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International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management
Customer experience management in hospitality: a literature synthesis, new understanding, and
research agenda
Jay Kandampully, Tingting(Christina) Zhang, Elina Jaakkola,
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Customer Experience Management in Hospitality:
A Literature Synthesis, New Understanding, and Research Agenda
Submitted: 08 October 2015
1
st
Revision: 25 April 2016
2
nd
Revision: 05 October 2016
3
rd
Revision: 03 February 2017
Accepted: 04 March 2017
Abstract
Purpose—In the contemporary hospitality industry, superior customer experiences are essential
to gaining customer loyalty and achieving a competitive advantage. However, limited research
addresses this subject. The aim of this study is to advance scholarly research on customer
experience management (CEM) in the hospitality field by providing a comprehensive overview
of the key elements of CEM, a framework for managing customer experience, and a rich agenda
for research.
Design/methodology/approach—An extensive literature review produces a comprehensive
overview of existing knowledge of CEM. A synthesis of prior literature reveals a need for
additional, contemporary information sources. The study is therefore supplemented by invited
commentaries on CEM from senior scholars and hospitality managers.
Findings—The proposed model takes a holistic perspective on managing a positive customer
experience, through collaboration among marketing, operations, design, human resources, and
strategy, in association with technology and social media.
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Research implications—The literature review and commentaries from leading experts reveal six
areas for further research on CEM in the hospitality industry.
Originality/value—This study provides a comprehensive, systematic review of CEM literature
and detailed understanding of the mechanisms for managing customer experiences in the
hospitality industry. It integrates state-of-the-art CEM knowledge in the generic business context,
along with principles of hospitality management, and advances CEM research by emphasizing
the need for collaboration among marketing, operations, and human resources.
Keywords: Customer experience management, hospitality, customer-to-customer relationships,
social media and technology.
Paper type: Conceptual research paper
Introduction
Firms are recognizing the critical roles played by positive customer experiences—and
subsequent word of mouth—across all industry sectors (Teixeira et al., 2012). Today’s
technology-driven, digitally advanced customers expect personalized experiences at every point
of interaction. A survey by Gartner (2014) shows that 89% of firms expect to compete primarily
on the basis of customer experience, and it is now one of the key strategies adopted by
hospitality firms: leading firms such as Marriott, Hilton, Starbucks, Disney, and Starwood excel
by creating a distinctive customer experience both offline and online. Although it is a nascent
field, customer experience management has become a key interest also in academia (Grewal et
al., 2009; Puccinelli et al., 2009; Jaakkola et al., 2015), highlighted by the Marketing Science
Institute as a “tier 1 research priority” for theory and practice for 2014–2016 (MSI, 2016).
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From a marketing perspective, customers are the reason for the firm’s existence, and “to
satisfy the customer is the mission and purpose of every business” (Drucker, 1973, p. 79). Yet
satisfying the customer ultimately has limited effects on the firm’s competitive advantage in the
market. Instead, positive customer experiences offer a more powerful concept for explaining
firms’ market performance (Verleye, 2015). Providing compelling CE can set a firm apart from
its competitors (Schmitt, 2010), and superior CE has been acknowledged as key to gaining
customer loyalty (Klaus and Maklan, 2011). Practitioners hail customer experience management
(CEM) as one of the most promising approaches for consumer industries (Homburg et al., 2015).
Customer experience (CE) reflects the customer’s journey through all interactions with the
firm—pre-consumption, consumption, and post-consumption (Kandampully and Solnet, 2015).
CE is therefore more than the result of a single encounter: it is affected by every episode of the
customer’s interaction process with a firm (Verhoef et al., 2009) and often is co-created through
interactional activities among actors (Ponsignon et al., 2015). The CE in hospitality settings is
not derived solely from food, beverage, accommodation, and entertainment but also from a
myriad of supporting features and processes, such as websites, technology, online and offline
interactions, in-room entertainment, facility designs, and interactions with service personnel and
other customers. Management of CE thus is a complicated task for hospitality firms. Indeed,
Forrester Research (2014) reveals that most customer experience initiatives fail; very few
companies reach the stage of customer experience management maturity. The topic therefore
warrants further academic attention.
Despite its importance, academic research on CEM in hospitality fields is limited, with little
integration of the CEM research with principles of hospitality management. The current article
seeks to advance scholarly research on CEM through an extensive review and synthesis of
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fragmented CEM research in hospitality management and business management. We provide a
comprehensive overview of state-of-the-art knowledge on CEM and identify its emerging
directions in both research and practice, complementing the review with commentaries from
senior academics and hotel general managers. In this manner, we extend understanding on
customer experience management in the hospitality industry.
This analysis highlights the diversity of disciplinary approaches to CEM in the hospitality
context and demonstrates the importance of bringing together marketing, operations, human
resources, and technology to manage customer experiences. Ultimately, this study broadens
current perspectives by providing a detailed understanding of the mechanisms for managing
customer experience in the hospitality industry.
Methodology
To map existing research knowledge and emerging CEM topics, we undertook an extensive
review of literature and combined it with invited commentaries from a selection of leading
hospitality scholars and hotel general managers. We identified research relevant to our study
purposes, analysed and synthesized the research findings, and developed conceptualizations and
conclusions on the basis of this evidence (Denyer and Tranfield, 2009).
To identify relevant research, we performed an article search in October 2014, using the
Business Source Complete (EBSCO) and ProQuest databases. We supplemented the initial
search with a new search in February 2016 in the Scopus and Web of Science databases.
Together, these databases offered a comprehensive range of business-related, peer-reviewed
journals. Focusing on CEM research, we searched for titles, abstracts, and keywords that
featured some combination of the search words “customer experience” and “management.”
Because CEM is a relatively new topic, most relevant articles have been published in the past 25
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years. Therefore, we narrowed our search to literature published between January 1990 and
December 2015. The searches returned a total of 571 hits (see Table 1).
PLEASE INSERT TABLE 1 HERE
Next, we screened the 571 articles to select papers for detailed analysis. Following
Guillet and Mohammed (2015), we limited the evidence base to international peer-reviewed
journal articles, for two reasons. First, we assumed that scholarly works such as research notes,
commentaries, book reviews, and reprinted articles do not make original or significant
contributions to knowledge development (Tsang and Hsu, 2011). Second, we assumed that in
comparison with books and edited monographs, academic journals represent the most advanced
source of knowledge in any field (Mustak et al. 2013). Our next step was to remove duplicate
entries. We then reviewed titles, abstracts, introductions, and conclusions of the articles to
determine their relevance, that is, whether customer experience management was among their
key topics (Denyer and Tranfield, 2009). This screening produced 59 articles for further analysis
(see Appendix A).
Torraco (2005) calls for reviews that examine literature according to a particular lens,
defined by the objectives, to focus on specific aspects of previous research for critical evaluation.
Accordingly, our analysis involved three stages. First, we sought an overview of published CEM
research, by examining the study context, the definition of CEM, and the literature base or
theoretical approach of the papers in the sample. Second, we separately assessed studies in the
hospitality context (9) and other contexts (49), to identify specific features or determinants of
CEM, as well as which CEM topics were examined in the hospitality context relative to broader
CEM literature. From this effort, we developed a comprehensive overview of the key aspects of
CEM in hospitality and formulated questions for continued research into CEM. Because we
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aimed not merely to summarize what is already known in the hospitality field but also to explore
potential new avenues for CEM research, we expanded our literature review beyond studies in
hospitality. By incorporating research outside the hospitality context, we were able to gain
insights from other sectors.
The study obviously has some limitations arising from the chosen research approach.
Conducting a literature review by using selected keywords inevitably means that some relevant
papers that used different terminologies may have been missed. We used four databases to
achieve as wide cover of relevant literature as possible, but research published for example in
book chapters or conference proceedings, or written in other languages was excluded from this
study. Nevertheless, the review method allowed us to achieve a good cover of relevant
peer-reviewed research on the topic, and focus on a manageable number of papers to analyse.
To complement and enrich the literature review, we invited established scholars and
practitioners in the field to submit short commentaries on the topic of CEM. From a
methodological standpoint, this “reflections of experts” procedure is fairly new for the
hospitality discipline. The infusion of expert opinions, knowledge, and descriptions of
managerial practices increased the external validity of our findings and allowed us to gain insight
into timely, emerging topics not yet observable in existing journal publications.
From academia, we chose eight professors who represent four key approaches to hospitality
research: marketing, operations and design, human resources and strategy, and technology and
social media. Each invited scholar is a distinguished expert in the selected area, as demonstrated
by, for example, numerous widely cited articles and influence in key hospitality journals,
education, or industry affiliations (see Appendix B). Our list is naturally not exhaustive but also
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other scholars could have been invited; our aim was to approach a broad set of scholars who
could provide complementary perspectives. The invited scholars (listed alphabetically) were:
• Srikanth Beldona, University of Delaware, United States (technology)
• Byron Keating, Australian National University, Australia (operations and design)
• Bonnie Knutson, Michigan State University, United States (marketing)
• Anna Mattila, Pennsylvania State University, United States (marketing)
• Khaldoon Nusair, Sultan Qaboos University, Oman (social media)
• Chris Roberts, DePaul University, United States (strategy)
• David Solnet, University of Queensland, Australia (human resources)
• Beverley Sparks, Griffith University, Australia (marketing)
We contacted these scholars by e-mail in August 2015. Each scholar agreed to provide a
short, written commentary that summarized his or her views on the meaning and influence of
CEM in the field, as well as predictions about future CEM developments that likely will be
important for research, practice, or society.
In February 2016, we contacted (by e-mail) general managers in high profile full-service
hotel companies in the hospitality industry. We chose senior managers from full-service hotels,
because such hotels offer multiple hospitality services such as accommodation, restaurants, bars,
café, events, and conferences. Therefore, their managers represent perspectives from multiple
hospitality sectors.
The commentary request began with explaining the goal of the study. Managers were asked
to briefly describe what aspects they find most essential in their company’s CEM efforts and
what they regard as important issues or problems related to CEM that academic research should
tackle in the future. We contacted a total of 12 managers, of whom eight provided commentaries.
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The commentaries primarily reflected their company policies and priorities. To protect the
informants’ anonymity, the managers’ names and company names are not included; we refer to
them as hotels a, b, c, d, e, f, g, and h.
We analysed a total of 16 commentaries, from eight academics and eight practitioners, to
identify important themes and aspects of CEM in a hospitality context. In particular, we relied on
the commentaries to identify emerging research topics. We read the commentaries and used
thematic content analysis (Kolbe and Burnett, 1991) to identify and categorize themes; we then
compared and revised the themes until we found common perceptions. The commentaries are not
empirical research data, and we do not claim that the views of our informants are generalizable
to the industry as a whole. The role of the commentaries is to broaden the study’s perspective and
identify issues related to the phenomenon. Excerpts from these commentaries are incorporated
throughout this text.
Defining customer experience management
“Customer experience is an elusive and indistinct notion. It’s a difficult construct to
define, let alone measure, because of its multiple elements and individualized, personal
nature. Think about the last time you went to a movie with someone. You both sat in the
same theatre, ate the same popcorn, and saw the same film, yet you each walked out with
a totally different experience. This is because each consumer is unique. Each person
brings a different background, values, attitudes, and beliefs to the situation; everyone
experiences it through individualized ‘rose-colored glasses.’" (Bonnie J. Knutson)
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Professor Knutson captures the elusive nature of customer experience. A multitude of CE
definitions appear in literature; Gentile et al. (2007), for example, propose that customer
experience consists of interactions between customers and companies. Through their various
interactions with firms, customers develop sentiments that reflect their involvement from rational,
emotional, sensorial, physical, or spiritual angles. Meyer and Schwager (2007) stated that
customer experience refers to internal feelings of customers when facing various interactions
with firms, whether direct (e.g., usage, service consumption, purchase) or indirect (e.g., online
reviews, word-of-mouth, advertising). According to this definition, companies that compete to
achieve a satisfactory customer experience must orchestrate all customer contacts, direct or
indirect, during the service process. Therefore, the customer experience construct should be
holistic and involve customers’ cognitive, affective, emotional, social, and physical (behavioural)
responses. Managing customer experiences might not be completely under firms’ control; it
might involve elements that companies have difficulty influencing, such as other customers in
the service setting (Harris and Daunt, 2013) or online reviews (Sparks and Browning, 2011).
Verhoef et al. (2009) note that customer experience encompasses activities in different
stages, such as search, purchase, consumption, disposition, and other related activities. Puccinelli
et al. (2009) examine customer experience from a consumer behaviour perspective and connect
specific aspects of those behaviours— “goals, schema, information processing, memory,
involvement, attitudes, atmospherics, consumer attributions, and choices” (p.15)—with CEM
strategies. According to Grewal et al. (2009), because customer experience encompasses every
moment of truth in which customers interact with a firm, product, or service, CEM must entail a
business strategy that results in a mutually beneficial relationship between the firm and its
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customers. Palmer (2010) suggests three key constructs—involvement, emotions, and
interpersonal relationships—that either parallel or contribute to customer experience.
Resent research suggests that customer experience is derived not only from interactions in
employee–customer dyads but also from broader networks of actors, stakeholders, customers,
suppliers, managers, frontline employees, and brands (Jaakkola et al., 2015; Verleye, 2015). This
interactive, co-created perspective reflects the rise of customer collectives organized around
shared interests and complicated service delivery networks that encourage various suppliers and
providers to contribute to the creation of customer experiences (Akaka et al., 2015; Verleye,
2015). Customer experience is the result of co-creation during interactions among customers,
employees, and a range of other stakeholders (Carù and Cova, 2015). Therefore, customer
experience management in contemporary markets must go beyond the customer–provider dyad
and service encounters.
Disciplinary Perspectives on Customer Experience Management
Our review of extant research reveals that CEM studies reflect three disciplinary
perspectives: marketing (including technology and social media), operations (including service
design), and human resources (including organizational behaviour and strategy) (see Table 1).
Marketing scholars study the positive implications of creating superior customer experiences and
advocate for the importance of this concept (Grewal et al., 2009; Klaus and Maklan, 2013).
Several studies connect customer experience to the management of customer relationships in
multichannel environments, noting the importance of insights into the experiences customers
have through various encounters with firms or brands (Chan, 2005; Frow and Payne, 2007).
Retailing research with a marketing focus also addresses constructs that affect customer
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experiences, with a strong emphasis on characteristics and stimuli in the servicescape (Baskaran,
2011; Verhoef et al., 2009).
The operations management perspective directs attention to service delivery and the role of
service design in facilitating superior customer experiences (Teixeira et al., 2012). In this view,
customer experiences are created during the navigation of the service process; the smoothness
and efficiency of the process is a key concern for managers, especially when the service involves
multiple channels and service providers (Patrício et al., 2008).
Studies that draw their theoretical foundation from human resource management (HRM)
research highlight the importance of the people factor, that is, of employees within the
organization who help shape customer experiences. The HRM perspective also emphasizes the
importance of selecting service-minded employees and providing them with service-focused
training; in addition to an empowered environment and the overall service climate, such factors
are critical for managing customer experiences (Gazzoli et al., 2013; Zhang, Bai, and Lu, 2014).
Table 2 illustrates the various disciplines that inform effective CEM. It also shows that
extant research has focused mainly on a single perspective; studies that integrate multiple
perspectives are rare.
PLEASE INSERT TABLE 2 HERE
Key Aspects of CEM in the Hospitality Context
Although hoteliers and restaurant managers embrace CEM as a key goal (Bharwani and
Jauhari, 2013), only a limited number of hospitality studies focus on CEM (Johnson et al., 2009;
So and King, 2010). The following section provides a summary of the few studies that explicitly
address CEM in the hospitality sector.
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Johnson et al. (2009) examine the management of service quality and emotions across
customer relationships. They find that it is important to balance service quality and price to
enhance joyful experiences. Ryu and Jang’s (2008) study reveals six service facility factors—
aesthetics, ambience, lighting, service product, layout and social—that have positive influence
on customers’ perception of upscale restaurant experiences. Morgan et al. (2008) examine the
role of employees, processes, and physical evidence and how they can be used to manage
customer’s meal experiences in dining rooms.
Using a case study of Ritz Carlton Hotels, Nixon and Rieple (2010) highlight the
importance of service design and systems that help create employee customer engagement and
manage customer experiences. Johansson and Naslund (2009) show how cruise ship experiences
are created by the effective management of spaces, passengers, and emotions (emotional labour
of the service providers). So and King (2010) develop a measure to evaluate hotel brand equity
as an outcome of brand strategies. Their findings suggest that customer experience can be
influenced by three service dimensions: core, servicescape, and employee. Nicholls (2011)
examines the role of culture and the value it brings to customer-to-customer interaction and its
subsequent influence on CE in the hospitality industry.
With a conceptual model to test customer experiences in a coffee outlet, Sathish and
Venkatesakumar (2011) find that a customer’s coffee experience—and resulting level of
satisfaction and loyalty—is influenced by employee interaction and product quality. Miao et al.
(2014) examine hedonic aspects of hospitality consumption experience at pre-consumption,
during, and post-consumption phases and find a hedonic value dynamic over the course of the
experience. These findings are summarized in Table 3.
PLEASE INSERT TABLE 3 HERE
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As Table 3 highlights, research on CEM in the hospitality field is limited. However,
researchers and managers have pointed out that CEM is particularly important for the hospitality
industry (Bharwani and Jauhari, 2013; Kandampully et al., 2015), because it entails extensive
customer–employee relationships (Bujisic et al., 2014) and service aspects that are integral to the
hospitality experience (Kandampully et al., 2014). Hospitality services involve relatively longer
interactions between customers and employees, which provides unique opportunities to create
relationships. Thus, customer–employee relationships often contribute to customers’ positive
experience (Hur et al., 2015). In service contexts, shared experiences between customers and
employees result in the co-creation of memorable experiences (McColl-Kennedy et al., 2015).
Thus employees help create unique, memorable experiences (Bharwani and Jauhari, 2013). In
most hospitality services, experiences are created not just by firm and their employees but also
by other customers; customer-to-customer interaction is critical to the hospitality experience
(McMillan et al., 2011). We therefore expand this understanding by drawing on insights from
CEM literature as well as commentaries from scholars and practitioners. Four themes emerge
from this synthesis that have implications on CEM in the hospitality context:
1) Service aspects are integral to the hospitality experience.
2) Employees’ role is imperative in creating unique and memorable experiences in the
hospitality industry.
3) Hospitality service involves extensive customer–employee relationships.
4) Customer-to-customer interaction is a critical part of hospitality experience.
The following sections provide detailed discussions of these themes (see Table 4).
PLEASE INSERT TABLE 4 HERE
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Service aspects are integral to the hospitality experience
As we noted previously, service is integral to a hospitality experience. Within hospitality
contexts, many typical service research topics such as service quality (Johnson et al. 2009),
servicescape factors (Ryu and Jang, 2008; Morgan et al., 2008), and service design (Nixon and
Rieple, 2010) emerge as pivotal determinants of customer experience. A service orientation is an
organization-wide embrace of policies, practices, systems, people, and behaviours focused on
service, to ensure customer satisfaction (Carraher et al., 1998; Fearon et al., 2013; Homburg et
al., 2002; Kim et al., 2012; Lytle et al., 1998). As a core component of hospitality, service is
essential to ensure that customers perceive value and also is critical for long-term business
sustainability (Ariffin et al., 2013; Salem-Mhamdia and Ghadhab, 2012):
“The only proven way to manage best customer experience is through legendary service
which is also known as operations excellence” (Hotel-d)
Because of the importance of service to hospitality experiences, a service climate is also
pivotal. A service climate is defined as the subjective perception of organizational support that
employees receive from the firm, in the form of policies, practices, and procedures (He et al.,
2011; Schneider et al., 1998) that create unique environments in which employees become
customer-focused or service-minded after receiving organizational resources, such as
empowerment or managerial assistance. Therefore, a service climate is not an organizational
attribute, instead, it is an individual attribute; its measurement is the perceptions of individual’s
psychology rather than organizational features. The creation of an appropriate service climate is
a key aspect of CEM in the hospitality industry.
Employees’ role in creating unique and memorable experiences in the hospitality industry
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Both theory and practice have recognized the growing importance of employees not only
from an operational perspective but also from the perspective of value that leads to business
success (Karatepe, 2013). Hospitality employees engage in frequent, intimate interactions with
customers (Satish and Venkatesakumar (2011) and are therefore in key position to ensure
customer satisfaction (Tsai, 2013) and prompt repeat business and customer loyalty (Van Doorn
et al., 2010).
Employees act as an interface that provides positive customer experiences and gains
customer commitment (Bharwani and Jauhari, 2013). During service delivery, employees
guarantee service quality and live up to customer expectations (He et al., 2011; Jung and Yoon,
2015; Namasivayam et al., 2014). They also act as brand ambassadors (Veleva et al., 2012) who
deliver value and maintain the corporate or brand image (De Roeck et al., 2013; Harris, 2007).
Employees are thereby primary drivers of competitive advantage, accentuating the importance of
attracting the right employees (He et al., 2011). This notion is reaffirmed by Professor Solnet:
“Having spent many years working in the service sector I have always known that what is
in the mind of the service employee undoubtedly ‘leaks out’ to the customer. The
importance of the connection between worker attitude and customer experience was well
argued by Ben Schneider and David Bowen in the mid 1990s. Their contention was that
in service organization, there are ‘flimsy and permeable boundaries’ [1993: 40] between
the organization and its customers, so that having the right people in the right jobs who
are motivated to try hard and are committed to the firm is critical.” (David Solnet)
Scholars have sought to identify factors that influence indicators of employee commitment
and engagement, such as reduction of employee turnover (Jung and Yoon, 2015; Karatepe, 2013),
retention (Deery and Jago, 2015; Milman and Dickson, 2014) and citizenship behaviour (Hui et
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al., 2014; Liu and Tsaur, 2014; Wang, 2014). In particular, fun at work appears essential for
enhancing employee motivation and productivity while reducing their stress. A fun working
environment is a frequently cited employee need, and according to employees, the boundaries
between work and play are melting away (So and King, 2010). In many cases, fun at work
creates an environment that promotes an organizational culture, leading to positive experiences
in the workplace. As a hotel manager notes: “Nurturing our culture is our first priority among our
associates by engaging their hearts and minds” (Hotel-d).
Employees share their experiences, both with co-workers and during the co-creation of
value to create memorable experiences with customers (Akaka et al., 2015). Because employees’
experiences at work are key success factors for service firms (e.g., Zappos.com; Perschel, 2010),
managing human resources within the service organization is critical to managing customer
experiences in the hospitality industry.
Hospitality service involve extensive customer–employee relationships
In highly interactive services, such as hospitality, the service quality that customers perceive
depends greatly on their interactions and subsequent relationships with employees. Customer–
employee interactions serve as unique moments of truth, as a hotel manager notes, “Regardless
of our technological advancements, human interaction will continue to be the most crucial aspect
of providing a unique customer experience” (Hotel-a).
More interpersonal interactions over time influence customers’ emotional consideration of
the service firm (Powell and Greenhaus, 2012; Shemwell et al., 1999; Johnson et al., 2009),
because consumers often lack the skills, expertise, or education needed to evaluate the service
immediately (Powell and Greenhaus, 2012). Only through on-going interaction and mutual
dependence can service providers and customers form strong emotional bonds and trust
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(Kandampully et al., 2015; Shemwell et al., 1999). Both Professors Roberts and Solnet note the
role of emotions in customer–employee interactions:
“Central to service-based firms is the role of the employee with the guest. However,
current understanding about this guest/employee interaction suggests that there is more
going on than just what these independent domains may explain. There is human emotion
and memory at play, too, creating an experience based upon the interaction of these
business domains. Both customer and worker share this emotional and memorable
experience. Thus, as a memory, it can carry over to future interactions with other
customers or workers—for good or for bad.” (Chris Roberts)
“Researchers have become more sophisticated and scientific in relation to the human
resource connection to service and customer experience and have introduced a
psychological perspective. For example, it is understood that authentic emotional displays
by service employees are critical to the way the customer experience is developed and
evaluated (Hennig-Thurau et al., 2006). In addition, emotions are known to be contagious,
which means that service organizations must proactively ensure that positive emotions,
not negative ones, are the ones being spread around. Interest in the importance of
employee emotions can be traced back to the concept of ‘emotional labor,’ coined by
Hochschild et al. (1983). For example, serving a customer at the front desk involves
‘intellectual’ labor but also ‘emotional’ labor in that the employee is expected to do their
job correctly and accurately, but also to convey happiness, welcoming, hospitality even if
they don’t feel those emotions.” (David Solnet)
In the hospitality industry, customers interact with a service provider over longer periods
than occurs in many other service sectors (e.g., retailing, banking). Hotel customers often stay
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for more than one night, and during the course of that stay, they may have multiple interactions
with hotel employees. Relationship studies suggest that customer–employee relationships are key
influences on customer experiences during hotel stays that affect both customer satisfaction and
loyalty (Bujisic et al., 2014; Kandampully et al., 2015; Prentice, 2013).
Previous studies also examine factors that influence customer–employee relationships. For
example, employee commitment affects employee performance and contributes to customer–
employee relationships (Hur et al., 2015; Kandampully et al., 2015; Karatepe, 2012). According
to the Marriott hotel chain’s philosophy, employees should receive good care, because they take
care of guests (Namasivayam et al., 2014). The importance of customer–employee relationships
accentuates the relevance of fostering a service climate (Bowen and Schneider, 2014; He et al.,
2011). Therefore, facilitating favourable interactions between employees and customers is
another key aspect of CEM in the hospitality context.
Customer-to-customer interaction is part of the hospitality experience
The hospitality context provides customers with a unique opportunity to share services with
fellow customers. It is these collective experiences that enhance the individual’s perception of a
personal experience, such as a crowded music concert or nightclub experience. Therefore,
customer-to-customer interaction is a critical factor in many hospitality services. Nicholls (2011)
highlights the role of culture, the value it brings to customer-to-customer interaction, and its
subsequent influence on customer experience in hospitality contexts. Businesses pay close
attention to building relationships with their customers, but another important interaction that can
exert a profound impact on the service experience is with the social environment (Verhoef et al.,
2009). The social environment refers to interactions among customers in a service setting (Garg
et al., 2012); it is an important focus of investigations in hotel and restaurant settings. For
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example, in their investigation of customers’ dining experiences, Andersson and Mossberg (2004)
uncover evidence that other customers are one of six key drivers of customer satisfaction. As
Professor Nusair suggests, the interaction that determines service experiences is not a customer–
provider dialogue but rather a “trialogue” involving other users too:
“Social media sites such as Facebook, Instagram, TripAdvisor, and blogs represent
platforms that facilitate a trialogue-based communications between the users with one
another and the hospitality/tourism enterprise. Through social media, users not only share
their positive/negative experiences within their community but also share that same
message with thousands of people around the world. The creation of positive customer
experiences is associated with successful performance outcomes (Rose et al., 2012);
therefore social media is redefining the way hospitality/tourism researchers examine the
customer experience construct.” (Khaldoon Nusair)
Commentaries from hospitality managers further highlight the relevance of
customer-to-customer interaction and experience sharing:
“Social media has become so much part of everyone’s life that one can post just about
anything either positive or negative about their experience. So we have to articulate and
manage the experience which at least will not result in any negative listing. As you know
most millennials make buying decisions based on what these social media sites are
reporting about your hotel.” (Hotel - d)
“…a hotel’s ability to manage its online ecosystem (social media, travel review sites,
e-commerce sites) is becoming increasingly important to a hotel’s success. Customers are
now able to provide instant feedback which the rest of the world is privy to and therefore
the hotel’s ability to manage these channels are critical to their reputation.” (Hotel-a)
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The increasing focus on co-creation leads many hotels and restaurants to encourage
customers to employ their knowledge, resources, and passions to co-innovate products and
services. Starbucks established MyStarbucksIdea.com to engage fans to share, vote, discuss and
consider ideas in themed product and service categories (Sigala, 2012). This practice makes good
use of customer-to-customer interactions to improve customer experiences and relationships
sustainably. Facilitating and tapping into customer interactions is a key aspect of CEM in the
hospitality context.
Future research agenda
Our analysis of extant research, coupled with the commentaries of leading experts in the
field, enables us to provide a rich agenda for further studies of CEM in the hospitality industry.
Specifically, we propose six research avenues.
1. Multidisciplinary view on CEM
The expert commentaries confirm that extant CEM research has been constrained by
disciplinary silos. Future research should adapt a multidisciplinary approach, as Professors
Mattila, Nusair, and Keating argue:
“In the future, I believe that it is important to examine service experiences from a
multidisciplinary perspective, and to that end, I would like to see more collaboration
among marketing, human resources and operations management scholars.” (Anna
Mattila)
“In my opinion, the customer experience construct is an eclectic area of study that builds
upon multidisciplinary contributions. The customer experience concept is relatively
complex and there is no prior holistic theoretical model in hospitality/tourism research
that has examined all the elements that form the customer experience. For the
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advancement of hospitality/tourism research, integrating the marketing perspective with
other multidisciplinary teams can help in building a model-based framework that captures
the holistic nature of the customer experience.” (Khaldoon Nusair)
“… rapid advances in information and communications technology, and ever-decreasing
geographic boundaries. And yet, theoretically, our approach to the study of services is still
far too constrained by disciplinary silos. Service design provides a way to address this
problem. The design process necessitates and facilitates collaboration across disciplinary
and epistemological boundaries, providing the context for developing a lingua franca to
aid communication and understanding among the different service sub-disciplines. A
more multidisciplinary approach to services is critical to the identification of new theories
and approaches in response to this complexity, which in turn, will lead to better service
experiences.” (Byron W. Keating)
2. Capturing all aspects of customer interactions with the firm
Customer experience in most cases extends far beyond service delivery, to include the
phases prior to and following service delivery (Nicholls, 2011; Nixon and Rieple, 2010; Gopalan
and Narayan, 2010). Firms seek ways to create relationships with customers during the pre- and
during-consumption stages, then continue to engage in active participatory relationships with
customers in post-consumption stages (Kandampully and Solnet, 2015). They attempt to entice
customers to serve as contributors and promoters of the brand through positive word of mouth.
Therefore, research should address the emergence of customer experiences throughout the
customer journey (MacGillavry and Wilson, 2014), within and beyond direct interactions in the
service setting:
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“Because the [customer experience] concept is complex, it must be viewed as holistic in
nature. Therefore, research requires a holistic model: 1) Pre-Experience—everything
involved prior to the actual consumer experience, 2) Participation—the actual
involvement of the consumer in the event, and 3) Post-experience—the aftermath (banked
memories) of the participation.” (Bonnie J. Knutson)
“One of the challenges for marketing researchers is to be able to fully understand the
service experience at different phases of the consumer purchase cycle. For products such
as accommodation or flights, the service experience starts in the pre-consumption phase
and flows through the consumption and post-consumption phases. People often search
and book online and the experiences at that point are likely to influence the brand
perceptions, as well as experiences in the main delivery phases.” (Beverly Sparks)
3. Role of people in shaping customer experiences
Many well-admired service firms recognize the important role of people, both within and
outside the organization, to maintain their success. According to former Starbucks executive
Howard Behar, “We’re not in the coffee business serving people; we are in the people business
serving coffee.” However, this domain remains relatively poorly understood from a CEM
perspective. Therefore, researchers could focus on understanding CEM by considering people as
a driving force (O’Reilly and Paper, 2012; Pandey et al., 2009). In addition, managing employee
wellness comes into play because employees may experience strain both emotionally and
physically in the work environment. Given that it is employees, especially frontline employees in
the hospitality industry, who directly serve customers, their status strongly determines customers’
service experience. According to Tracey (2014), human resources affect—both positively and
negatively—many organizational performance outcomes, which ultimately define the customer
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experience. Professor Solnet and a hotel manager elaborate on how research might further
understanding of customer experience from a human resource perspective:
“The inclusion of employee-related issues in a recent review of service research (Ostrom
et al., 2015) further endorses the need to more deeply consider employees and human
resource management in service research and the absolute truth in the interconnectivity
between employees and customer experience. We will continue to see growth in the
human resource management/customer experience nexus, with emerging insights from
many academic disciplines. For example, psychological researchers will be paying more
attention to the impacts that organizational practices have on customer service behaviors
and customer experiences. […] Even with the rise of technology in service organizations,
employees and the way they are managed has always and will always matter.” (David
Solnet)
“For me, hotels are only as successful as the people who value and care for the property,
its guests and each other. I am curious if there would be a way to track high performing
hotels and the impact major staffing reductions have on future hotel performance for key
metrics such as ADR, RevPar, customer service ranking in the brand, team member
turnover and longevity, etc. It seems as though there is a trend where hotel companies are
hiring asset managers who recommend staffing changes who justify immediate financial
benefit without regard to its long-term impact on service and these other key metrics.
Once these staffing changes are made are we able to correlate any impact on the business
outside the bottom line financial? If so how many years does it take to see the staffing
changes impact these other areas ultimately impacting bottom line financial performance
in loss of ADR, RevPar, Reputation, Trained team members etc.” (Hotel-g)
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4. Changing role of customers
The need for researchers to explore how the social environment affects CEM in hospitality
contexts persists. For example, types of patronage at a hotel or restaurant (e.g., business versus
leisure) could influence expectations related to customer-to-customer interactions during a
service experience (Nicholls, 2011). Today’s increasingly diverse demographic setting may
create new challenges for managing customers and employees alike:
“We have for the first time in American history four different generations either working
side by side or having our customers from all four generations. As you know, each
generation has very distinct attitudes, expectations, habits, life styles, exposure to life
experiences and service levels, motivational levels, risk takers willing to try new food and
beverage, etc. So what this means to us is that as a brand we should be able to completely
satisfy from veterans to baby boomers, to Gen X and Gen Y! We have to ensure that we
offer our product, service, and people which can cater to all four generations.” (Hotel-d).
The frequency and depth of exchanges among customers also might influence customer
experiences to different degrees. The types of interactions (e.g., intellectual vs. humorous, family
gatherings vs. business meetings, online vs. offline) might determine a customer’s experience;
for example, a delightful dining partner would enrich a pleasant meal. For different types of
customers, who might be more comfortable with human contacts or addicted to virtual
communities, online and offline interactions are likely to make a significant difference to their
experiences (Garg et al., 2012).
In particular, by noting customers’ extensive use of mobile devices and social media, firms
are increasingly realizing customers’ roles as brand ambassadors. Engaging and enticing
customers to offer positive online reviews and electronic word of mouth (eWoM) is thus a
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strategy discussion point in many boardrooms (Novak et al., 2000). We foresee the need for
research to explicate this new, active role of the customer, as well as the challenges associated
with extending customers’ access to broader service systems, beyond firm–customer dyads:
“Future challenges include the growth of eWoM and how to better manage this by taking
a proactive approach and intervening more at the point of contact, where possible.
Another challenge is to better design the servicescape for enhancing customer
experiences, taking into consideration the complexity of the service ecosystem.” (Beverly
Sparks)
5. Role and influence of information technology and social media
The connected marketplace, created through the adoption and extensive use of the Internet
and mobile devices, forces firms to adopt new customer mind-sets, regarding them not only as
individuals but also as social customers within communities, both offline and online. As
customers in the connected business world take on extended roles, even beyond the co-creation
of value (Frow and Payne, 2007; Payne et al., 2009), they embrace co-ownership of the brand
and its success or failure (Kandampully et al., 2015). Further research therefore might address a
broader range of CEM issues in the hospitality industry, reflecting individual customer
perspectives and customer communities in both offline and online worlds. In such increasingly
connected marketplaces, it is important to study the role of human interaction in the hospitality
industry. Both academic experts and managers highlight the importance of this topic:
“Technology, Internet and mobile social media are of critical importance to the hospitality
industry today as it appeal to the younger customers…” (Hotel-f)
“Expanding the servicescape research to the area of sensory marketing is important as
today’s digital world is able convey personalized advertising messages via multiple
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sensory channels. Finding the right balance between technology and human touch is also
critical for many segments of the hospitality industry. Given the power of today’s social
media, I think that it is also important to investigate ethics violations in social media and
to understand customer engagement in social media from a holistic perspective across
various channels.” (Anna Mattila)
“The future of the service experience and how customers evaluate its efficacy will depend
on a firm’s ability to seamlessly converse with the customer in both physical and virtual
worlds simultaneously. Firms should be prepared to adapt quickly and re-engineer the
delivery of service experiences based on what lifestyle technologies customers acquire
and use. This is all the more important in the lodging industry, whose product is to a large
extent, a ‘home away from home’ experience. At a macro level, lodging firms need to
match, if not exceed, guests’ technology-enabled lifestyles. For example, some hotels
now offer guests the ability to stream content onto guest room TVs from their own tablets
and smartphones, and through their own subscriptions at select providers. Put differently,
the proliferation of consumer-owned high-tech equipment is forcing hospitality providers
to play catch-up and deliver superior technology-enabled experiences. The provision of
technology-enabled experiences should captivate guests and also maximize their potential
to communicate about their experiences effectively. Academic research should pave the
way towards the development of a service experience management framework that
effectively articulates the role of technology in the customer co-creation of value.”
(Srikanth Beldona)
6. Creating better measures and tools for CEM
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Technological advancements and the Internet have contributed to the growing importance of
interaction and the relationship between the firm and its customers (Nambisan and Baron, 2007).
This has compelled marketers to view customers not as a single entity but as “social customers,”
with a concomitant shift from marketing to customers to marketing with customers.
Understanding the customer experience and ensuring that it is managed effectively at every point
of the customer’s interaction with the firm has become a key target for firms that aim to be at the
leading edge in the market. The question then arises as to whether and how well firms deliver the
experience that customers expect. Creating a mechanism to measure how well firms are meeting
customer’s expectations is critical. According to Maklan and Klaus (2011) and Klaus and Maklan
(2013), CEM should include product experience, outcome focus, moments of truth, and peace of
mind (emotional factors). We therefore suggest the need for appropriate CEM measures and
methods that can address the contemporary challenges of increasingly complex, fragmented
markets. Our expert informants share this view:
“There is an old business axiom that says, ‘You cannot manage what you cannot measure.’
Assuming this to be true, and accepting the belief that [CEM] is the future of an
increasingly fragmented, complex, and global hospitality industry, researchers have to
develop a valid model for identifying and measuring what is meant by the customer
experience. While several [customer experience] elements have been the subject of
extensive research (i.e. service quality, customer value, and customer satisfaction), to date,
the dimensions of the total integrated [customer experience] have not been extracted, only
assumed. To do so will be an exciting challenge.” (Bonnie J. Knutson)
“Managing the service experience entails developing an in depth understanding of the
complex nature of what consumers do, think and feel when they interact with a business.
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By knowing more about the lived experience (in situ) at all phases of the buying cycle, a
manager can better enhance customer experience. This has resulted in a renewed interest
in multi-method approaches in my research. I have applied methods like scenario
experiments, eye tracking, photo elicitation, experienced based sampling and
cross-sectional and longitudinal surveys to delve deeper into service experiences”
(Beverly Sparks)
Conclusions and implications
Theoretical contributions
This study provides a synthesis of literature and expert commentary that fills a void in
customer experience management in the hospitality field. It combines business and hospitality
knowledge and provides a multidisciplinary perspective of marketing, operations, and human
resources. Prior reviews have not integrated CEM knowledge with the principles of hospitality
literature; this review therefore advances understanding of CEM in hospitality contexts.
Our analysis reveals that customer experience management entails collective functions and
various activities within the organization, including strategy (providing a clear customer focus),
marketing (directing firms’ efforts toward building long-term relationships, both inside and
outside the organization), operations (building customers’ trust in the firm’s efficiency and
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uniqueness), service design (orchestrating front-office and back-office operations to support both
internal and external customers), human resources (providing a source of creativity, innovations,
and energy that support the firm in all situations), technology (enabling and contributing to the
firm’s innovativeness across all aspects of the organization), and social media (nurturing
channels of communication to engage individual and communities of customers). Thus, CEM is
not confined to one organizational aspect but entails an organization-wide endeavour, co-created
through the contributions of customers and employees. Figure 1 illustrates a framework of the
essential factors for creating an organization-wide collective focus on CEM.
PLEASE INSERT FIGURE 1 HERE
The proposed model (Figure 1) takes a holistic perspective and provides a broad illustration
of some of the factors that are essential for a hospitality firm to manage the customer experience
effectively. It provides a new, organizational perspective to interconnect various internal factors
of a hospitality organization (strategy, human resources, marketing, social media, technology,
design, and operations). The importance of integrating firms’ internal functions has been
suggested previously (Berry, 1980; Greene et al., 1994; Grönroos, 1983; Rafiq and Ahmed, 2000;
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Zhang, Kandampully, and Choi, 2014). In this study, we contend that the alignment of functional
factors is essential to managing the customer experience. Although most previous research on
customer experience management has been grounded in marketing, we find only a limited
number of studies that have roots in human resource management and operations management,
or that combine various perspectives. None of the commentaries from managers connect
marketing with CEM, indicating that also CEM practice is restricted by organizational silos.
Managerial implications
This study highlights the need for a holistic understanding of all aspects of the firm to
effectively manage customer experiences. In the early 1980s, both theory and practice focused on
measuring service quality to improve services and gain success in the competitive market. Today,
service quality is a core foundation for building the firm’s image and a core strategy for the most
successful service companies (e.g., Singapore Airlines, Southwest Airlines, Ritz Carlton Hotels,
Four Seasons Hotels, Disney). These firms transform ideas of service quality from a
measurement to a vision on which to base the image of their firm.
Similarly, customer experience cannot be created in isolation, through marketing strategies
alone. To create and manage customer experiences that pertain to a firm’s unique brand identity,
they must be part of the firm’s strategic vision and unify the efforts of the entire organization. We
argue that hospitality firms that consider customers’ positive experiences part of their vision also
must understand that experiences are not created; they are co-experienced by customers and
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employees during service delivery. Management of customer experiences therefore can be
achieved through an orientation that places employees at centre stage. Highly successful
hospitality firms create a service environment that encourages employees to adjust their service
provisions to cater to customers’ unexpected needs. We propose the term “people innovations” to
describe the ability of service employees on the front line to innovate as they creatively modify
their services. At this critical moment in the service delivery process, co-experience takes place,
providing a unique opportunity to develop the all-important employee–customer relationship.
While technology leads to innovation among globally connected customers, service employees
continue to hold the key that transforms simple hospitality interactions into memorable customer
experiences. Recognizing the importance of its people, Ritz Carlton uses the term “select” rather
than “recruit” as an important distinction in how it competes for the talent that is critical to
creating the unique Ritz Carlton experience.
Our study clarifies that a positive customer experience is the outcome of a cleverly
orchestrated, multifunctional approach that employs marketing, operations, human resources,
strategy, technology, social media, and design. Neglecting certain perspectives might be
detrimental to success, as illustrated by a comment from a manager of a major hotel chain:
“Designing the hotel with operations in mind is not common, which has an adverse effect on the
guest experience…” (Hotel-e). We suggest that for hospitality firms, it is imperative to have a
collective focus on creating the all-important customer relationship, as confirmed by a hotel
manager: “Customer experience is an outcome of total team effort” (Hotel-f).
Comments by Professor Roberts further illustrate the importance of combining HRM,
marketing, and operations elements to provide an individualized, memorable experience,
seamlessly supported by cues in the service setting:
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“Hospitality firms have adopted different strategies where the delivery of a service plays
a significant role in the product design, reputation and brand identity. In such instances,
deep, repeating relationships are desired with guests. Individualized records are often
kept of customer preferences and business transactions. Guests are encouraged to
strengthen their relationships by building recognition through frequent guest programs.
Employees are coached to treat guests as known and regular customers. For these firms,
the employee role in service delivery is a key aspect of the product design. Starbucks is
an example of this strategy. The comfortable seating, the free Internet service, and the
pleasant ambiance are combined with the friendly and attentive staff member to create a
memorable experience. Starbucks’ intention is that the memory is one that the guest will
want to consciously repeat.” (Chris Roberts)
Our study also highlights the crucial role of technology, the Internet, and mobile social
media in fundamentally changing how people live and providing powerful dissemination
capabilities to connect with others. These changes provide new opportunities for firms to engage
and co-create with customers for mutual benefit (McColl-Kennedy et al., 2015); they result in
the personalization of services and enhancement of customers’ perceived value and relationships
with firms (Füller, 2010). Customers are no longer passive recipients of a firm’s value
proposition; they now participate actively in brand co-creation and co-ownership (Verleye,
2015).
Acknowledgements
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The authors would like to acknowledge the contributions of leading scholars in the hospitality
management academic field and senior managers of hospitality firms to this article. Their
insights, thoughts and views contributed substantially to building a broader understanding of
Customer Experience Management from both a theoretical and practical perspective. We
therefore express our sincere thanks to: Professors Anna Mattila, Bonnie Knutson, Chris Roberts,
Beverley Sparks, Byron Keating, Srikanth Beldona, Khaldoon Nusair, David Solnet and senior
managers from Marriott, Hyatt, Hilton, Crowne Plaza, The Fairmont, Columbus Hospitality,
Fairfield Inn & Suites and Staybridge Suites.
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Table 1. Databases used for searching relevant CEM articles.
Data base Time of search Number of hits
Business Source Complete (EBSCO) October 2014 187
ProQuest October 2014 52
Scopus February 2016 208
Web of Science February 2016 124
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Table 2. Key research perspectives and foci in extant CEM literature
CEM Perspective Contributions and Exemplary Studies Literature Base
Understanding the
entire customer journey
Firms should map, manage and measure
customer touch points during the customer
lifecycle.
Clatworthy, 2012;
Frow and Payne,
2007
Marketing
Creating positive customer experiences
requires integration of information and
processes across various touch points.
Chan, 2005 Marketing
(CRM)
Successful implementation of CRM requires
focusing on decentralized CEM at the touch
point level.
Henneberg, 2005 Marketing
(CRM)
Design of service
delivery process
Customer service failures persist from poor
service delivery process designs.
Fawcett et al., 2014 Operations
Customer needs should be translated into
technical design characteristics of service
processes.
Botha and Van
Rensberg, 2010
Operations
Efficient service design is important,
especially in multichannel environments.
Patricio et al., 2008 Operations
Design of marketing
mix variables affecting
customer experience
CEM entails the development of promotion,
price, merchandise, supply chain, service
environment, and location of the provider.
Baskaran, 2011;
Grewal et al., 2009;
Verhoef et al., 2009
Marketing
(retailing)
CEM is affected by brand name, price,
advertising, employees, servicescape, core
service, word of mouth, and service quality.
Ismail et al., 2011 Marketing
The positive
performance outcomes
of CEM
Superior customer experiences result in
positive outcomes (e.g., higher customer
satisfaction, more frequent shopping visits,
larger wallet shares, higher profits).
Grewal et al., 2009;
Klaus and Maklan,
2013; Sharma and
Chaubey, 2014
Marketing
(retailing)
Customer experience is an improved service
quality measure.
Klaus and Maklan,
2007; Palmer, 2010
Marketing
Role of organizational
factors in implementing
CEM
CEM is an overarching approach that requires
cultural change and knowledge management.
Chakravorti, 2011 Marketing
Organizational factors (top management
support, employee training and motivation,
organizational structure) are key to
personalizing customer experiences.
Padilla-Meléndez
and
Garrido-Moreno,
2014; Tracy, 2014;
HRM/OB
Role of frontline
employees (FLE) in
CEM
FLEs shape the customer experience. Service
brands are established by managers but must
be transformed into employee personal value.
Harris, 2007; Zhang,
Kandampully, and
Choi, 2014
HRM;
marketing
(brand
management)
FLEs job satisfaction and commitment are key
for creating positive customer experiences
Gazzoli et al., 2013;
Pandey et al., 2009
HRM
Notes: CEM = customer experience management; CRM = customer relationship management; HRM = human
resource management; OB = organizational behaviour.
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Table 3. Previous CEM findings in the hospitality sector
Authors Method Constructs Setting Key findings
Kisang and Soocheong,
2008
Scale
development
IV: facility aesthetics, ambience, lighting,
service product, layout, and social factors;
DV: DINESCAPE hospitality
Based on quantitative analyses, a six-factor
scale was identified, consisting of facility
aesthetics, ambience, lighting, service product,
layout, and social factors.
Morgan et al., 2008 Conceptual theatrical metaphor restaurant
An analysis of the service encounter as drama
can reveal the role the customer plays, the
super-objective behind their visit to the
restaurant, and the unspoken subtext behind
critical incidents.
Johansson et al., 2009 Survey
IV: perceived price/perceived quality; DV:
customer satisfaction/emotions hotel
The weaker the relationship segment, the more
quality-based and disappointing the customer
experience. The stronger or closer the
relationship segment, the more balanced (price
and quality) and joyful the experience. One
segmentation method seems more efficient
than the other.
Zehrer, 2009 Conceptual
service experience/service design/small and
medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) tourism
Service experience must be appropriately
managed by SME operators who collect and
evaluate relevant customer experience data.
Service design must be holistic, embedded in
the organizational culture of the service
provider using tools such as “blueprinting.”
Synergistic cooperation and learning regions
among traditionally fragmented tourism
providers are essential for achieving long-term
competitiveness.
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Gopalan and Narayan,
2010
Scale
development
IV: stakeholder
DV: customer become a promoter/ customer
become a detractor
Mediator: customer experience hotel
Effective management of customer
satisfaction entails cross-functional
collaboration and transparent measurement
schemes that clearly delineate the impact of
each stakeholder’s actions on overall customer
experience.
Coghlan and Pearce 2010 Diaries
IV: motivations/activities; DV:
emotions/satisfaction/experience tourism
Emotional variability occurs across time with
distinct phases of positivity, annoyance and
receptivity. Variability appears linked to daily
activities and personal characteristics.
Satisfaction levels do not always follow
patterns of emotional variability, which are
weakly related to expectations and
motivations recorded at the start of the trip.
Nixon and Rieple, 2010 Case study
employee engagement/ memory creation/
identity/ scenography hotel
The Ritz-Carlton no longer sees itself as a
hotel company but considers itself an
“experience and memory creator.”
So and King, 2010 Survey
IV: Company’s presented brand/external
brand communications/customer experience
with company; DV: brand equity; Mediator:
brand awareness/brand meaning hotel
For experienced hotel customers,
service experience is most influential in
determining brand meaning (i.e., the
customer’s dominant perceptions and
impression of the brand).
Nicholls, 2011 Conceptual
cross-culture/customer-to-customer
interaction hospitality
Customer-to-customer interactions are
relevant to hospitality management;
opportunities for future investigations are
identified.
Klaus and Makla, 2011
Longitudinal
study
IV: hedonic pleasure, personal progression,
social interaction, efficiency and surreal
feeling; DV: customer experience tourism
Hedonic pleasure and personal progression are
two core experiences valued by customers.
Core experiences generate surreal feelings and
incomparable and memorable evaluations of
the overall experience. Social interaction
facilitates core experiences; efficiency enables
them.
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Sathish and
Venkatesakumar, 2011 Survey
IV: offered services/assortments
provided/pricing factor/quality of products
provided/atmospherics/ staff/value added
services provided; DV: satisfaction/loyalty;
Mediator: Customer experience
Coffee retail
outlets
Services offered by staff and quality of
products offered are more important in
creating customer’s coffee experience than
other variables.
Prebensen et al., 2013 Survey
tourist resources/value perception/ personal
service/ environment/ other tourists tourism
Tourist resources, in addition to personal
service, environment, and other visitors,
enhance the experienced value of a trip
significantly.
Miao et al., 2014
Quasi-experi
ment
hedonic experience value during
pre-consumption, consumption, and
post-consumption hospitality
Perceived hedonic value (predicted,
experienced and remembered) of hospitality
consumption is dynamic over the course of the
experience. Predicted hedonic value is largely
a function of temporal distance from a
hospitality experience, with an upward pattern
as the date draws near.
Tracey, 2014 Conceptual HR management, Context-specific factors hospitality
A comparison of the findings shows a
substantial degree of overlap in the themes and
results that have been generated to date.
Context-specific factors should be considered
in efforts to advance our understanding about
the ways in which hospitality HR systems may
impact a wide array of individual and
organizational outcomes.
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Table 4. Key insights into hospitality and CEM
Key insights Important concepts for further research
• Hospitality is about extensive customer–
employee relationships.
•
Employee emotion management
• Time duration of service encounter
• Employee engagement
• Employee citizenship
• Service climate
• Service is an integral part of the hospitality
experience.
•
Service design
• Service-oriented leadership
• Customer-to-customer interaction is
imperative for the hospitality experience.
•
Customer misbehaviour
• Type of patronage
• Frequency and depth of exchanges between
customers
• Type of customer interactions
• Type of customer personalities
• Online vs. offline interactions
• Employees play a key role in creating unique,
memorable, positive experiences in the hospitality
industry.
• Fun working environment
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Figure 1. Essential Factors for Creating an Organization-wide Collective Focus on CEM
Strategy
Marketing
Design
Social
Media
Operations
Human
Resource
Technology
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Appendix A. Previous CEM findings
Source Method Key findings
Angelis et al., 2010 Conceptual
Operations need to be designed with customer perception and
experience in mind, with corresponding performance measures and
management.
Baskaran, 2011 Conceptual
Several ways (e.g., brand, price, promotion, supply chain
management, location, advertising, packaging and labelling, service
mix, atmosphere) to deliver a superior customer experience should
result in higher customer satisfaction, more frequent shopping visits,
larger wallet shares, and higher profits.
Berry et al., 2006 Conceptual
By fundamentally enhancing the ease with which customers can
experience a service, companies can attract new customers and even
create new markets.
Berry et al., 2002 Conceptual
Offering products or services alone isn’t enough these days:
Organizations must provide their customers with satisfactory
experience. Competing on that dimension means orchestrating
all the “clues” that people pick up in the buying process.
Bihari, 2012 Conceptual
CRM enhances the customer experience by account and transaction
accuracy and carefulness, efficiency in correcting mistakes, and
friendliness and helpfulness of the personnel.
Botha and Van
Rensburg, 2010 Conceptual
Defines a step-by-step model for linking the customer experience to
business processes and translating the needs of the customer into
technical design characteristics for each process.
Carbone and
Haeckel, 1994. Conceptual
Managing experience clues requires judgment, skills, and
investments in order to create competitive advantage and customer
loyalty.
Carbone, 1998 Conceptual
Businesses should develop a systematic method for managing
customer experience to effectively differentiate their products and
services from competitors.
Chen et al., 2012 Conceptual
Experience sharing is value creation efforts for the direct benefits of
others. Value-in-experience is an effort-based meaning of value
creation. Value initiators are actors who perform experience sharing.
Chakravorti, 2011 Literature review
Develops a framework of knowledge and organizational culture
enhanced customer experience management.
Clatworthy, 2012 Qualitative
Underlines the importance of aligning the customer experience with
the company brand and how. A key element is the development of a
service personality and consideration of service touch point
behaviours through a combination of analytical work and experience
prototyping.
Dawes and Rowley,
1998. Case studies
As customers become more proficient at taking on an IT role,
traditional models of the service experience may need to be revisited.
Donne, 2009 Qualitative
The critical influences on participants' experiences are instructors'
behaviours and attitude through intrinsic service values, participants'
interactions with one another in their own peer socialscape and their
own performance in developing skilled and hedonic consumption.
Fawcett et al., 2014
Critical incident
technique CIT)
A holistic view of customer service that emphasizes policy, people,
performance measurement and processes.
Frow and Payne,
2007 Case study
Organizations seeking to deliver a perfect customer experience
should focus on recognizing the problem and opportunities for
improvement and co-creation.
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Garg et al., 2012 Conceptual
Research gaps are identified; this paper also offers a generalized
framework for customer experience measurement that applies to
online and offline experiences.
Gilmore and Pine,
2002 Conceptual
Each company should examine its own situation and
determine which levels, among the five physical (flagship location,
experience hubs, major venues, derivative presence, and world-wide
markets) and five virtual (flagship site, experience portals, major
platforms, derivative placement, and world wide web) make
marketing sense.
Gopalan and
Narayan, 2010 Scale development
Effective management of customer satisfaction entails
cross-functional collaboration and a transparent measurement
scheme that delineates the impact of each stakeholder’s actions on
overall customer experience.
Grewal et al., 2009 Conceptual
The role of macro factors in the retail environment and how they
shape customer experiences and behaviours.
Henneberg, 2005
Exploratory,
qualitative research
design
An approach based on CEM, with a decentralized, interaction, and
learning skills-based approach, is rare, though successful CRM
consists of elements of both dimensions.
Ismail et al., 2011 Literature review
Examines the impact of customer experience on brand loyalty
through a comprehensive review of existing literature on customer
experience and service brand literature.
Johansson and
Naslund, 2009 Survey
The weaker the relationship segment, the more quality-based and
disappointing is the customer experience. The stronger or closer the
relationship segment, the more balanced with respect to price and
quality) and joyful the experience. One segmentation method seems
more efficient than the other.
Klaus and Maklan,
2007 Conceptual
The authors offer the concept of experience quality, which
incorporates service quality but also extends to aspects of customer
experience not related directly to service to predict consumer
behaviour with respect to brands.
Klaus and Maklan,
2011 Longitudinal study
Hedonic pleasure and personal progression are two core experiences
valued by customers. A core experience generates surreal feelings,
incomparable, and memorable evaluations of the overall experience.
Social interaction facilitates core experiences; efficiency enables
them.
Kisang and
Soocheong, 2008 Scale development
Quantitative analyses reveal a six-factor scale: facility aesthetics,
ambience, lighting, service product, layout, and social factors.
Kulkarni, 2011 Survey
Retail chains need to compete by extending convenience,
assortments, variety, good quality merchandize, after-sales service
and an overall wonderful shopping experience to the customers.
MacGillavry and
Wilson, 2014 Case study
DHL Freight enhances the customer experience by bringing the voice
of the customer into the organization, improving customer
interactions, and developing an organization-wide customer-driven
vision, common purpose, and value proposition.
Maklan and Klaus,
2011 Conceptual
Market researchers serve their service organizations and customers
better if they take an active role in updating CEM, commensurate
with advances in the conceptualization of what firms offer.
Miao et al., 2014 Quasi-experiment
Perceived hedonic value (predicted, experienced, and remembered)
of a hospitality consumption experience is dynamic over the course
of the experience. Predicted hedonic value is largely a function of
temporal distance from a hospitality experience, with an upward
pattern as the date draws near.
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Mohamed and
Borhan, 2014 Survey
Customers’ emotional experience has positive significant effects on
customer attachment behaviour but not commitment. Consumers in
general look for the trustworthiness of promotional activities when
purchasing local or international products.
Morgan et al., 2008 Conceptual
An analysis of the service encounter as a drama reveals the role the
customer is playing, the objective behind their visit to the restaurant,
and the unspoken subtext behind critical incidents.
Muskat et al., 2013 Mobile ethnography
Service experience must be appropriately managed by museum
operators who collect, evaluate, store and reuse CEM relevant data.
Nambisan and
Nambisan, 2008 Multiple cases
Having the right technology-based system can enhance the customer
experience and help companies improve both their innovation and
customer relationship management capabilities.
Nicholls, 2011 Conceptual
The relevance of customer-to-customer interaction to hospitality
management is highlighted and opportunities for future
investigations identified.
Nixon and Rieple,
2010 Case study
The Ritz-Carlton no longer sees itself as a hotel company; it now
considers itself an “experience and memory creator.”
Novak et al., 2000 Survey
The study developed and tested a structural model that embodies the
components of what makes for a compelling online experience.
O’Reilly and Paper,
2012 Qualitative
Organizational changes initiated by management create strategically
constructed silos that force implementation through people and
systems to control and standardize the service interface and resultant
customer experiences.
Otnes et al., 2012
Interview and
observation
Marketplace rituals can enhance CEM. These rituals are planned,
symbolic and repeated performances executed for and with
customers.
Palmer, 2010 Conceptual
By incorporating emotions and perceptual distortion over time,
customer experience overcomes many problems associated with
static, partial measures of service quality.
Patrício et al., 2008 Interview
Service experience blueprint method enabled an efficient service
design, in service multichannel delivery.
Paula and Iliuţă, 2008 Conceptual
To succeed or survive, companies need a new way of thinking.
Success belongs to those that put the customer in the centre of their
activity and offer superior value.
Payne et al., 2009 Case study
Examines the co-creation of value in the service dominant logic,
proposes a conceptual model of co-creation for managing brand
relationship experiences and develops a case study about an
innovative service that uses opportunities for co-creation that reflect
changing consumer preferences and new mobile technologies.
Pandey et al., 2009 Survey
Positive impact of spiritual climate on customers’ experience of
employees’ service is substantiated empirically.
Prebensen et al., 2013 Survey
Tourist resources, in addition to personal service, environment and
other visitors, enhance the experienced value of a trip significantly.
Puccinelli et al., 2009 Conceptual
The key domains are goals, schemas and information processing;
memory; involvement; attitudes; affective processing; atmospherics;
and consumer attribution and choice. They are not exhaustive but
offer a wealth of insights for the retailing arena.
Petre et al., 2006 Conceptual
This research moves customer-centred design and evaluation beyond
websites to address value, loyalty and retention in e-commerce, then
integrates perspectives and strategies to encompass the total customer
experience.
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Rhea, 1992 Conceptual
Organizations need to shift their focus from designing products to
designing a cycle of customer experiences. The dynamic model of
this process-one that is reiterated to varying degrees with each
consumer decision-moves from Life Context to Engagement to
Experience to Resolution.
Rowley, 1999
Case studies and
walk-through audits
This methodology offers an important approach to the evaluation of
the total customer experience, which encompasses consideration of
the way in which the variety of individual service exchanges come
together to provide an integrated experience.
Ryder, 2007 Survey
The recent trend in the marketing practices is to create engaging and
long-lasting shopping experiences for customers.
Sharma and Chaubey,
2014 Survey
Strong relationship between customer experience with the overall
feeling, trust and satisfaction is helpful in delighting the customer.
Sathish and
Venkatesakumar,
2011 Survey
Services offered by staff and product quality are more important for
creating customers’ coffee experience than other variables.
Stone, 2012 Conceptual
For customer service, suppliers increase their focus on efficiency and
margin and seek win–win of self-fulfilled customer experience with
minimal human intervention from staff.
Tax et al., 1998 Survey
The results support a quasi “brand equity” perspective whereas
satisfaction with complaint handling has a direct impact on trust and
commitment prior positive experiences mitigate the effects of poor
complaint handling.
Tracey, 2014 Conceptual
A comparison of the findings shows a substantial degree of overlap in
the themes and results that have been generated to date.
Context-specific factors should be considered in efforts to advance
our understanding about the ways in which hospitality HR systems
may impact a wide array of individual and organizational outcomes.
Tumbat, 2011 Ethnography
Customer emotion management is essential for understanding
customer performance in co-construction of service experiences.
Verhoef et al., 2009 Conceptual
Prior customer experiences influence future customer experiences;
social environment, self-service technologies and the store brand are
important.
Wall and Envick,
2008 Conceptual
Experiences clues are (1) functional, or the technical performance of
the service; (2) mechanic, or tangibles associated with the service;
and (3) humanistic, or behaviour and appearance of service providers.
These clues are important in creating the customer's service
experience, influencing both rational and emotional perceptions of
service quality.
Yin et al., 2013
Ethnography,
interviews
Senior consumers face difficulties in various areas, including
understanding where certain products are placed on shelves and why;
access to products (shelf height), poor signage, labelling and
inappropriate portion sizes.
Zehrer, 2009 Conceptual
Service experience must be appropriately managed by small firms
that collect and evaluate relevant customer experience data. Service
designs must be undertaken in a holistic manner embedded in the
organizational culture of the service provider using blueprinting.
Synergistic cooperation and learning regions among traditionally
fragmented tourism providers are essential for achieving long-term
competitiveness.
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Appendix B. Motivation for inclusion of commentators
We used the following criteria to invite commentators from hospitality management academic leaders:
1) Recognize academic leaders in hospitality management,
2) Strong knowledge of customer experience management theory and practice,
3) Prior publications in service management,
4) Expertise in marketing, operations, human resources, or technology/social media.
Commentator,
affiliation
Main perspective to
represent in this
study
Indicators for expert or thought leader status in the field
Srikanth Beldona,
University of
Delaware, U.S.A.
Technology Ranked 15th in the world in research among hospitality faculty and selected as one of 2015’s Top 25 Most
Extraordinary Minds in Hospitality Marketing by Hospitality Sales and Marketing Association
International (HSMAI). Research interest includes hospitality and digital marketing, with research
appearing in the publications such as Cornell Hospitality Quarterly, Journal of Travel Research, Tourism
Management and International Journal of Hospitality Management.
Byron Keating,
Australian National
University (ANU),
Australia.
Operations and design Published more than 100 articles on the role and impact of emerging technologies on the design and
delivery of complex service operations. Director of Research School of Management at the Australian
National University, with a particular interest in the role of emerging technologies in supporting the design
and delivery of complex services. Presently Vice President of the Service Science Society of Australia and
on the International Advisory Board for the Service Education and Research Initiative.
Bonnie Knutson,
Michigan State
University, U.S.A.
Marketing Director of the Hospitality Management program at Michigan State University. Work has been featured in
publications such as The Wall Street Journal, USA Today, and on CNN. One of the most highly cited
hospitality management authors and distinguished professors; has been honoured with the Hospitality
Business Alumni Association Lifetime Academic Achievement Award.
Anna Mattila,
Pennsylvania State
University, U.S.A.
(marketing)
Services Marketing Marriott Professor of Lodging Management. Associate Editor, Cornell Hospitality Quarterly. Recipient of
Founder’s Award – Annual Graduate Education & Graduate Students’ Research Conference (2010),
University of Delaware Olson Lifetime Research Award (2007), and John Wiley & Sons Lifetime
Research Award, International Council on Hotel, Restaurant and Institutional Educator Convention (2006).
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Khaldoon Nusair,
Sultan Qaboos
University, Oman
Hospitality marketing,
technology and social
media
Head of Marketing Department in the College of Economics & Political Science at SQU. Prior to joining
SQU, author of one book and more than 75 refereed papers in leading academic journals. Recipient of
seven international awards for research contributions. Serves on the Editorial Advisory Board of six
international journals. Ad hoc reviewer for Cornell Quarterly, Journal of Service Management, Journal of
Information and Management, International Journal of Hospitality Management, and Tourism Analysis.
Served as Vice President of International Hospitality Information Technology Association (iHITA),
2009-2012. Industry experience includes working for multinational companies in the U.S.A. and the
Middle East.
Chris Roberts, DePaul
University, U.S.A.
Strategic management Professor of Strategic Management and director of DePaul University’s new School of Hospitality
Leadership in the Driehaus College of Business. Editor of Hospitality and Tourism Research. Research and
teaching efforts focus on leadership, strategy, and operational issues in casinos, resorts, and hotels.
David Solnet,
University of
Queensland, Australia
(human resources)
Human Resources Head of service management and hospitality at The University of Queensland’s Business School in
Brisbane, Australia. Managing director of Shift Directions, a management consulting firm specializing in
business improvement programs, financial analysis, service quality improvement, and management
development programs. Restaurant management background, with 18 years of experience including
senior management roles in the U.S.A. and Australia. Research, teaching, and consulting focus on
managing and leading service organizations, with particular emphasis on managing the
employee-customer interface through various organizational psychology lenses. Widely published in
leading academic journals, books, book chapters, and trade publications in the areas of service
management, managing and motivating service employees, and organizational service climate.
Beverley Sparks,
Griffith University,
Australia (marketing)
Marketing Professor at Griffith University, Australia. Director of the Tourism, Sport and Service Innovation Research
Centre. Active researcher, with a strong track record of grants and journal publications. International
reputation as a marketing researcher and educator in the hospitality field, with research work published in
international journals such as Journal of Service Research, Journal of Business Research, Tourism
Management, Journal of Travel Research, and Journal of Hospitality and Tourism Research. On the
editorial board of several journals, including Journal of Service Research, Journal of Hospitality and
Tourism Research, and Cornell Hospitality Quarterly. Has previously held the management positions of
Head of the School of Tourism and Hotel Management, Dean International (a University-wide
appointment) and Director of Education for the Sustainable Tourism CRC.
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