers which in turn increase the relationship quality between the hoteliers and the customers so that more loyal customers are introduce in the five star hotels in Bangladesh and make the hotels pursuit more competitive advantage, and long-term profit.