Assessment of Customer Experience and Its Relative Effects On Customer Emotions and Purchase Behavioural Intentions in Four & Five Star Hotels in Kenya

Abstract

Growth and survival of hotel industry depends on its ability to manage and create memorable experiences which are still among major challenges in the industry. Whilst realizing the gap between what customers desire from their experiences, firms are challenged to define experience, identify its determinants and engineer their experiences in order to make them better for the customer, organization and staff. The main study objective was to assess customer experience and its relative effects on customer emotions and purchase behavioural intentions in four- and five-star hotels in Kenya. The specific objectives were to: investigate how hotels design and improve customer experiences; examine items defining structure of customer experience; analyse extent to which customer experience influence customer emotions and purchase behavioural intentions; establish relationship among customer experience, emotions and purchase behavioural intentions and establish mediating role of customer emotions in the relationship between customer experience and purchase behavioural intentions. Embedded mixed method research design was adopted. Four and five star hotels within Nairobi (26), Kisumu (1) and Mombasa (6) were assessed. The study population consisted of 33 marketing managers and 3801 guests who stayed in the selected hotels. Marketing managers who participated in the study were selected using convenience sampling and 349 guests were selected as the sample size using multistage sampling procedure. Data were collected using structured interviews conducted with marketing managers and self-administered questionnaires to guests in the hotels. Data from interviews were analyzed using framework analysis. Data from the questionnaires were analyzed using descriptive statistics and inferential statistics which included principal axis factoring, correlation, structural equation modelling and bootstrapping. Qualitative findings revealed that organizations should define experience, manage its elements, have all departments be involved in the service design process and be informed of the company‘s guiding principles to embed into all areas of training. The findings indicated that the respondents agreed with the 35 dimensions as describing their perceptions about customer experience as their means were >4. Quantitative results proved that experience is composed of humanic, functional and mechanic dimensions which impact on customers‘ perception of overall experience and some dimensions played a more significant role in the customer‘s service experience evaluation process than others. Regression results showed that only humanic factor had significant influence on purchase behaviour (β = .17, t = 1.94, p = .05) while the other factors had no significant influence. The three customer experience factors with customer emotions accounted for 44% of the total variance explained in behavioural intentions. Mediation results showed that customer emotions fully mediates the relationship between functional factor and purchase behaviour (β = .08, t = 1.97, p = .05, VAF = 200%), partially mediates the relationship between humanic factor and purchase behaviour (β = .14, t = 3.24, p = .00, VAF = 45%) and mechanic factor and purchase behaviour (β = .11, t = 2.21, p = .03, VAF = 50%). Managers should focus on hotel operations‘ aspects important to the customer and recognize their significance in influencing emotions and purchase behavior. Further studies should be conducted to investigate how individuals of different genders, regions, age and purpose of visit evaluate customer experience.