Influence of customer relationship management dimensions on performance of five-star hotels in Nairobi County

Abstract

ABSTRACT The hotel industry today faces high level of competition; therefore, success will come only to those who can accurately study what consumers want by examining the environment continuously and offering the greatest value to customers. Estimates of above 600 million global tourists travel to various areas of the globe yearly, thus leading to an ever-increasing need for hospitality services. In 2016 the tourism industry contributed about 10% to GDP, 9% to formal wage employment and 3.5% to total employment in Kenya. Hotel industry today is waking up to consumers who require consistent delivery of the brand promise, changing needs and sensitivity to socio-political both regionally and internationally. They therefore have to consider acquiring customers on some factor other apart from produce price, quality or convenience. There has been a limited effort directed towards investigating the influence CRM dimensions has on the performance of five-star hotels in Nairobi. This study therefore sought to determine the influence of customer relationship management dimensions on the performance of five star hotels in Nairobi County. Specifically, the study sought to determine the influence of key customer focus, CRM organization, knowledge management and technology-based CRM on performance. It was guided by the Identify, Differentiate, Interact and Customize (IDIC) Theory. The study adopted a cross sectional descriptive survey design. The respondents comprised all the 40 top and middle level managers. The study employed a census approach. Primary data was collected from 40 respondents using semi- structured questionnaire. Descriptive statistics was used to analyze the four objectives and presented in tables. The findings indicated that key customer focus had the greatest influence on five-star hotel performance with an average rating of 4.37 and CRM Organization had the least influence with an average rating of 3.907. This implies that hotels in Nairobi County put great emphasis on customers in making major decisions that drive their business performance. The study concluded that customer relationship management dimensions are important factors in influencing performance of five- star hotels in Nairobi. The study recommends that hotels have budgets specifically for technology upgrading since majority of customers in this industry come from highly technologically developed countries. The study proposes that future research should be done on the importance of CRM dimensions as a tool of achieving competitive advantage in the hotel industry.