Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
individual customer relationships where the company can respond to needs by customizing
products and services to fi t each customer (Peppers
et al
. 1999). It also supports the recognition
of customers as co-producers by engaging with them in an individual way (Meuter
et al
. 2005).
The ability to respond to customers in this way is essential for gaining the competitive advantage
that comes from establishing and retaining long-term relationships. The communication
landscape has become more complicated as new technologies come into use and the number
of communication channels increases. While, for example, social media contribute value by
enhancing the one-on-one relationships that engage customers, they make communication
methods more diverse, more immediate and more complicated (Morgan and Chan 2011).
Business sources suggest that organizations are not putting effective strategies in place to deal
with a wider range of customer channel interfaces and thereby missing opportunities to
communicate effectively (Genesys 2002; Morgan and Chan 2011; Frary 2005).
Multiple communication channels such as e-mail, call centres and personal interaction offer
more opportunities for customers to communicate, but require enhanced planning to meet cus-
tomer needs (Buhalis and Licata 2002). Customers do not distinguish between channels and
anticipate that organizations should respond to them whether the interface is offl ine or online.
Delays in responding to customer concerns signifi cantly increase dissatisfaction and complaints
and lead to loss of loyalty (Cho Im and Hiltz 2003). Seamless integration across all channel inter-
faces is therefore a necessity (Reichheld
et al
. 2000), but becomes more of a problem in the age of
social networking where instant responses are anticipated (Frary 2005; Hvass and Munar 2012).
Despite the advantages of one-to-one communications in building individual relationships,
there are benefi ts to be gained from the use of one-to-many communication tools (Gurau
et al
.
2003). Signifi cant cost savings in SSTs can be made through the implementation of tools such as
FAQs. When well designed and maintained they can reduce call costs by posting answers to
customers' most frequent queries and thereby leave specialists to answer more diffi cult questions
(Buhalis and Licata 2002). This has a dual benefi t of reducing the load on call centres and
motivating staff to deal with more interesting and complex queries.
Maintaining loyalty and trust
Loyalty and trust are seen as essential elements of relationship management. Loyalty is earned by
organizations over time through repeated interactions and transactions (Vogt 2011) while trust is
identifi ed as the single most important factor in online customer relationships (Luck and
Lancaster 2003). Organizations can gain durable advantage if they demonstrate to their customers
that they understand the value of trust. Successful trust building can overcome the lack of
traditional face-to-face meetings in an online or SST environment, but requires that organizations
deliver on promises to sustain customer loyalty through delivering 'a consistently superior
customer experience' (Reichheld and Schefter in Luck and Lancaster 2003). An effective
method is to develop a trusted brand and, where applicable, to build on an established offl ine
brand (Reichheld
et al
. 2000). Where trust is lacking or lost, commitment to the relationship
from the customer is withdrawn (Vatanasombut
et al
. 2004). Loyalty depends initially on trust
and then requires that the organization identify the key drivers of customer allegiance. There are
several recognized strategies for building customer loyalty as follows.
Branding
The personal involvement of customers increases the opportunities to add value to a brand
by enabling identifi cation of features that appeal to the customer base (Buhalis and Licata 2002).
