Understanding Customers in the Tourism Sector: A Study on Intercontinental Hotels and Resorts

This report focuses on understanding customer behavior in the tourism sector, with a case study on Intercontinental Hotels and Resorts. It covers contemporary perspectives on consumption, individual decision-making and involvement, importance of perceptual processes, consumers in society, and future trends in consumer behavior.

Understanding
Customers

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
MAIN BODY ..................................................................................................................................1
contemporary Perspectives on Consumption..............................................................................1
Individual Decision-Making and Involvement...........................................................................2
Importance of Perceptual Processes to understand individuals consumers................................3
Consumers in society .................................................................................................................3
Where it is heading - Future Trends in Consumer Behavior......................................................3
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................4
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................5

INTRODUCTION
It is very important for the business organisation to understand its customers in order to
know the various aspect. The understanding customer includes the various perceptions which
need to be identified the business organisation in order to satisfy their needs and wants. The
understanding customer focus on the learning everything which is required by the marketer to
know about the customer. It is analysed that the customer behaviour is an important aspect for
the marketers in order to produce the products and services according to the customer
expectations. The organisation which is chosen for this report is Intercontinental hotels and resort
which is the company having the largest market share in United Kingdom. The company is
related to the tourism sector where the company provide the variety of services to its customers.
(Kumar, 2021). This report will include various topic such as an essay on the understanding
customer and the various influences over the tourism sector. (MAZZOCCHI, 2019)
MAIN BODY
contemporary Perspectives on Consumption
It is been identified that the consumer consumption depends of the various factors which
with divorcement. The study study shows that the micro factors have a influence over the
consumption of the products or serviced within the business organization. There are various
situations which have a high and low influence of the behavior of the customers over the
purchase of the products or services by the individual. (Ho, Tojib, and Tsarenko, 2020). It is
been identified that several macro factors have a influence in the consumption. It is very
important for the business disorganization to understand its customer in terms of their attitude,
behavior, buying decision etc. In context of the tourism industry it is been identified that the
perspective of the consumption depends of thee external factors and influence of the other
people. In context of the tourism industry and with the intercontinental hotel and resorts it is very
important for the marketer to understand the Barbour of the customers. It is been analyzed that
the personal experience matter a lot the purchase decision of the consumer within the services of
the business organization. The tourism sector is the most affected because of the changing trend
within the people. In context of the contemporary perspectives of the consumption in the tourism
sector it is identified that people wish to travel from one city to the another and have a enjoyable
weekend in their leisure time. It is been identified that the tourism sector has a impact of the
1

numerous behavior in the wide range because the tourism sector is dependent on the various
current trends and the various perceptions which is been made by the consumer.(Leninkumar,
2017).
Individual Decision-Making and Involvement
It is been analyses that the consumer buying decision has a huge process which involves
various stages. The consumer in context of availing services from the tourism industry is based
on several aspects. It is very important for the marketer of intercontinental hotels and resorts to
understand the behavior of the consumers while going through the purchase of the services
which is provided by the business organization.(Ignat, B. and Chankov, S., 2020). There4 are
various stages through which a consumer go through before making a decisions of the purchase
which is discussed below:
Problem recognition is the first step in the consumer decision making process where the
individual decides the need and the problem which need to be satisfied in respect to the purchase
of the products or service. It is very important for the individual to identify what the individual
wants. This is the step in which the consumer looks that how much time they need to spend in
the hotel or travel. (.Olejár, Babič, and Pusztová, 2019).
Information search is the second step where the consumer focus on identify the best
available option for an individual within the environment. In this the consumer finds the
information of the company and the product. It is very important for the marketer to keep their
information updates in order to understand customers and grab their attention.(Dogan, 2020).
Alternatives evaluation is the third step where the consumer seeks for the best available
option from the information search. It is identified that the consumer within the tourism sector
looks for the best journey which can make their experience good.. this is the decision process
where the customer identifies which is the best alternative which can help in satisfying the need
and the wants of the consumer.
Purchase decision is the step where the individual focus on the making the best decision
to purchase the product or service. This is the step where the consumer makes the actual decision
of purchasing. (Tarrant, 2020.)
Post purchase evaluation is the last step where the individual evaluates that whether the
purchase decision was right or wrong on the basis of the experience which is been made by the
individual.
2

Importance of Perceptual Processes to understand individuals consumers
It is very important fro the business organization to understand the consumer perceptions
while purchasing the products or service. It is analyzed that there are various purchase decision
process which impacts in the making of the decision for the consumer. The purchase decision has
changed a lot after the pandemic. It is very important for the organization to understand their
customers.(Satell, 2017).
Consumers in society
It is been analyses that the consumer behavior is been influenced by the society and the
perceptions of the other individuals. In context of the tourism sector it is analyses that the impact
of the society and the peers have a wide range of impact in purchase decision making. The
tourism sector has to identify the focus on maintaining their quality of services in order to attract
customers. Also for this sector there are various factors which need to be kept in mind in order to
attract customers.(Chang, Hsu,. and Yang, 2018). It is very important for the business
organization to identify the various aspect in which the consumer behavior in respect of the
tourism sector it is identified that there is influence of the culture , religion and the society which
can influence the purchase decision. It is very important for the marketer of the intercontinental
hotels and resorts to identify the various factors and work according to meet the expectations of
the consumer in order to maximize profits. (Mathur, 2021). The culture plays the vital role in
influencing the consumer behavior. It is been observed that after the pandemic the tourism
industry was the most affected because of the fear in the minds of the costumer to travel from
one place to the another place. This covid -19 has changed the perceptions of the consumer and
this needs to be adopted by the tourism industry in order to make the relevant changes. The most
priority in which the consumer needs to meet the expectations of the consumer while maintain
the cleanliness. It is very important for the organization to understand the perceptions after the
pandemic. (Cho, and et. al., 2020).
Where it is heading - Future Trends in Consumer Behavior
The understanding consumer behavior is the most important for the business organization to
evaluate themselves according to the needs and demands of the consumers. (Peukert, and et.al.
3

2019). It is been identified that as the change in the trend as the consumer buying behavior it is
essential for the tourism industry to adopt to the certain changes which can influence in the
purchase of the product or service.. The changes which is been observed in the consumer
behavior is that the people want the hygiene on the top priority and the cleanliness within the
organization. Also the accommodation which is been proceeded by the consumer should include
the best services and within the minimal charges which influxes the purchase decision.
(Kamboj,2019).
CONCLUSION
From the above report it is concluded that the understanding consumer is not an easy
task for the business organisation. It is very essential for the tourism sector to identify the various
factors which influences the purchase decision of the services of the consumer. The consumer
behaviour depends on the various external factors such as culture, society , individual and
personal experience. The understanding consumer behaviour for the business organisation is
essential because of the changing trend within the consumer perceptions after the pandemic
impacted a lot for the business enterprises. It is been analysed that the Intercontinental hotel and
resort need to identifying the factors and bring changes according to the needs and perceptions
of the consumer. The process of the decision making should be analysed by the company.
4

REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Chang, Y.W., Hsu, P.Y. and Yang, Q.M., 2018. Integration of online and offline
channels: a view of O2O commerce. Internet Research.
Cho, H. and et. al., 2020. Sport nostalgia builds customer equity and future
behavior. Marketing Intelligence & Planning.
Dogan, O., 2020. Discovering customer paths from location data with process
mining. European Journal of Engineering Science and Technology, 3(1), pp.139-
145.
Ho, T.H., Tojib, D. and Tsarenko, Y., 2020. Human staff vs. service robot vs. fellow
customer: Does it matter who helps your customer following a service failure
incident?. International Journal of Hospitality Management, 87, p.102501.
Ignat, B. and Chankov, S., 2020. Do e-commerce customers change their preferred
last-mile delivery based on its sustainability impact?. The International Journal of
Logistics Management.
Kamboj, S., 2019. Applying uses and gratifications theory to understand customer
participation in social media brand communities: perspective of media
technology. Asia Pacific Journal of Marketing and Logistics.
Kumar, J., 2021. Understanding customer brand engagement in brand communities:
an application of psychological ownership theory and congruity theory. European
Journal of Marketing.
Leninkumar, V., 2017. The relationship between customer satisfaction and customer
trust on customer loyalty. International Journal of Academic Research in
Business and Social Sciences, 7(4), pp.450-465.
Mathur, T., 2021. Marketing health insurance products: Sources and consequences of
customers’ confusion. International Journal of Healthcare Management, 14(4),
pp.1337-1347.
MAZZOCCHI, N., 2019. Retail service co-creation: a tool for understanding and
transferring the new meaning to customers.
Olejár, J., Babič, F. and Pusztová, Ľ., 2019, July. Understand the Buying Behavior of
E-Shop Customers Through Appropriate Analytical Methods. In International
Conference on Industrial, Engineering and Other Applications of Applied
Intelligent Systems (pp. 300-307). Springer, Cham.
Pansari, A and et. al., 2017. Customer engagement: the construct, antecedents, and
consequences. Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, 45(3), pp.294-
311.
Peukert, and et.al. 2019. Shopping in virtual reality stores: the influence of immersion
on system adoption. Journal of Management Information Systems, 36(3),
pp.755-788.
Satell, G., 2017. Mapping innovation: A playbook for navigating a disruptive age (Vol.
21). New York, NY: McGraw-Hill Education.
Tarrant, D., 2020. Tricky customers. Company Director, 36(7), pp.40-45.
5

6