HGE401 | Hotel & Guest Experience

Executive Summary

The study is conducted to investigate about customer experience and the new trends of consumer

behavior and how the perspective of experience economy has changed. Now the hotels are not

only restricted to providing rooms and just to clean it. The motive of hospitality and tourism sector

provide best services to the guests for which they can also create the competitive advantage for it.

According to the study, personalization is the main key element for any hotel company for which

they can get engage their guests and make their experience memorable. Its hotel responsibility to

make customer journey memorable which also shows the loyalty of guest with hotel and hotel with

guests. The study also explains the two main concept of experience economy which is

commoditization and customization. Today many organization delivering customer customized

services just because to make their product or services unique from their competitor. The best

example is Starbucks which convert into successful place for customer because it adopts the things

according to the customer requirement and also they understand the need and want of customer.

There are many hotels introduce many different service’s related to technology like door opens by

smartphone, increase or decrease the room temperature by mobile device, different loyalty

programs on re-booking. These are the personalized services for guests to make strong attachment

and make their hotel journey more memorable. Furthermore, hospitality and tourism service

providers are now offering their customers many different services to make their relationship more

strong and the services like offering discounts, giveaways, birthday celebrations, anniversary

celebrations and loyalty points. The study also suggest that many hotels are now using digital and

social media services to engage with customer and doing strong conversation with customers. Now

most of the hotels have digital service of check-in and check-out which the transformation of

technology is and these are the services which customer looks and get back to repurchase, which

is the positive sign for any hotel.

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Introduction

In today’s world experience economy is not restricted to goods and services but now

consumer want experiences. Here experiences means personally engage an individual to make

their experience in memorable event. The term “Customer Experience” means creating value to

the customer and to interact them nice, easy and convenient way (Pine & Gilmore, 1999).

According to different retailer’s perspective providing goods and services are not enough to run

the business because now what consumers want is experiences, this is now the main part of

growth in developed economies GDP. The old concept shows business arrangements are

restricted to only buying and selling and economic offerings are for buyers but now the current

situation is consumers want something which is inherently personal, memorable and engaged an

individual emotional, physical and psychological level (Pine & Gilmore, 1999). Furthermore, the

competition in businesses now more intensified because the technological advancement and

internet increase the productivity and high commodity supply (Schmitt, 2003).

According to the study, small businesses now offering and engaging customers by

making their experience positive and memorable by innovation, vision, and passion do to

something new and these engaging and memorable experiences results by making business more

competitive by their competitor (Drucker, 1985). The good example of cereality which is a bar

and café changed the concept of breakfast just to engage the customer and provide the mass

customization by offering customer to make their own cereal, own flavor and topping to enjoy

their breakfast and make it memorable. This example shows that how the concept of commodity

of corn changes into innovation and small businesses. This also shows the innovative process

which provide value addition to customer and important source to engage the customers (Fiore,

Lee & Kunz 2004). The concept of commoditization is common because there are many

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products which are available in bulk in market like rice, cotton, wheat, bandages, wheel chairs,

household products like furniture’s and cleaning product. Another good example is supermarkets

like SPAR, Metro, TESCO and Walmart, they offer many different products which are lower in

price comparatively in other markets. According to Pine and Gilmore (1999) explains that the

economic growth of United States of America, who shift their economy from extracting the

commodity to processing the finish goods then to offer the services and currently to engage or

staging the memorable experiences. For instance, Starbucks the small business idea now converts

into victorious public company because their main focus on designing of their shops with

pleasant colors, modern furnishings, especially the concept of selection of own music from the

vast library.

The concept of economy as defined by Pine and Gilmore (1999) explains the key element

of any economy is its economic offering which means what a buyer expecting and getting from

seller in exchange for money. The study also shows that commoditization are undifferentiated

which means it’s available in huge quantities in market and its refining process of any specific

commodity. For instance, separating mangoes by quality and coal by size and oil according to

the purity. These products are fungible and available in market in bulk quantities and consumer

purchase it simply on the basis of their prices. The best example of commoditization ever

invented is internet now it’s available in bulk in every businesses like banks,

telecommunications, hotels, and restaurants, buses, waiting area, airports, trains and universities.

People now spending their time and money both on internet and after introduces of 4G and 5G

technology from many telecommunication companies now customer purchase experiences. In

addition, customization is also the key element of progression of economy which means

providing something to customer which is phenomenal and unique. According to the previous

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study it is suggested that customers feel more delight and comfortable if the services provided to

him involve additional benefits and value creation which results customer satisfaction (Mattila

and Enz, 2002; Oliver et al., 1997; Tung, 2012; Wang and Beise-Zee, 2013a, 2013b). According

to the study, at experiencing stage customization plays an essential role to make memorable

consumer experience more memorable. For instance, the LEGOs which provide customized toys

and bricks which engage you and make your experience positive. Another example of mass

customization is Dell which offers customer customized systems and assemble on demand of

customer because they have their strong supply chain facility. Just like now hospitality and

tourism companies now offering customized holiday and honeymoon packages for new couples

and for this many tourism companies and hotels do strategic alliance with different airlines

(Adegbesan & Higgins, 2011).

Over the last two decades, the hotel industry has been experiencing marvelous changes

and because of updated technology the hotel industry is now move forwarding to growth. Now

consumer have many choices to choose the hotels and tourism companies according to their need

and want (Gilmore & Pine, 2002). The consumer behavior trend has been changed and every

customer want memorable experiences which connects to their emotions. According to the

survey, one of the most essential elements adopted by hospitality industry is customer experience

and many firms are now competing by offering memorable experiences to their guests (Gartner,

2014). According to Meyer and Schwager (2007) many organizations invests million dollars on

customer relationship management and use many software’s to get the customer data but now the

trend is completely changed. Now organization mostly working on customer experience

management to make customer journey with hotel more memorable. For instance, many hotels

provide online services for booking through their websites. Now the hotel industry have different

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segments too like midscale, upscale, economy and luxury hotels like intercontinental and

Crowne plaza are two upscale hotel brands. The hotel industry is now extremely competitive and

it is very essential for hotel management to keep their businesses according to the new latest

trends in market. The hotel owners has to be make sure about the tremendous customer

experience because now customer have different choices in this competitive environment and

customer switch to another brand with in a second. The study by Palmer (2010) explains three

major elements which contributes to customer experience with hospitality industry are emotions,

interpersonal relationships and involvement. Furthermore, the top latest trends in hospitality

industry which consumer want are personalization, smart hotels, sustainability, artificial

intelligence (technology) and smart hotels. Firstly, personalization plays an important role in

hotel sector because if the guests use the same hotel service again then its hotel responsibility to

greet the guest personally and offer some discounts or gifts for getting return service.

Personalization matters a lot because to engage customer personally the relationship between

customer and hotel will be stronger it’s give future benefit to hotel (Fuller, 2010). The past study

by Rauch (2013) explain that one of the most important trend in hospitality industry in the year

2014 is mobile communication via application and social media) communication and it’s the

main authentic tool for hotel marketing and give value addition to the customers. This is the era

of technology and now the digital and social media is now more developed than the past years.

The study Joshi, Ma, Rand and Raschid (2013) mention social media is the largest online

platform to engage the consumer’s and the main source of generating sales for hotel sector.

Another consumer trend for hotel sector is customer want smart hotels means hotels have

internet enabled services and all the work done through internet like control the cooling of air

conditioner or heater from their smart phone, use smart tv by voice command, light bulb

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brightness low or high, these are the smart services by hotels who designed their structure by

concept of internet of things (IOT). These are the quality services which makes the guest

experience more memorable and play positive role for hotels (Briggs et al., 2007).

According to the Bernazzani (2019) customer experience is now the primary

differentiator and competitive advantage in hospitality and tourism industry. There are five latest

trends in hospitality industry for which hotels can fulfill the guest’s expectations which are

luxury, innovation, sustainability, food and beverages and technology. Now customer

expectation are skyrocketed and they want everything from single entity in hospitality sector.

According to the study by Harris Poll and Eventbrite 78% Millennials spend their money on

experiences rather than other services. Now hotels are adopting the tastes of Youngers and they

are providing memorable experiences to their guests rather than just service. There are many

examples of hotels that engage their customers by giving memorable experiences like The

Hoxton, 25hours and Citizen Hotels have an advantage of vivacious locations that appeal the

guests and travelers. According to the blog by Trivago (2019) mentions about the changing the

trends and how to make hotel experience better for guests. Furthermore, green environment and

adding greenery to hotels are attracting more customer because customer like greenery and eco-

friendly environment like reusable glasses and bottles, LED lighting, fresh flowers decoration.

Another consumer trend related to hotel industry is feel like home means comfort and

convenience service such as library, swimming pool, coffee and tea machine, slow attractive

music and creative wall arts which grab the consumer attention and make memorable journey

for guests. The study by kandampullay (1998) suggest that to achieve the customer delight and

authenticity it is essential to work on innovation which attracts the customer attention towards

purchasing. According to the study, many hotels are now working on their competitive

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advantage because everyone wants to provide the guest some unique experience. In addition,

every hotel have different competitive advantage like chef skills, food and beverages, prime

location, employees, cost and resources (Shetty, 2010). Hilton one of the biggest hotel and resort

chain of America and it’s the best option for guests to make their trip more memorable.

According to the blog by Saunders (2017) the aim of the Hilton to be a part of changing trend by

offering their guest some loyalty program and getting attention through technology. Hilton has

the highest rated application also the award winner and it’s introduce for guest. By this

application guests can easily check-in rooms digitally, room maps, live chat facility, and

customize option for selecting the rooms and personalization through a TV who welcomed the

guests at the time of entry in the room. Finn (2005) investigates that extreme level of satisfaction

of customer or guests can make them more loyal with company. Another example related to

personalization is Marriott international who investing in authenticity for making guests

memorable experiences by offering things digitally. According to the blog by Solis (2018) the

total numbers of loyalty members of Marriott’s international now over 110 million because now

Marriott’s worked on transformation for more business growth. Social media is also the main

key for Marriott because their skilled team have special command on social media conversation

and the team strongly monitoring the social media conversations. One of the biggest luxury hotel

and Casio is The Plaza (New York), the top choice of VIP’s. Just because of its iconic structure

and design, facility of grand piano, gymnasium, offer personal chef which is the competitive

advantage too and also the facility of climate control system. The Plaza is providing those

amenities which guests expect. Another hotel example by Morgan (2015) the world best

company hat understand the priority and the power of social customer service is the Starwood

hotels. But now Starwood has been acquired by Marriott international and for this Starwood is

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now using latest technology for their reward programs. Guests are inspired by its prime location

near beach which feels them fresh and unique experience which energize their moods. According

to Walls (2013) for delightful hotel experiences it is important to make internal ambiance of

hotel attractive like soft music and pleasant lighting which makes the guest experience more

memorable and build the positive reputation of hotel.

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