Purpose of the report
Discuss about the concept of home.
Hospitality is known as a friendly gesture that is being showered to people, who are raveling away from their home. Hospitality sector along with the travel and tourism sector has contributed maximum to the world economy and has created maximum amount of jobs. According to the data of World Travel and Tourism Council (2017), these sectors have contributed $7.6 trillion and 292 million jobs worldwide in the year 2016. This industry contributed to worlds GDP by 10.2% and 1 in every 10th job was related to hospitality and tourism. Australia is on rank 12 within 185 countries worldwide and the hospitality and tourism sector has contributed with 10.9% of total contribution to the nation’s economy in the year 2016 (World Travel and Tourism council 2018). The investment in this sector was estimated to rise by 14% in the year 2017; however, the job expectancy is estimated to fall by 0.3 percent. Therefore, it is evident hospitality has emerged as the main industry for the developing and developed nations to generate revenues and increase their GDP growth (Australian Bureau of Statistics 2018).
While providing the quality care and accommodation, the leading hospitality businesses are marketing themselves as home or someone who provides homely environment. This concept is modern in the hospitality industry and one of the most trending concepts that every hospitality business is trying to accommodate worldwide. According to the ratings of Tripadvisor, maximum of the travelers are looking for homely ambiance and comfort in rooms nowadays and therefore it has become the leading trend in the hospitality business of modern travel and tourism industry. The purpose of this report is to research about the concept of home in hospitality industry and find out the ways using, which, it is influencing such businesses to earn revenues. Further, as a consultant of the hotel Spicers vineyard estates, situated in New South Wales, Australia, recommendations from the research will be provided to the hotel to adapt to this modern trend.
The hotel Spicers vineyard estates is situated in the valley of Hunter vineyard and is completely traditional and unique lodge. The uniqueness of this luxurious property lies within comfortable accommodation, luxurious dine cuisine, exclusive wine experiences and delightful sceneries (Spicers Vineyards Estate 2016). It provides the guests with the facility to enjoy horse riding, golf, hot air ballooning and many activities that are more attractive. Other than these facilities, the hotel provides a modern Australian cuisine restaurant to its younger generation guests so that they did not feel left out or unattended (Spicers Vineyards Estate 2016). Despite of these factors, there are 3 percent people, who feel that their stay in the hotel was disappointing and 9 percent rated their stay in the hotel as average. Therefore, it is evident that there are several factors that need to be applied within the hotel facilities so that those customers providing negative reviews can be satisfied.
Background of the hotel
With the expansion of tourism industry, the hotels and resorts are getting the opportunity to improve upon their business. Effective and high quality customer service is considered to be the primary need of the hotels and tourism business. The concept of home has therefore been introduced in the hotel industry in order to provide distinctive customer experience strategy (Andriotis and Agiomirgianakis 2014). This is believed to be one of the essential steps to implement competitive advantage business policy for all major hotels resorts.
Kandampully et al. (2015), have mentioned in this regard that hospitality and residential design are becoming attached with each other. This is aimed to provide better level of comfort and coziness to the guests. It has also been seen that due to Limited economic capability most of the tourists as referring to spend their tour time with the hotel rooms. This is mainly due to the home like experience that has been provided by most of the hotels. The improve develop customer service has encouraged many of the tourist to spend more time in the hotel room as a part of their relaxation activity. There also has been changed in the pattern of recruitment and training given to the hotel staffs. This can help them to improve upon their individual capability of providing effective room service to the guest.
Amblee (2015), has highlighted up on the importance of safety and security, which is needed to provide a friendly atmosphere within the hotels and resort. There also has been high degree of diversity, which provides opportunity for the best to choose from a wide range of rooms. There can be modular sleeping areas, which allows the guests to enjoy high level of privacy. There is also the option for staying with huge groups and friends and families.
The main of the current hospitality industry is to provide all basic home amenities within the hotels, which will encourage the guest to stay for longer duration. The hospitality industry is closely related to that of the home, where the Hotel Management acts as the host to provide all basic service amenities. People who are staying away from home, need to have higher level of security for dealing with the basic amenities that they carry. People also need high level of security for all business visit, along with high level of Hotel service for staying in longer duration.
Better level of Hotel service is also required to maintain sustainability in the business. Hence, it can be said that the hotel and resorts, which are able to provide better home like experience is likely to gain more competitive advantage (Nikolaidis et al. 2016). Eco friendly procedures are also essential steps that are needed to deal with the issues related with that of environmental degradation. The quality of the customer service is considered to be the essential element of providing home like experience in hotel. The Hotel star services possible for providing a clean and healthy atmosphere with every rooms.
The concept of home
In order to maintain home like experience in the hotel the Spicers Vineyards Estate, it is essential to bring about change in the human resource management. The hotel has to recruit more number of staffs.
Using data to identify specific need of the customers
Collection of essential data is believed to be highly essential in the context of providing effective customer service to the hotel industry. This can be implemented in the process of conducting online survey from the customers. The market researchers need to set up a definite Framework for questionnaires that will help to collect essential feedback on the customers about their demand. It will therefore be possible for the hotel to understand the essential requirements of the guests (Erevelles et al. 2016).
It is also essential to consider the fact that there is different type of guests, who visit the Hotel each year. These include Tourists and business parties. It is essential to conduct separate market online survey in order to understand the need of every group. The pricing strategy also has to be implemented accordingly depending upon the demand level of the customers. For example, for business class parties, who are planning to stay for longer duration, will need to be given packages.
Understanding of customer journey for each type of customer segment
As different type of customer visits the hotel in the form of guest, it is essential for the hotel management to understand the journey pattern. For example, the guests who are visiting from nearby places, do not need extra amenities. On the other hand, the guests who are visiting from long distance need to be given all kind of amenities that include high level of security as they will be carrying important languages. For business class people it is also essential to provide even higher levels of security with the help of digital locker, it will help them to secure on essential business documents.
Once the company is able to provide all the basic amenities to the customers, they can plan to establish long term relationship with their guests. The customer journey mapping system is essential in the given context, which can help them to accurately measure the need of every customer group (Bernard and Andritsos 2017).
Source: (Bernard and Andritso 2017)
Planning is also believed to be an essential part of the customer journey. This will help them to better prepare for all future Journeys and thereby assist in the process of advance booking.
How Spicers Vineyard estates can use this concept
Prioritizing Actionable Business Opportunities to Improve the Customer Experience
It is essential to improve the level of customer experience, which is achieved by the process of increasing customer acquisition (Hyun and Perdue 2017). This is achieved by the process of implementing advanced level of technological infrastructure. The customer will therefore be able to connect to the hotel management through online booking system. Launching of mobile phone applications will allow the customers to check the availability of room on any particular date. There will also be added benefit that include providing loyalty benefit program, which will help the regular visiting guests of the hotel. One of the best way of having competitive advantage in the tourism industry of Australia is to retain the customers.
In order to provide better customer service at every stage, the hotel management need to provide personalized care to every guest. This can be achieved by providing effective room service quality. As the management is able to provide better understanding of the exact requirement of guests, they are able to provide satisfactory customer service.
In order to provide home like experience the hotel management of Spicers Vineyards Estate need to optimize the guest experience. In the initial step it is essential to recruit more number of Hotel staffs. This will be highly effective in providing personal level of customer care. During the process of recruitment, it is essential to focus upon the communication skills of the hotel staffs (Kneževi? et al. 2015). As the Hotel Management is able to effectively communicate with the customers, they are able to understand their requirement properly and fulfill their exact need.
The feedbacks that are provided by the customers after they visit the hotel need to be analyzed properly with market researchers. This will help them in processing of all the raw data that are available through the online and offline surveys. It is therefore possible to track the performance level of the hotel staff and the quality of their behavior with the guests. Special focus need to be given in each customer segment, which requires different level of care. This can be understood by proper segmentation of the customer and prioritizing their needs. Advanced levels of database can be implicated that are needed to store the data for future usages.
Conclusion
In the concluding note it can be said that, in the recent trends of tourism industry the concept of home is becoming Highly popular in the hotels and resorts segments. This is mostly achieved by providing effective level of customer service and ensuring personalized care to each segment of customer. Advanced level of business communication is also required in order to understand the requirement of each segment of guests that visit in Spicers Vineyards Estate.
Using effective technological infrastructure are also needed to conduct market research and customer survey. This is required to collect essential information net is needed to improve the quality of existing customer service.
References
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