Chapter – 6

SUGGESTIONS AND CONCLUSION

6.1 Suggestion:
The study aims at analysing relationship marketing practices that exist
between the select players in the tourism industry which include, Relationship
Marketing Attributes, Relationship Marketing Outcomes, and Relationship Value.
The study focused on understanding the networks of tourism partnerships existent
among the hoteliers, Travel agencies, and Tourists. It also evaluates the effectiveness
of e-CRM in building relationships among the select players in the tourism industry.
Tourism Industry in itself is versatile constituting several players, say service
intermediaries like hotels, tour operators, travel agents, cruise ships, airlines, car
rentals, tour guides, entertainment service providers, etc. This will lead to successful
tourism firm and strong tourism partnerships in the industry, leaving behind happy
and delighted tourists. By the inferences drawn the following suggestions are made to
improve the relationship marketing in the Indian Tourism Industry.

The suggestions are presented under three broad headers namely:

1. Suggestions to improve the relationship between
i) Travel agency and a Hotel
ii) Hotel and Tourists
iii) Travel agency and Tourists
2. Suggestions to improve e-CRM practices in the tourism industry
3. General suggestions

1. Suggestions to improve the relationship between Travel agency and a Hotel:

· Information irregularity can create a slight stir in the relationships between the
hotels and the travel agencies. When one partner has greater information than
the other, it means that the transaction cost theory fails to model the agent–
principal relationship. In the tourism industry, especially when travel agents
have more information than the hotels, then the hotels are likely to have
difficulties in governing their agents, thereby raising the outlook that the travel
agent is not serving the principal’s best interest. There needs to be an

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 equilibrium in the momentum of information dissemination that happens in the
tourism channel. The Travel agency needs to pass on the information
pertaining the prices it quotes to its customers thereby avoiding price
discrimination of Hotels customers.
· Building healthy relationships has directly got to do with the flexibility of the
partners. The relationship between a travel agency and a hotel should be
symbiotic and not parasitic.
· Hotels need to make efforts to encourage guests to book directly through a
travel agent than through the OTAs highlighting its customers the importance
of pricing-related issues and service-related issues to best protect the interests
of the travel agency and its customers.
· Travel agencies and hotels have been partners in the tourism industry for
decades together. They are involved in a mutual exchange relationship based
on their transactions. The present study reveals that some reservations the
travel agency makes for the hotels today vary from 20-40 % that can still be
raised up by the travel agency if they follow a stronger business model.
· Collecting commissions from the hotels and other suppliers have always posed
a problem to the travel agency. For individual tours like the custom tours, the
travel agents should consider receiving exclusive rates from their vendors and
marking them up rather than taking a commission which gives pricing
flexibility and better cash flow and reduces the pain of collecting a
commission.
· The quality of communication between the travel agency and the hoteliers is
good, however for best results in creating a successful relationship hotel
companies should communicate with travel agents in a timely, accurate,
adequate, complete, and credible manner.
· The proper dissemination of information across the tourism channel to a great
deal can contribute to the overall success of the relationship between the hotels
and the travel agency. It only makes sense that hotels should provide travel
agencies with whatever information they need to sell rooms and not hide any
information from them and work together in the best interest of each other.
· Formal the relationship between the two parties, the greater the hoteliers’
gauge of the relationships’ overall success. We found no significant

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 differences in the formality of the relationship between the hotel companies
and the travel agencies according to the level of business. Beyond mere
formality, having documents that set standard operating procedures and spell
out both parties’ responsibilities should improve communication, as well as
strengthening the business relationship.
· It is critical for hoteliers to be loyal and maintain harmonious dealings with
the travel agencies. The hotels need to look out for travel agencies having
high-integrity and pay them commissions accurately and promptly.
· The hotels need to improvise on the degree of commitment they show towards
their travel agency by prioritizing their demands based on the sales they
generate and the experience they hold in their dealings with the hotels and also
their historical performance.
· The coordination and participation shown between the hotels and the travel
agency are low. Hoteliers rarely seem to seek the travel agents’ suggestions
about how to improve the relationship. This joint programming appears to be
absent in the hotels and travel agencies relationship, given that such a
relationship should be beneficial to both organizations. They hotels need to
accept the suggestions posed by the travel agency because they are the ones
directly having a direct encounter with the customer and are well aware of the
market conditions and the tourists’ preferences, likes, and dislikes.
· Efforts to handle conflict effectively was a concern for both the hotels and the
travel agencies. Hoteliers stayed away from allowing travel agents to dominate
the relationship, using harsh words, and turning to outside arbitration or
mediation. The hotels need to treat the travel agents fairly, and as their
partners, a direct approach in handling conflict would work best in this case.
The hotels and the travel agencies need to meet on a regular basis to check
where there is any glitch in any process or their dealings and make joint efforts
to sort out conflicts when aroused.
2. Suggestions to improve the relationship between Hotel and Tourists:
· There an upswing of the middle-class travelers in an emerging market like
India. The increase in their disposable income have led to this trend pattern in
Indian travel markets. The hotel industry needs to invest more on coming up

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 with economy hotel properties especially in Indian markets to cater to the
rising middle-class segment tourists demands.
· Hotels need to advance their technology use and continue to improve their
websites. By way of optimizing the site, creating offers based on customer
data mining, and enriching the hotel’s website with information not available
through other channels.
· The hotels need to establish easy-to-use and efficient web design.
· Hoteliers should include other services such as newspaper delivery, airport
pickup, breakfast, use of the business lounge, spa or restaurant deals or
coupons as options for customers to choose when they book through the
company’s website.
· The hotels can direct its customers to use the site of the hotel instead of the
OTA by Providing reasonable guarantee and cancellation policies on a website
where a customer can get flexible terms with privilege points.

3. Suggestions to improve relationships between Travel agency and Tourists:

· Families with small children, older people or people who seek comfort and
relaxation during their holidays are the ones using the services of a travel
agency, because these types of tourists usually want everything arranged
before their journey so that their food and accommodation arrangements are
taken well care of in advance by the travel agency. The travel agency offers its
customers a whole holiday package and allied services too, they arrange for
their clients stay at a hotel, buy a plane ticket, provide you with proper
insurance, arrange your visa, and the tourist is all set to go. The travel agents
usually don’t charge customers for their services. Their payment comes
through the hotels and wholesalers and other partners. So, the travel agency is
a preferred option for travel by majority of the tourists in India.
· The travel agency needs to specialize not just service the tourists. The travel
agency needs to pick a few destinations or activities and resolve to be a better
expert at them than anyone else because consumers now have extensive access
to so much travel information, at their fingertips through the Internet that they
have themselves become generalist travel agents so when they seek help,
they’re seeking a real specialist.

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· A lot of online portals have captured the market today offering tourists ‘Do It
Yourself’ (DIY) solutions, the travel agency needs to differentiate itself from
DIY, self-service online solutions and in its place, give consumers highly
personalized service, recommendations right from their very first interaction
with them be it online, by phone or in-person.
· The travel agencies need to work on selling experiences to their customers.
The more unique, the more value the travel agency would be adding to its
services. Getting access to certain special events and difficult to access areas
can fetch and trigger sales and excite customers too.
· The travel agencies need to shift their focus on complicated things because the
technology has made everything easy for the tourists. However, the travelers
need agents for multiple trips such as longer international trips, cruises, etc., so
the travel agencies energy and specialization should be on focusing on many
travels.
· Travel agency needs to be winning over customers as a trusted advisor for
which it needs to push itself in acquiring these skills rather than on its sales.
Most agents can sell a lot more if they can be perceived as a trusted advisor.
This means that travel agents need relationship-building and trust-building
skills rather than pushing just room bookings.
· The travel agency needs to work on its writing and email skills. Many clients
prefer email communications. Good writing is a sales skill that aids in building
trust and relationship with customers. The travel agency can focus on taking
up classes to improve this skill and thereby also improve sales conversion.
· The travel agency needs to be incredibly responsive & reachable even when a
travel agent is not at the office they need to use a smart phone to be extremely
responsive through voice, email, and social media. The agency can make use
of services of the Google Voice to have one number that rings you at their
office landline, mobile, or any other number.
· The agency needs to focus more on selling expertise than on selling deals,
especially since it’s an online trend it is tough to beat deals online, so the
agency needs to transform its business and its message to sell expert advice
and personalized service.

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4. Suggestions for improvement of e-CRM practices in the tourism industry:
· Utilizing and investing in technology will help the hotels become less reliant
on OTAs. If the hotels want to survive, they need to know how to invest in
travel technology and e-marketing and how to optimize their direct channel.
· Hoteliers in the same city or region can be connected through professional
networks such as LinkedIn. Com and form a revenue management
professionals group to discuss issues that are not adequately addressed by the
travel agencies.
· Hotels and travel agencies can establish greater trust by intensifying their
adoption of e-communications.
· It’s an era of reviews online and the popularity of the media and the fan
following on the FB page, the agency needs to get itself written up in
national media or at least local newspaper and get clients to write up
endorsements on LinkedIn. The agency needs to build their reputation with
real traveller reviews on a referral service available to them. It is ideal to
have a Facebook Page for the travel business of the agency and also get the
clients to be fans and to post reviews of the services of the travel agency.
· Tourists mentioned that many hotels and travel agencies still operate their
businesses in ignorance of or without fully utilizing the capabilities and
potential of the internet that needs to be set right by developing a web
framework for the business activities of the firm, in the present study being
the hotels and the travel agency.
· Most of the travel agents have websites are not active. Travel Agency
websites need three key things, that include sound design, compelling
content and easy maintenance and handling.

5. General suggestions:
· The spread of education has fostered the need to know more about different
parts of the globe, the real hunt for knowledge has encouraged the educated
middle-class travellers to travel and explore new places. Easy access to travel
books and other travel guides and the technology have fostered and triggered
this growth among the educated class of travellers, thereby leading to the
upsurge of informed travellers in India. Education tourism needs to be

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 rebranded and positioned in India today as the travel markets has a lot of
educational tourists who are on the rise, and it is time to make India as the
educational hub for tourists all over the world.
· The potential for tourism in India is undervalued by the tourism organisations
functioning in the state and the centre. India is a country of rich religious
diversity and history. Almost every town and Village in India is dotted with
unbelievable architectures of ancient past. There are numerous hills,
mountains, rivers, lakes that offer incredible tourism possibilities. There is a
demand and need for modern amusement parks, water parks and theme parks.
The wide variety of handicraft and other arts needs to be showcased to capture
the real potential of the Indian handicraft industry.
· Many tourist destinations around the world are created by experiences. The
tourism ministry today should primarily focus on seeing the real potential in a
tourist’s place to attract more visitors rather than on banking on the natural
beauty of an area. Measures can be taken to make the tour complete with tour
guides.
· It is crucial to building good roads and approach points to a certain tourist
destination, organized train travel, easy bus connectivity, and quick and safe
car hire services with well-informed personnel combine with great freeways
and highways may sound ideal this is a critical feature for an unmatched
tourist experience.
· The tourism ministry of India should carry out aggressive online and other
marketing strategies to promote India as a must-visit location. By propagating
‘Incredible India’ campaigns abroad, conducting tourism seminars or offering
Indian sites with facilities to support foreign film productions in the country.
Aggressive marketing is absolutely critical for India to be seen and heard well
as a tourist destination.
· India is currently in a place where it can make a cash cow by marketing
customized experiences to the visitors, offering luxury spa sessions, rare
animal sanctuaries, religious pilgrimage tours and extreme Himalaya tours.
Though too many points of differentiation are available, Indian tourism should
focus on how it has something to offer for everyone in every category with all
budgets viz., India in luxury, to the common man’s India, ancient India and

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 much more. The way information is packaged and distributed can go a long
way in improving tourist traffic in the country.
· India's transportation system is in need of a serious refurbishment. The cars,
trucks, bicycles and rickshaws drive into opposing traffic rules to get where
they need to go leading to fatal accidents. While India also has an extensive
railway system, due to overcrowding and poor maintenance, this mode of
transportation is not preferred. Concerned departments need to rework on its
traffic laws and reduce rail congestion so that visiting tourists will have an
easier time travelling from one place to another.
· It is found that the existence of KSTDC is not known by the majority of the
visitors. KSTDC has been operating secretly without any publicity about its
existence and without creating an awareness to the tourists about the benefits
the tourists can seek from them. KSTDC needs to take part in different tourism
fairs all over the world to gain greater impetus into enhancing their marketing
strategy to promote Karnataka as a tourist destination.
· A tourist friendly environment in Karnataka is the need of the hour. The
residents should welcome the open lifestyle of Westerners, and they should be
allowed to live here as they live in their country, the local population needs to
embrace the foreign tourists and not manipulate them and consider them as
aliens to the land.
· In the hotel industry, most of the female staff belong to the age group of 20-30
years, who end their carriers in the hospitality sector once they get married and
shift to a safer and better paying jobs gradually owing to long working hours
in Hotels as compared to fixed duty timings in any other sector the hotel
industry needs to have flexible working hours for women employees and have
to engage the employees in some stress management activities to help them
better serve their guests. If the hotel staff is happy then they can make the
hotels customers happy too.
· The hotel industry needs to rework on their payment norms in terms of salary
paid to its employees. A lot of fresh graduates get into the hotel industry in
pursuit of their career and just take up jobs initially to get settled and gain
some work experiences to migrate later to other sectors. The reason being they
do not find the industry attractive in terms of the payment it offers them and

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 also the longer and inflexible working hours’ forces many to leave their jobs
in the hotel sector adding up to just 0-5 years of experiences.
· The amount of the staff engaged in hotels is fundamentally determined by the
value status of the hotel. The reports of the World Tourist Organization
suggest that, the most favourable number of staff for every ten rooms in three-
star hotel – 8 persons, in four-star hotel – 12 persons, in 5-star hotel – 20
persons. The international chains of hotels in the budget and top categories
keep the staff-to-room ratio low, contrary to the Indian hospitality scene. The
Indian hotel industry needs to follow this ratio too to cut costs and be able to
offer excellent facilities to its existing employees.
· A lot of hotels are business class hotels always having 100% occupancy
throughout the year with scheduled meetings and conferences scheduled much
ahead of time, especially in places like Mangalore, Bangalore, Mysore but
when it comes hill stations like Coorg a slight change in the occupancy levels
during tourist season and off seasons is noted. The hotel industry needs to
analyse the future demands the tourism industry is going to place on them and
devise plans for its expansion and bring about effectiveness in its operations.
· The fragmented nature of the hotel industry, which involves the many
ownership structures and numerous small operators, potentially prevents
industry players from making a stand together.

6.2 Conclusion
The study examines the relationships between the preferred service providers
being the hotels and the travel agency in the tourism industry as well as the tourist’s
perception of the service provider’s relationship with them. The hotel industry has
been in a long-term relationship with the travel agents for a long time to render better
services to its customers. If a company has to carry out a market transaction it needs
to discover someone it wishes to deal and conduct negotiations so that it can best
focus on the areas of its expertise. For a hotel industry that ideal partner is a travel
agent that can handle all the distribution channel networks of the hotels and can
economically perform that function too, so, that the hotel can best focus on what it
expertise’s and on its core services such as the accommodation functions.

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 A strong theme within our findings is that the tourists desire a more balanced
relationship between hotels and the travel agencies. This result seemed to be the
foundation of the recommendation that hotels should enhance their bargaining power
by looking for alternative partners. They need to stand united, develop skills to remain
competitive without unfavourable OTA (Online Travel Agency) contracts, that would
deprive the traditional travel agency of its fundamental right and would, in turn, leave
them deprived for serving the hotels faithfully for all these years.
Hotels should share data about their stock and business methodologies with its
nearby accomplice like that of a travel agent. This may counter to the hotels'
competitive position, yet sharing data will make the data stream more straightforward.
The point here is not that the hotel shares all its sensitive financial information with
the agency, but it can swap data on online channels that offer similar types of
services.
If a particular hotel receives unfavourable or unfair treatment from a travel
agency, the manager should, let other staff concerned know about the same and carry
the information through a right source so that the necessary action can be taken
immediately. These study results suggest that travel agents should be trustworthy,
show a cooperative attitude, and be committed to the relationship with the hotel
company. Similarly, hotel businesses that travel agents see as honest, cooperative, and
committed to their relationships with those agencies can expect to receive more offers
from travel agents to establish long-term business relationships.
Finally, based on the past data available and the industry forecasts it can be
concluded that India is going to emerge as a major giant in the Tourism industry in the
coming years. The primary focus of any marketing activity in tourism is not just
satisfying the tourists alone, but also causing the tourists to delight in the services
provided by the hotels and the travel agency. It is crucial to acquire, retain, and make
customers loyal to the firm by making them realize that they are getting more value
for their money every time their deal with the hotels or a travel agency. To achieve
this the hotels and the travel agency needs to work with perfect coordination and unity
understanding that they need to set up their partnership by healthy relationship
marketing practice that has been discussed through this study. Relationship marketing
is the need of the hour, and hence the tourism partners need to work continuously with
each other to evolve strategies for effective relationship marketing in the Indian
tourism industry.

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6.3 Scope for Future research
The present study mainly focuses on analysing the relationship marketing
practices in the Indian tourism industry. The study can be extended to International
Tourism as well.
The Indian tourism industry has been facing a significant change regarding
new players barging into the tourism markets especially the OTA’s (Online Travel
Agencies) that have been penetrating the industry and trying to dissolve the existence
of traditional travel agencies. They have been trying to replace the human touch to the
tourism markets. The future research can be on analysing the future of OTA’s in India
and analysing the marketing strategies they follow to acquire customers and establish
markets.

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