An Analysis of Local Hotels on Tourism Destination Image in China
1.1 Background and the Purpose of Research
Filipova (2016) states the hotel product is of determining importance with regard to tourism. It is a main part of the tourism product (Madgerova 2013). Within this sense, V. Kyurova indicates that this product is a basic component of the whole tourism product used by the end consumer (Kyurova 2011). Tourism industry is increasingly developing in recent years in China which stimulate the development of local hotels. According to the World Tourism Organization, it is forecast that China will become the world’s number one tourism destination by 2020. While China’s hotel industry has only existed since 1978 as the result of implementation of Reform and Opening-up policy. With sustainable growth of economy as well as increased leisure and development of transportation, people have more means and opportunities to spend some days enjoying themselves from work and study, China’s tourism and hotel industry has unprecedented development in recent years. Additionally, China’s own increasingly growth of population boost the development of domestic tourism. China inbound tourism developed with a steady growth in the first half of 2016. There were around 67.87 million overseas visitors came to China, which showed a 3.8% growth over the same period in 2015 (Table 1.1). Besides, overnight visitors increased to 28.87 million and it has 4.3% growth compared to 2015. The total inbound tourism revenue was around USD 57 billion, which increased by 5.3% over the same period of 2015. (Table 1.2).
Table1. 1 Visitors arrivals statistics: 2016
*Source: Travel China Guide. Com
Table1. 2 Overnight visitor arrivals statistics: 2016
*Source: Travel China Guide.com
Moreover, based on China National Tourism Administration (CNTA, 2014) data, China is home to 11,687 star hotels in the end of 2013 with an annual growth of 2.82%. Up to the end of 2013, star hotels presented in general an olive-shaped distribution structure. Specifically, there were 739 five-star hotels, 2,361 four-stars hotels, 5631 three-star hotels and 2831 two-star hotels and 125 one-star hotels. From this, it is clearly to show that the big market of Chinese hotels and there are abundant facilities for customers to use when they are on holiday in China.
From the perspective of local hotels’ prospect, with the dominant development of Chinese tourism industry, there is increasingly growth of needs to leisure holiday hotels and it is clearly to see the bright future of hotel industry in China. In term of Chinese economy transition and consumption upgrade background in China, it is golden period to accelerate the growth of hotel industry in the next few years. And in the acceleration of technology, it is important that hotels apply advanced technology to promote their competitiveness. Advanced technology can be applied in hotel rooms, marketing, saving energy, service and in other aspects which not only can bring convenience to the daily management of hotels but also can provide customers new accommodation experience. Therefore, new technology applied in hotel management will be a significant means to improve competitiveness in the future.
Although there is bright future of hotels in China, hotels are still facing some challenges during the rapid development process. Firstly, the usage of high scientific and technological content of service is insufficient. The hotel service programs should reflect technology content, high star-rating hotels facilities have similar quality compared with the same class in international hotels, however, it is still not enough to apply high technology in hotel management. Secondly, economic hotels have little attention. As mentioned before, China will be the number one destination image country all over the world, the number of guest rooms will be the sum of Europe and America. However, Chinese hotel investors and developers pay much attention on high-class hotels market while pay less attention on economic hotels market. Thirdly, it is rather low degree of hotel collectivization. At present, hotel collectivization degree in America has reached about 70%, European countries have reached 30% or so while China has less than 10% hotel collectivization. Finally, there are some problems in the management of human resource in hotels, such as low quality of hotel staff, unreasonable hotel structure and lack pf professional staff in hotels.
Tourism destination image is a key factor to attract tourists. In the 1970s, tourism destination image has been studied and it is getting more and more attention. There are three categories of destination image, they are original image, induced image and compound image. Original image means individuals can get information from education, mass culture, social media and literature review and other ways to form the image of destination. Induced image means advertisements, promotion and broadcasting to promote and advertise destination information which can influence people’s perspective of destination image. Compound image means after tourists go to one specific tourism destination, they have a comprehensive understanding about the destination image with their own experience and previous knowledge.
In this paper, the main objective of the study is to examine the relationship between local hotel experience and tourism destination image and how local hotel experience subsequently affects tourism destination image in the hotel industry in China. Besides, this study can help hotel operators to formulate and implement effective marketing management strategies to deal with the fierce competition in the hotel service industry as well as to improve the tourism destination image by providing customers satisfying hotel experience according to customers’ needs and expectations.
1.2 Research Question
Kearney and Bradley (2009, P.79) correctly state that’ place…cannot be separated from people’. According to Crompton, destination image is usually defined as set of belief, ideas and impressions that people have about some places or destinations (Crompton, 1979). From the point of view of Oxford dictionary, hotel is a commercial establishment providing accommodation, meals, and other services for travelers and tourists. When people have a trip somewhere they need to book a local hotel, the experience of local hotels that visitors have may generate some impacts on their perspective of destination image.
Local hotels are considered as one of the individual experience in tourism destination; a high-quality experience is able to influence not only intention to return and willingness to recommend the country as a tourism destination but is also able to induce more positive intensions toward the products made in the sojourn country (G. Bertoli, 2012). In order to guarantee the enjoyable local hotel experience of customers when they are on vocation in somewhere, hotel service quality, reliability and service satisfaction are vital to make customers happy. In addition, studies have documented that a 5% increase in customer retention can generate a profit growth of 25–95% across a range of industries (Reichheld, 1996; Reichheld & Sasser, 1990). It is the reason that the local hotel industry places a large focus on the guest experience along with their satisfaction about the tourism destination and it is also important to keep high customer retention in order to make high value of loyal customers.
However, there are very few studies dealing with the effect of tourism experience on country image perception (Jaffe and Nebenzahl, 2001), this leads to my research question: what are the impacts of local hotels experience on the tourism destination image?
In the context of tourism, satisfaction with travel experiences contributes to destination loyalty (Alexandris, Kouthouris, & Meligdis, 2006; Bramwell, 1998; Oppermann, 2000; Pritchard & Howard, 1997). The degree of tourists’ loyalty to a destination is reflected in their intentions to revisit the destination and in their willingness to recommend it (Oppermann, 2000). If tourists have a good time in some destination or place, they will recommend it to their friends and revisit the destination Tourists’ positive experiences of service, products, and other resources provided by tourism destinations could produce repeat visits as well as positive WOM effects to friends and/or relatives. Recommendations by previous visits can be taken as the most reliable information sources for potential tourists. Recommendations to other people (WOM) are also one of the most often sought types of information for people interested in traveling.
1.3 Overview of the Study
In the introduction part, background and the purpose of the research will be displayed and from the brief introduction of China hotels and China tourism, it is easier to understand the significance of this study. Besides, according to the introduction and background of the research, the research hypothesis will be listed which will be verified if the hypothesis is right or not from the result of investigation.
And in the literature review part, all related theories about the research will be discussed. All the data that related with the analysis of local hotels on tourism destination image will be discussed with details based on H1, H1, H3, H4, H5.
The third part is about the research methodology in this study. Data collection will be in the form of questionnaire which can provide reasonable evidences for the project.
The next chapter is focusing on data analysis. Base on the data gathered from questionnaires, this thesis would use SPSS21.0 to make a deep analysis.
And then is the conclusion and recommendation part, it will emphasize the significance and purpose of this research and mention effective suggestions for further tourism and hotel management.
In the last part, limitations will be demonstrated in order to better development of the research in the future.
2.Literature Review
2.1 Foreign theory
Foreign experts believe that the destination brand image has advantages and difficulties of management, the advantage of the destination image makes it easy to understand the enterprise's brand image, the difficulty lies in the lack of the management experience and marketing team. Foreign studies believe that strengthening the destination image building, we should start from the following points:
2.1.1 Strong government guidance
The chief executive's emphasis on the branding of the destination and strong guidance is the key to the success of the destination branding. The study pointed out that the government departments in the branding process must be consistent with the objectives of cooperation. There is also a theory that: Branding in order to succeed must be borne by top management, the need for professional leadership. Because leaders can not only make full use of all kinds of resources and capabilities, but also can provide a variety of strategies for the uncertain future.
2.1.2 Stakeholder support
Brand image to the strategy in addition to government support, also need to be combined together to create the core strength of local residents of tourist destination brand image, to allow local residents to play their role, the local characteristics and destination residents known as the combination of the good, for the purpose of image construction investment as much as possible therefore, power, must pay attention to the important role of local residents in destination branding process, as far as possible to influence their behavior. At the same time, and some institutions do support work based on group cooperation and integration, seize the opportunities arising from the brand culture, sports, political activities, and through the interactive media destinationimages advantage.
2.1.3 Destination branding Guide
destination image of the brand should also pay attention to the local environment, can use the local environment for the purpose of image guidance, which can be managed, but also the effect in practice. There is an essential difference between other regions and enterprises, because the core factors of regional image to visitors and local residents contact, and the control of all elements of the product, so the destination image is better than the ordinary products difficult to manage, development is still to be improved from the aspects of management and control. In order to improve the image of the destination.
2.1.4 Brand portfolio and brand structure
In the construction of the destination image of the problem, the brand is a choice, generally divided into two kinds: one is a single brand strategy, the two is a multi brand strategy. The selection criteria of the two are the resources that can be mobilized. If resources are limited, a single brand strategy should be implemented. Because the multi brand share is to meet the needs of a number of interest groups and the market, which is undoubtedly self destruction of resource poor areas, it is difficult to implement. When the local authorities decide to build a number of brands, we should consider the use of brand architecture to manage these brands. According to Dolly's view, there are four brands to choose from, such as brand strategy, brand strategy, brand strategy and brand strategy.
2.2 Domestic theory
2.2.1 Marketing subject to clear
Now there are several different views on the subject of marketing in china. An idea that the government should take the lead in marketing. A government led by the constraints of the development of enterprises, do not have professional and empirical, there are some drawbacks of the government. So the combination of these two different views, the author thinks that the two forms of combination, complement each other, the government and enterprise cooperation management, marketing destination image should be divided into levels of promotion, use and management of government and other public institutions of the long-term development strategy, flexible and professional combine with business experience, together to create the development of the construction of the image of the destination, is a permanent solution.
2.2.2 Destination Title personalization
To establish the destination image to use elements with vivid image, outstanding personality, fit the t, heme of the times, echoes with the overall image age; there should be appropriate momentum, not excessive publicity also can not be too low, to produce easily recognizable impression and image. In the process of the establishment of the destination image, we should implement the accurate positioning, system planning, integrated communication,image communication, integrated marketing, implementation of image. Objective the topographic image should include the dual connotation of national culture and local culture. Make the destination image clear and acceptable to the guests.
2.2.3 Destination to achieve significant results
In the process of the destination image marketing, it is very important that how to convey the destination image and brand promotion to the guests, but also pay enough attention to the effect of the destination image marketing. In the promotion of a product at the same time, but also to achieve the effect of the demonstration, so that the image of the destination is the promotion of success, if after a lot of publicity, a large amount of capital investment, no guests, no investigation shows that the guest satisfaction of product and project is successful satisfactory, then this product is not successful. Therefore, it is necessary to establish a scientific system of marketing evaluation system, the use of scientific and advanced management experience to the destination image building, which is necessary to achieve the success of the terrain image.
2.2.4 Information technology support
The information technology is now an important way of marketing development, the electronic information technology is fast, wide range and lower cost of publicity, publicity and the establishment of the destination image marketing system in the electronic platform, dynamic rapid release of enterprise information, centralized management of enterprise network platform, product control, product quality management system, booking, product updates consultation center service system, hotel map and standard system interface, customer management etc.. In today's scientific and technological progress, the use of scientific and technological products to bring the results of the enterprise is also a good way to save resources, play a practical way.
3.Concept and analysis of Destination Image
3.1 Concept of Destination Image
Local hotels can be a tourism destination brand which attract more visitors to experience local culture and special things like local cuisine, traditions hospitality of local people and so on and all these staff can give visitors unforgettable memories, different experience as well.
From Crompton’s point of view, image is the sum of beliefs, ideas and impressions which visitors have when they are in a destination (Crompton, 1979). In 1989, Gartner states that “image is a complex combination of various products and associated attributes.” And in other academic writings (Baloglu and Brinberg, 1997, Walmsley and Young, 1998)indicate to regard image as a conceptual idea which composed of two components: perceptive/cognitive evaluations which mean one’s knowledge and belief of an object and affective appraisals related to one’s emotions to the subject.
The destination image will create higher satisfaction in visitors’ mind and the appraise of the destination experience will have effect on the destination image and change it (Chon, 1991). It is an interactional process between destination image and tourists’ satisfaction, if you potential tourists heard that this destination is very worthy visiting from the advertisement, public relations, word-of-mouth recommendations and other means of information, they will have stronger intention to visit the destination, furthermore, when tourists are satisfied with the experience in the tourism destination, they will recommend the destination to their friends or families, and maybe recommend it through social media like Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram, WeChat and Weibo (Chinese social media software) and so on, and this will build the destination image into a better one.
However, there are a number of researches about image definition while there is no explicitly explanation of image definition, they are all vogue defined in the field of academic writings since various researchers have different ideas to define a subject.
As for the function of destination image, it also influences tourists’ behavioral intentions. Many researchers have studies the topic of the role of image in a tourism destination. Image is an important factor which can positive or negatively affect business activities. Zeithaml and Bitber quoted in Jay (2000, p347) states “image is considered to have the ability to influence customers’ perception of the goods and service offered”. Therefore, image also have the ability to influence customers’ buying behavior. In the terms of customer’s behavior research, a number of researchers have proposed it is multi-staged of customer’s buying process and when consumers want to buy a particular product or service, it should satisfy their need and meet their expectations about the product and service (Kye-Sung Chon, 1990). Berkman and Gilson (1986) have proposed a model of consumer buying process as followed:
Need recognition Information search Evaluation of alternatives
Choice of products or service Post-purchase evaluation
In addition, Court and Lupton (1997) express their argument that destination image can positively influence visitors’ decision and intension about revising somewhere in the later days. In order to make it much clear to see the effect of destination in tourists’ behavioral intentions, Kotler, Bowen and Makens (1996) made a sequence model: image quality satisfaction. In the term of this model, it is obviously to see the relation among image, quality and satisfaction, image would influence customers’ evaluation of quality of product and service they received, and furthermore, the perceived quality would also affect customers’ satisfaction about overall experience. In a word, there is agreement among many researchers considering the effect of tourism image on the behavior of individuals (Ashworth & Goodall, 1988; Mansfeld, 1992).
Based on the above literature, two hypotheses are proposed in the following:
H1: Hotel accommodation experience has positively influences on tourism industry
H2: Tourism destination image has a positive impact on tourism industry
3.2 Sports leisure tourism of classification
Sports tourism resources in the world
North America, Europe, Asia Pacific, Africa
Landform Scenic Sports Tourism Resources
Mountain type: suitable for mountain climbing, skiing, rock climbing, field survival, etc.; China is mountainous, the five mountains (Mt. Hengshan, Huashan, Heng Mountain, Taishan, Songshan), etc..
Canyon type: suitable for exploration, crossing, rafting, liusuo; Three Gorges of the Yangtze River, Longmen gorge, the Yellow River hukou, the Yarlung Zangbo Grand Canyon North Colorado Grand Canyon is famous canyon;
Plateau type: riding, riding, racing, etc.;
Basin type: foot, sand, folk performing arts, bonfire party;
Plain type: the North China Plain, Jianghuai plain, Northeast China plain ice festival;
Desert: desert tourism, hinterland crossing, off-road racing;
Water sports tourism resources
River, lake waters: China is rich countries, the Changjiang River, on both sides of the Yellow River, there are many beautiful and good ecological wonders, suitable for shore and water: rafting, swimming, rope, slide; Lake sparkling magnificent and beautiful quiet, the Qinghai Lake, Qiandao Lake in Hangzhou, Chinese is the five largest fresh water lake in Poyang Lake, Dongting Lake, Taihu, Honghu, Chaohu lake, etc.;
Waterfall: Huangguoshu Waterall of Guizhou, the Yellow River, Hukou Waterfall;
Ocean and beach type: suitable for diving, yacht, flying, sliding, water sports, underwater sports, etc.;
Snow and ice: alpine skiing, ski jumping, cross-country skiing, sledding, and ice skating;
Sports tourism human resources
National Traditional Sports Tourism Resources: Dragon Boat Race, ethnic dance, wrestling, pole climbing, Xishuangbanna Water Splashing Festival, etc.;
Large scale sports competitions, such as World Cup football, Olympic Games, tennis, marathon, cycling;
Playground sports tourism resources
Ski tours, mountain climbing, golf, diving, skydiving, rock climbing;
3.3 development of sports leisure tourism
China has extensive regions, natural resources is very plentiful, geographical and climatic conditions are very favorable,well-known mountains and rivers, lakes and seas,Large area green ecological vegetation, the tourism industry has been a dominant industry Chinese economic development with which the life lever is improve, the tourism industry also has to widelly waters, sea, mountains and other champaign view,population the density of less, high air quality of urban development. For family travel, good for both young and old people in the holiday products, at the same time, be able to enjoy the surrounding facilities, leisure and health in the elderly and middle-aged people to join and business , young people also have the entertainment activities, such as golf, skiing, surfing beach, sand skiing, rock climbing, adventure, suitable for sports leisure tourism the product also came into being.
There are many tourists places in China,as island development of Zhejiang province, the Hangzhou sports tourism, Tianjie mountain sports tourism of Fujian, Longyan characteristics of forest tourism of Fujian, Jiangxi province rock exploration project, Hainan Island Golf surfing, is a good for people to travel and leisure place.
Although there are many tourist attractions in China, the development is relatively good, but there are also good publicity is not wide enough visibility of the situation is low.
The present situation of sports leisure tourism, the hotel industry should also do a good job of related products and services, in order to promote the development of the hotel industry better. The acceleration of economic development in the west to speed up the process of international integration, strengthen the link between places, the China hotel industry entered a period of rapid development, ushered in an excellent development opportunity, but also faces enormous challenges. Tourism is a basic industry, pillar industry, the status of the development of the economy is very significant, and play an increasingly important role. The great development of the tourism industry depends on supporting the supporting industries of the tourism industry, the cooperative development of airlines, travel agencies, commercial and hotel industries. The focus of the hotel industry in one, is a tourist resort and leisure accommodation, is the business event of the official residence of social activities. The prosperity of the hotel industry and the level of the hotel marketing strategy, marking the development trend and level of tourism.
3.4 A role of destination image
3.4.1 brings huge traffic
Before the start of major international events, many hotels to expand of the hotel guests to visit the preparation, then also consideration a hotel guests ability is sufficient enough, whether has the good destination image marketing service for you. Such as the Olympic Games in Beijing, international exhibition, international racing, and held in Qingdao International Regatta, the tourists are very a great many, in some places reception amount was 100 thousand in one day, and the guests visited the hotel is also very high in demand, the number of passenger flow, this is the hotel is located in ordinary tourism can not be compared. The increase of tourists, the hotel must be increased, the number of rooms must also be able to reach the hotel guests to visit the reception capacity, which is also a very big advantage.
3.4.2 Drives local economic development
The characteristics of sports leisure tourism for the hotel is to bring fast flowing population, this part of the customers are mainly young people, their economic vitality, consumption concept and type of product requirements are showing younger features, flow speed. The sports leisure tourism is a new kind of product, so the consumption of the local hotel is very fresh, fast, so that it can stimulate the development of the hotel economic, making the hotel capital effectively and quickly!
3.4.3 Driven subsidiary industry development
The guests not only need accommodation, certainly there are restaurants, leisure and entertainment needs, in addition to the hotel in the daily diet, the guests will enjoy special local delicacy, so the catering industry has also brought the development and economic vitality, the food can not appease the needs of the guests, the guests will visit the tourist souvenir shop, supermarkets, clothing stores, jewelry bags and others, so in the local tourism, there are a lot of commercial street, so as to appease the guests can stay at home to enjoy the pleasure of tourism experience. Neither travel too tired, and can enjoy other services experience. And there is a unified image of the planning of the hotel, such as the Wangfujing hotel in Beijing, both located in the vicinity of the National Grand Theater, but also enjoy the maturity of Wangfujing commercial street. Beijing National Stadium Bird's nest, the water cube is not far from the hotel and business, so many destination hotel in the choice of the address, it is also conducive to the development of the hotel image and economic benefits. So many hotels are chosen in the surrounding supporting mature place, do a good job of this destinationimages advantage project preparation in advance, this is a huge project, need to have a strong marketing experience, foresight, excellent marketing management to do this step, not only is the huge business opportunities the benefits, but also to make for the destination image of preparation and hard work.
3.4.4 Offers opportunities for cultural exchange between China and foreign countries
The guest is not only between our China guests, there are a lot of foreign foreign guests, so it has Chinese national culture and world cultural exchanges and communication, China cultural characteristics and traditional culture is one of the many wonderful show, guests also want to see, we want to take advantage of this show to the world well, the hotel image, can give foreign friends to see our Chinese and the hotel itself features the combination, they must be a surprise; at the same time we have to learn the essence of foreign culture, it is also an opportunity to test and exercise our level of service personnel, foreign language is fluently, the degree of civilization behaviour is elegant, is an advanced or backward image, China brought the world millennium old precipitation or exhale when On behalf of the glory, this is certainly the people of the world.
So we not only service personnel, employees from all walks of life, and we China local residents, we must do a good job in image project construction, which is more than one image of the industry we also do for our country construction , study the skills to learn more knowledge to make contributions to the China.
3.5Concept of service quality and customer satisfaction
First of all, it is necessary to understand what is service quality. Service quality is regarded as an overall evaluation of service by customers (Shirshendu Ganguli Sanjit Kumar Roy, (2010). Service is the foundation of service marketing and service quality is the core of service marketing. Service quality is the key element in the competition of market share among all the corporations whether service quality is in manufacturing corporations with tangible products or in service retail industry. There is difference between the contents of service quality and tangible products quality. Consumers evaluate the service quality not only think about the result of service but also consider the whole service process. Service quality should be identified by consumers and only be accepted by consumers then the service could be said that it has good quality. The components of service quality, forming process, evaluation points and standards are all distinguished from the contents of tangible products.
Service quality can be perceived by consumers, it can be identified and measured by objective methods and more importantly, it can be measured and evaluated by consumers with their subjective thoughts. Service quality can be measured in the process of service production and transaction process and service quality exists when service corporation makes deal with customers, in addition, the development of service quality needs organizations and corporations having effective management and support system. Organizations and corporations should pay much attention to the following elements to better management of service quality.
1. Service level
Good quality does not mean it achieves the highest level of service, administrative staff should decide to get which level of service. When one service satisfies the needs and wants of targeted customers, the service can be said it has good quality.
2. Target customers
Target customers are the people who have desires and needs and they want to have a certain of level of service. With the development of economy, more mature market, more clear division of market, each service has to face different requirement. Corporation and organizations should choose different target customers according to each product and service.
3. Consistency
Consistency is one of the basic requirements of service quality. It requires service providers can maintain the same level of good service quality. The operation of service standards is one of the difficult service quality problems. Service quality relies on employers’ behaviors so different staff have different level of service sense will lead to high possibility of service level inconsistency.
As Lewis and Booms said in 1983, it is an important criterion in service assessment by consumers. Besides, previous literature researches propose that individual service quality elements have a positive effect on both customer satisfaction and customer loyalty, so it is essential to make related service marketing strategies to make customers satisfied with the service they received and then differentiate the organization itself from others.
Many researches show it is common that consumers will compare the performance of product and service to choose a better one. There are a lot of products and service, consumers will make a comparison between different experience and performance of products and service to make a decision whether they will consume them again in the future. When customer have satisfying service, they will recommend the organization to other people while if they have poor service experience, their evaluation and negative assessment will have devastating influence on the related organizations.
Oliver (1993) has made a model in order to make an integration of satisfaction and service quality literatures (see Figure 2.1 modified Satisfaction-service Quality Model). He mentions that while service quality consists of a comparison between ideals and perceptions of performance considering quality dimension, satisfaction is a function of the disconfirmation of predictive expectations regarding both quality dimensions and non-quality dimensions. What’s more, perceived service quality is regard to be a premise to satisfaction. Perceived service quality is considered to be the result of comparison between consumer’s expectations about the service before consuming and their evaluation after actual consuming experience (Asubonteng et al, 1996).
Figure2. 1 Modified Satisfaction-Service Quality Model
Service literature shows lots of factors that indicate image in the customer’s mind (Jay & Dwl, 2000). Image is regarded to affect customers’ minds from the combined influence of advertising, public relations, physical image, word-of-mouth, and their actual experience with the goods and services (Normann, 1991). Similarly, Gronroos (1983), using numerous researches on service organization, found that service quality was the single most important determinant of image. Therefore, Jay and Dwl concluded that a customer’s experience with the products and services is considered to be the most important factor that influences his/her mind considering of image (Jay & Dwl, 2000). And some scholars mention that destination image affects tourists’ subjective perception, consequent behavior, and destination choice (e.g., Baloglu & McCleary, 1999; Castro, Armario, & Ruiz, 2007; Chon, 1990; Echtner & Ritchie, 1991; Milman & Pizarn, 1995; Woodside & Lysonski, 1989). Service is special and it has four dominant characteristics which are intangibility, inseparability, perishability and heterogeneity (Zeithaml, Parasuraman and Berry, 1985).
Intangibility— It means service is not readily displayable and cannot be tested, tried out in advance of purchase (compare with TV, bed, Computer those products which can be used before purchasing). So intangibility of service means less certainty for the customers. Customers need clues to persuade themselves to buy it, therefore, physical evidence is important to present the reliability and quality to make customers do a decision. Physical evidence like price, people, place, equipment, symbols can make intangible service tangible.
Inseparability— It means products and consumption happen in the same time and they can’t be separated.
Perishability— It means service cannot be stored compared with goods.
Heterogeneity— It means it is not able to standardize the service quality and make it consistency across providers or within providers, across time and across delivery centers.
While as Hurley and Estelami (1998) state that, service quality and customer satisfaction have not been explicitly defined or distinguished in the marketing literature. So it is obvious that there is still some confusion about the similarities and differences between these two concepts (J. Enrique Bigne, et al., 2001). Parasuraman, Zeithaml and Berry (1988), quoted in J. Enrique Bigne (2001, p. 608) states “while in the literature on satisfaction expectations are interpreted as prediction, in the literature on quality they are interpreted as wishes or an ideal result.” Moreover, Oliver (1997) points out service quality assessment is more specific (about particular elements or key factors), but customer satisfaction evaluation is more holistic.
For the definition of consumer satisfaction, Giese and Cote (2000) outline three general elements: (1) consumer satisfaction is a response, an emotional or cognitive judgement (emotional response predominating); (2) the response refers to a specific focus (the object of the consumer satisfaction); (3) the response id linked to a particular moment (prior to purchase, after purchase, after consumption, etc.). Giese and Cote (2000), quoted in J. Enrique Bigne (2001, p. 609) states that specific definition of consumer satisfaction need to be made according to the context, taking into account the above dimensions.
According to the literature review, another hypothesis is proposed:
H3: Hotel experience depends on service satisfaction and service reliability
H4: The tourists’ previous experience of accommodation in local hotels significantly influences the perceptual/cognitive and affective components of the perceived image of the tourist destination
3.6 Relationship between customer loyalty and customer behavior
Firstly, it is necessary to understand the definition of customer loyalty. Customer loyalty means the consistency of customer purchasing behavior, it shows the reliability and approvement of products and service and customers will insist purchasing and using the products as well as service in one organization for a long time, it is kind of degree of highly trust and loyalty in cognitive and perceptive aspect, it is also a comprehensive evaluation of advantages in the long time competitive situation from differernt organizations from the perspective of customers. Based on previous research, when there is a 5% increase in loyal customer, the organization can make 25% to 100%.more profits. Therefore, it is a very significant mission for corporate operators to maintain loyal customers.
As mentioned by Ann, e-Françoise and Audrain-Pontevia (2016), there are a number of academic writings have done the studies that growth in customer satisfaction leads to higher customer loyalty (Picon et al., 2014), then results to higher margin (Oliver, 1999), higher corporation value (Askoy et al., 2008) as well as strategic increase in the future (Malshe and Agarwal, 2015). Customer loyalty is defined as a “customer’s post-consumption evaluation of a product or service” (Mittal and Frennea, 2010, p. 3), and generally speaking, customer satisfaction has been regarded as a powerful predictive element about customer loyalty (Oliver, 1999; Zeithaml, 2000). Many literature review and practical clues show that customers with high satisfying experience and loyalty will buy more goods in a long period of time. (Anderson and Sullivan, 1993) and loyal customers can activate useful word-of-mouth effects on other potential customers (Anderson, 1996), are less sensitive to prices (Fornell et al., 1996), and are more receptive to cross-selling marketing (Fornell, 1992).
With the increasingly marketing competition, customer loyalty is a key factor to influence corporate’s long term profits. It is more meaningful to measure market share from customer loyalty rather than the quantity of customers. Organizations can emphasize the marketing strategies to increase customer loyalty in order to have competitive advantages in the fierce competition among other organizations since there are several benefits to make increase customer loyalty.
(1) Customer loyalty positively consolidate the present market
Organizations with high customer loyalty means a higher barrier for other organizations, because they need invest more money so as to attract original customers and this effort needs a consistent process and this challenge always make competitors weaker, therefore, customer loyalty can protect the present market share effectively.
(2) Customer loyalty positively decrease marketing costs
For loyal customer, organizations just need to care about their benefits and needs, and make them satisfied with the post-purchasing service. It does not cost much but it can bring beneficial results from the word-to mouth effect from loyal customers.
(3) Customers will not choose a new service in a short time
Customer are loyal to one specific organization not just because this organization can meet their needs but more importantly, this organization can provide added values to customer from satisfying service quality.
(4) Customer will not purchase lower products in a short time.
Loyal customers will not turn to buy lower products in a short time since they are less sensitive to prices (Fornell et al., 1996).
From the literature review above, we can see that loyal customers have potential to buy products and service for a long time and they are less changeable to another organization’s products and services, so we might address that there is relationship between customer loyalty and customer behavior.
Based on the definition of customer behavior on Wikipedia, consumer behavior is “The study of individuals, groups. Or organizations and he processes they use to select, secure, use, and dispose of products, services, experiences, or ideas to satisfy needs and the impacts that these processes have on the consumer and society.” Additionally, Michael Solomon (2013, P.6) made a deeper explanation of customer behavior definition, he indicates “consumer behavior is a process in its early stages of development, the field was often referred to as buyer behavior, reflecting an emphasis on the interaction between consumers and products at the time of purchase.”
In 2009, Laura A. Lake proposed a five-stage model of customers making their decision of buying something.
Stage1: Need recognition and awareness: It is the start of having the desire and recognition to buy what they want and having the awareness of what they need.
Stage 2: Searching for information: In the second period, customers will search the related information of the products and services they want and need through various means during the purchase process so as to know much about the products and service to make the purchase decision based on their personal demand.
Stage 3: Evaluating the alternatives: There are a lot of information can be searched, it is confusing for customer to choose the quantity, the price, the color, the design, the material of the product they want, so in this stage, comparison is very common among customers to decide what kind of products they really want and need.
Stage 4: Purchase: After all the above stages of making a decision to buy something, it is the stage to pay for the products and service that customers need.
Stage 5: Post-purchase evaluation: After customers buying the products or service, they will make an evaluation about what they have bought. If there is something wrong with the products and service, they are unsatisfied and may remorse with the purchase which is disadvantageous to attract customers to revisit.
Therefore, customer behavior is not a simple idea to make a decision to buy something while it is a complex process before, during and after the purchasing process.
After the definition and process of customer behavior, it is necessary to understand what factors can influence customer behavior in order to make related marketing business strategy to adopt. Buying behavior is also influenced by cognitive and evaluative components (Verhallen & Raaij Van, 1986). Nowadays, it is very common that people share their accommodation, traveling experience on social media like Facebook, Instagram or in some tourism website. Tripadvisor.com is a good platform for customers to share their hospitality and tourism opinions, as the website itself said that it is ‘‘the largest site for unbiased travel reviews (which) gives you the real story about hotels, attractions, and restaurants around the world. It boasts more than 1,926,031 unbiased reviews and is updated every minute and every day by real travelers; it contains ‘been there, done that’ inside information; and ‘the best deals for your travel dates’’’ (tripadvisor.com, 2005).
It is well known that behavior is governed and controlled by mental activity. Although the needs of customers are diverse and their purchasing behavior is various in the process of marketing business, all these actions are based on their mental activities. The American famous psychologist A·H·Maslow came up with a need hierarch in 1951. He states that there are different degrees of needs when determine to do something (Maslow, 1970). As Figure 2.2 showed below, self-actualization, safety, belongingness, esteem and physiological needs listed according to customer’s different degree of needs. And he indicates that people’s needs are developed from low level to high level, only when their low level’ s needs are satisfied then the high level of their needs will create.
Figure2. 2 Maslow's Need Hierarchy
Hotel image is the image and evaluation of public’s perspective about the hotel management process. If hotels want to have competitiveness and differentiate from other hotels, it is an efficient way to establish a good and special image.
There are some components of hotel image.
(1) Staff image. It includes the image of leaders in hotel, image of public relation employees. Leaders of hotel are the representatives of the hotel; their image indicates the hotel image. If leaders have good image, the hotel image will be better that is called “halo effect” in psychology. In addition, public relation staff in a hotel is not only an organizer but also an executor, they are representatives between hotel and the public to contact and communicate with them directly, therefore, they embody the hotel image in a way. What’s more, other staff often have face to face communication with customers, so they are also an important factor to show the hotel image.
(2) Management image. Hotel is a system management and it is controlled by hotel system. If hotel internal system can operate smoothly which shows the superior management ability can build a good image of hotel management.
(3) Power image. Power image can reflect in hotels facilities like building construction, facilities and equipment and so on, they are hardware to form hotel image. Besides, power image reflects in salary and welfare, if staff has high wage and good welfare which means the hotel has favorable economic benefits. Therefore, economic strength is the material foundation in order to build hotel image.
(4) Products and Service image. Products and service are the most important contents to consumers, they are representatives of hotel image and they can be easily evaluated by consumers, so it is another good way to establish hotel image as well through products and service image.
Staff image, management image, power image, products and service image are the factors to establish hotel image. Moreover, the name of hotel, hotel badge, hotel logo, advertising slogan and other factors are also the composition factors. These factors have interactions with each other to build the hotel image. Hotel image can be built through hotel corporate culture, institutional management and a series of business operation management activities to differentiate itself with other hotels to give a special expression to consumers and the public. The success of the hotel image building concerns the hotel operation performance and management ability, therefore, hotel should pay much attention to the hotel image.
Moreover, there are four characteristics of hotel image.
(1) There are subjective and objective contents of hotel image. In terms of objective part, hotel shows its image in the public invisibly, actually that is the hotel’s concrete objective condition, it includes the internal operation management and external marketing business as well as social activities of hotel. As for subjective part, it includes the judgement and evaluation from the public about the hotel, their judgement and evaluation are connected with their emotions and values, they have interaction.
(2) Hotel image is the comprehensive result from the judgement and evaluation of the public, there are many factors can influence the public’s perspective of the hotel, such as finance capabilities, service quality, environment, location, products quality and other factors. All these are the fundamental components of hotel image, hotel needs to make insistent effort and try their best to make good performance in order to satisfy their customers and leave the most pleasant impression on customers’ mind.
(3) Hotel image has the persistence characteristics which means once the hotel image is built, it is unchangeable in a short period, and once customers have their perspective about the hotel image, it is not easy to change their mind.
(4) The establishment of hotel image depends on various communication media. If hotels want more people know them, they need to use various media to advertise themselves to the public. Therefore, the establishment of hotel image is a communication process of hotel information in a way. Hotels delivery their information to the customer and the public, those people from knowing nothing about the hotel to knowing it, getting familiar with it and having deep impression about the hotel which is the goal of hotel to build its image.
From the above literature review, a good hotel image seems to influence customers’ buying behavior and the public’s loyalty about the products and service. A good hotel image means customers have acceptance of hotels before buying products if customers have loyalty about the hotel and its products which can help hotel gain the trust of market and improve its business reputation.
Therefore, another hypothesis is addressed following:
H5: Hotel image is positively related to customer loyalty.
Maslow's hierarchy of needs is a hierarchy of human needs from low to high. The lower level is the physiological need, the last is the need for security, love and belonging, respect and self realization. Self realization refers to the full realization of the potential of creation, the pursuit of self realization is the highest motivation.
The current hotel management also needs short board.
The current demand incentive mechanism is not perfect, the staff work intensity, wages are not high, welfare level is not high, incentive system is not perfect, etc.. Incentive and restraint mechanisms are divided, the lack of sense of belonging, so in response to these circumstances, we have to do a good job in the relevant systems and policies, so that the hotel staff to work together to develop the hotel business.
4. Marketing strategies and Characteristics
4.1 Marketing strategies
4.1.1 Brand strategy: brand image building
Maslow's theory divides demand into five levels five class levels , followed by a lower level to a higher level, from the hotel customer satisfaction strategy perspective, the hotel can provide different services and marketing to consumers in each demand level. Based on the needs of the consumer, the marketing method is based on the different needs of different marketing methods.
According to the five levels of demand, can be divided into the following five consumer markets: we will be based on the following specifically marketing planning services, to make specific analysis:
At present, some hotels have not yet unfold out sports leisure tourism projects, lack of awareness of the local tour hotel. Hotel employees, especially prove senior management level of management and marketing capabilities are the problem.
Today's local hotel industry is in a stage of rapid development, but also the era of the most marketing. Need to study and explore the hotel marketing strategy under the new situation.
4.1.1 Brand strategy: brand image building
To meet the social needs of Malos's theory in the req