Relationship Marketing

Abstract:
This academic paper describes and analyses the term ‘Relationship Marketing ' and ‘Quality of Service ' delivered to the customers in a hotel business. The New Year 's Event was organized by the Pavithra Hotel to attract new customers and retain them by providing them with the best quality service. The theory relationship marketing and quality of service are analyzed with the event and specifically how the hotel has built on its relationship marketing and provided good quality of service to its customers. Some recommendations are provided as to how the hotel can improve on its marketing issues and the advantages and disadvantages of implementing these recommendations with in the industry.
Introduction:

According to Peppers and Rogers (2004) customers have relationships with service providers, and these relationships can be simple and straight forward, or complex and emotional (Ball, Coelho & Vilares. 2004). This journal article explores the term ‘relationship marketing ' and ‘quality of the service ' products. The main aim in choosing these two topics were because this particular branch of the hotel was not doing very well when newly opened but after the New Year 's event organized by the hotel which was mainly to attract more customers to build on the relationship with customers and retain customers by providing the best quality service to the customers. This, in turn would enhance the productivity of the hotel. The paper also describes the event of New Year 's Event and is related to relationship marketing and the quality of the service offered to the customers. Recommendations are provided at the end to improve these service products to suit the current industry and enhance the performance in terms of relationship marketing and quality offered. The article is developed by referring some of the scholarly journal articles and also the real life event which took place.

Background -New Year 's Event (Pavithra Hotel, Bangalore):

Hotel

References: Altman, I. and Taylor, D.A. (1973), Social Penetration. The Development of Interpersonal Relationships, Holt, Rinehart and Winston, New York, NY. Anderson, J.C.(1995), " Relationships in business markets,exchange episodes, value creation, and their empirical assessment" , journal of the academy of marketing sciences, vol 23, no 4, pp346-50. Barnes, J.G. (1995), ``Establishing relationships ± getting closer to the customer may be more difficult than you think ' ', Irish Marketing Review, Vol. 8, pp. 107-16. Beatty, S.E., Mayer, M., Coleman, J.E., Reynolds, K.E. and Lee, J. (1996), ``Customer-sales associate retail relationships ' ', Journal of Retailing, Vol. 72 No. 3, pp. 223-47. Bitner, M.J., Booms, B.H. and Stanfield Tetreault, M. (1990), "The service encounter: diagnosing favorable and unfavorable incidents", Journal of Marketing, Vol. 54, January, pp. 71-84. Berry, L.L. (1995), "Relationship marketing of services – growing interest, emerging perspectives", Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, Vol. 23 No. 4, pp. 236-45. Biong, H. (1994), ‘The role of the salesperson within a long-term buyer-supplier relationship in the industrial market ', paper presented at the Relationship Marketing: Theory, Methods and Applications Conference, Emory University, Atlanta, GA. Clark, M. and Payne, A. (1994), "Achieving long-term customer loyalty: a strategic approach", working paper, Centre for Services Management, Cranfield School of Management, Cranfield Crosby, L.A Darby, M.R. and Karni, E. (1973), ``Free competition and the optimal amount of fraud ' ', Journal of Law and Economics, April, pp Dick, A. and Basu, K. (1994) Customer loyalty: toward an integrated conceptual framework, Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, 22(2), pp. 99–113. Ennew, C.T. and Binks, M.R. (1996), ``The impact of service quality and service characteristics on customer retention: small businesses and their banks in the UK ' ', British Journal of Management, Vol. 7, pp. 219-30. Gremler, D.D. and Gwinner, K.P. (1998), ``Customer-employee rapport in service industries: scale development, validation, and future directions ' ', paper presented at the Frontiers in Services, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN. Gwinner, K.P., Gremler, D.D. and Bitner, M.J. (1998), "Relational benefits in services industries: the customer 's perspective", Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, Vol Gronroos,C. 1991, "The marketing strategy continuum; toward a marketing concept", services marketing management decision, vol 29, pp 7-13. Gronroos,C Gwinner, K.P., Gremler, D.D. and Bitner, M.J. (1998), ``Relational benefits in services industries: the customer 's perspective ' ', Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, Vol. 26 No. 2, pp. 101-14. Holmlund, M. and Kock, S. (1995), ``Buyer perceived service quality in industrial networks ' ', Industrial Marketing Management, Vol. 24, pp. 109-21. Hennig-Thurau, T., Gwinner, K.P. and Gremler, D.D. (2002), "Understanding relationship marketing outcomes", Journal of Service Research, Vol. 4 No. 3, pp HaÊkansson, H. (Ed.) (1982), International Marketing and Purchasing of Industrial Goods. An Interaction Approach, John Wiley & Sons, Chichester. Izquierdo, C.C, Cillan ,J.G, Gutierrez, S.M.(2005), " The impact of customer relationship marketing on the firm performance: a Spanish case", journal of services marketing, vol 19, no 4 , pg 234. Liljander, V. and Roos, I. (2002), "Customer-relationship levels: from spurious to true relationships", Journal of Services Marketing, Vol. 16 No. 7, pp. 593-614. Morgan, R. & Hunt , S( 1994), " The commitment –trust theory of relationship marketing", journal of marketing, vol 58, july pp 20-38. Peppers, D. and Rogers, M. (2004), Managing Customer Relationships, Wiley, Hoboken, NJ. Peterson, R.A. (1995), "Relationship marketing and the consumer", Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, Vol. 23 No. 4, pp. 278-81. Parasuraman, A., Zeithaml, V.A. and Berry, L.L. (1985), ``A conceptual model of service quality and its implications for future research ' ', Journal of Marketing, Vol. 49, Fall, pp. 41-50. Richards, T.(1998), " Buying loyalty versus building commitment. Developing the optimum retention strategy", marketing and research today, feb pp 43-51. Reichheld, F.F. (1996), The Loyalty Effect, Harvard Business School Press, Boston, MA. Reichheld, F.F. and Sasser, W.E.J. (1990), ``Zero defections: quality comes to services ' ', Harvard Business Review, September-October, pp. 105-11. Reynolds, K. and Arnold, M. (2000) Customer loyalty to the salesperson and the store: examining relationship customers in an upscale retail context, Journal of Personal Selling & Sales Management, 20(2), pp Sheth,J.N &Parvatiyar , A(1995), " Relationship marketing in consumer marketing, antecedents and consequences", journal of the academy of marketing science,vol 23, no 4 pp 255-71. Sivadas, E. and Baker-Prewitt, J. (2000) An examination of the relationship between service quality, customer satisfaction, and store loyalty, International Journal of Retail & Distribution Management, 28(2), pp. 73–82. Kaj Storbacka, Tore Strandvik and Christian Grönroos, 1994 Managing Customer Relationships for Profit: The Dynamics of Relationship Quality, International Journal of Service Industry Management, Vol. 5 No. 5, , pp. 21-38, Zeithaml, V.A., Berry, L.L