Abstract

 

This research has been conducted for analysing the impact of 4Ps of marketing on satisfaction and experience of customers in budget hotels. In order to conduct the research, quantitative research method has been used. In case of quantitative research method, questionnaires were used to collect data from respondents. The respondents in current study are 100 customers of 10 budget hotels in China. The study has found that there is a significant positive impact of product, price, place and promotion on satisfaction and experience of customers in budget hotels. In order to increase satisfaction level of customers and for making their experience positive, budget hotels have to focus on products, price, place and promotional activities of organisation. In the end of this study, limitations and directions for future research have also been provided.

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION

1.1.Background

With the enhancement and progress in the economy of China and the advancement of material conditions of China citisen, the China has greater requirements for the quality of living. They expect the open scope of vision and to sustain with the rate of times (Li et al, 2013). Therefore, tourism consumption turns out to be a significant way for the people of China to relax, to gain new knowledge, and to know people all around the world in their spare time. However, the fast progress of domestic facilities of traffic in the recent times has largely contributed in reducing the time to travel from one destination to another. The traffic facilities have also contributed a lot in making outbound and domestic tourism more effective and convenient (Amin et al, 2013).

The budget hotel was formed back in 1920s in United States. While the budget hotel has its outlets all around the world and the terms ‘budget’ or ‘economy’ are often involved throughout the sector of hospitality, there is not any standard definition which is accepted worldwide of this segment. The rapid progress in the economy of tourism and the consistent alteration in the demand of market depict that budget hotel has turned out to be the hottest fields in the sector of hospitality (Grissemann et al, 2013). The large potential of tourism and the dynamic growth of small and medium sized enterprise performances lead to the fast progress in the economy of China, also the continued growth of the disposable income of the citizens of China. More spare time because of two-day long weekend implemented by the government of China and the modification of the public holiday has also contributed to achieve that large-scale image of tourism at domestic level has started to form and the citizen of China become the focus of mass leisure tourism consumption. High quality and low cost are on first priority when selecting a place to lodge, so cheap and clean, can give primary needs and fundamental services for the facilities of lodging for tourists, and all of these requirements make the budget hotel unique out of rests (Ye et al, 2014).

In the year 2009, with the recovery of domestic economy, the industry of tourism hotel started to progress, and the industry of budget hotel make their way towards the stage of rapid recovery. By the end of year 2009, the total number of chain brands of budget hotel was 303, and the total number of budget hotel itself was 3757. This number has increased by 952 hotels with 33.94 percent increase when contrasted with same time frame in 2008 (Vetitnev et al, 2013).

Budget hotel has got a lot of potential to grow, particularly personified in the viable growth potential. Budget hotel comes under the young growth group of hotel industry of China. Advantages from booming progress of business travel market and leisure tourism, and budget hotel of China has a vivid prospect (Prayag et al, 2013).

1.2.Problem Statement

According to Liat et al (2014) with the consistency in the growth of economy of China, the activities of business between enterprises turn out to be more and more regularly and as well as the market of tourism in China turns out to be more and more lively. State-budget hotel is a new hotel serving to the demands of new customers, it likely to have great ability for growth, which becomes one of the investment’s hot spot. Due to high contest between budget hotels and the rationale to achieve viable competitive advantage, a violent encounter for customer resource opened. The stress of such competition significantly falls on ‘customers’, the budget hotel which is responsible for satisfying all of their customers and won trust of customers, it has had useful weapons to make them victorious in this smokeless battle.

It is stated by Walls (2013) as the competitive setting turns out to be more five unstable, the most significant problem faced by sellers is not to give good quality and excellent services or product, but also to sustain loyal customers who will play their role in providing profit to the enterprise on long-term basis and to compete in interactive and overcrowded marketplace, marketers are strained to have their view beyond the conventional four Ps of marketing approaches, which are not sufficient anymore to be applied for gaining competitive advantage. Satisfaction in the direction of well incorporated service marketing mix is likely to impact the decision of customer of enduring for involving the same service in future. It is defined by Osman and Sentosa (2013) that marketing mix is the mixture of every factor at the command of marketing manager to make the target market satisfied. Moreover, it is defined by Cetin and Dincer (2014) that marketing mix is the manageable variables which can be coordinated by organisation to make its target market satisfied. The present study is conducted for assessing the role of 4Ps of marketing on customer satisfaction and experience in budget hotels. Four Ps are studied as factors that can have an impact on experience and satisfaction level of customers in budget hotels. The main focus on this study is on budget hotels and their customers’ experience and satisfaction level.

1.3.Research Aim

The aim of this research is to analyse the impact of factors on customer satisfaction and experience in budget hotels.

1.4.Research Objectives

Following are objectives of this research for which the whole study is conducted;

• To evaluate the use of products, price, place and promotion in budget hotels for customers.
• To assess the effect of products of budget hotels on satisfaction and experience of customers.
• To measure the influence of price offered by budget hotels on satisfaction and experience of customers.
• To identify the effect of place of budget hotels on satisfaction and experience of customers.
• To assess the influence of promotion of budget hotels on satisfaction and experience of customers.

1.5.Structure of Dissertation

This dissertation consists of five chapters. The first chapter is named as Introduction that includes detail of research issue, its aim, objectives and problem statement for which the whole study is conducted.

The next chapter is Literature Review that includes analysis of some previous studies done on the topic of research. In this chapter, the researcher focused on analysing findings of previous studies for finding gap in literature.

Third chapter of this dissertation is Research Methodology. In this chapter, the detail about different tools, techniques, procedures and methods used to conduct the study is given. In this chapter, proper justification for the selection of various methods is provided.

The next chapter of this dissertation is The Research. This chapter is about analysis of data collected from respondents. In this chapter, different software and tools are used to analyse the data in order to draw some results and conclusions. This is considered to be an important chapter in the whole dissertation.

The last chapter of this dissertation is Conclusion that summarises the findings of whole research study. In this chapter, outcomes are presented that helped in knowing the achievement of study in the end.

 

 

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW

2.0. Introduction

This chapter consists of analysis of previous literature on factors affecting customer experience and satisfaction in budget hotels. In this chapter, a detailed analysis of literature for each variable is done one by one. This chapter of literature review analysis helps in getting insight about other researchers about the issue and finding gaps from the literature.

2.1. Budget Hotel

There is still no explanatory definition related to the budget hotels. The price of budget hotel is cheaper when compared to the luxury hotels and budget hotel gives basic facilities and services. Budget hotel targets the middle customers and small organisations business people, medium-sized hotel, small sized hotel, and house costs moderate, self-help tourists (Peng et al, 2015).

Budget hotel are taken as the 1 star hotel because of the reason that they give lodging at less price different from $30-$40/room/night, some with services of breakfast in this cost. There are very limited facilities of guests’ rooms such as iron board, water bottle and single bed. It is situated near Exits and highways. Long term lodging having cheaper prices is also available in services. Some of the instances are given below: Studio 6 and Motel 6, America’s best value inn, and Super 8 motel (Ren et al, 2015).

Budget Hotel is a hotel format that does the comparison of Full Service Hotel. The most dominant features of budget hotel is B&B and cheap costs (breakfast + bed) service mode. In 1950s, first of all, the budget hotel was seemed United States, and it is the most mature hotel in American and European countries today.  Being a new hotel state, budget hotel is the product of social and economic development; it is quite different as compared to full service hotel in budget hotel catering and upper-class society for meeting the lodging demand and populace of the facilities of product (Rishi and Joshi, 2016). Due to less number of services and facilities, the main budget feature is to do the supply of services at cheap price. Budget hotel targets the consumers, who are professionals, technicians, businessman, intermediate level and salesman, because of the reason that this customers group do travelling for business, prefer cheap costs, but focus on comfort and not on sophistication due to short saying. Budget hotel is a new hotel that is new hotel which is present for meeting the required alterations in tourism; it is against the traditional hotels (Jaafar et al, 2012).

The market category for budget hotels is set for development over the time period of 2014 to 2018 because of increased demand for lodging products that are affordable, with increased population of middle class in Asia-Pacific and Africa. The interest of investors in budget hotels has also been increased as compared to luxury hotels due to global financial crisis. In different international luxury hotels, different economy brands have been set up for focusing exclusively on category of budget hotels. For example, in 2013 economy Moxy Hotel brand was introduced by Marriott International in Europe (Peng et al, 2015). There are two budget hotels of Accor Hotels named as IBIS Budget and HotelF1. US is considered to be largest global market for budget hotels. The revenues of budget hotels in US were about US $12.4 billion in 2013. However, there is low share of budget hotels in European economies like UK and France. With respect to revenue, the share of budget hotels in US was 7.6% in 2013. The analysis shows that budget hotels are growing with rapid pace in different countries all around the world. Branded hotel chains are also focusing towards developing budget hotels so that people with low economic position can also get benefit from them (Ren et al, 2016).

2.1.1. Approaches taken by budget hotels

In budget hotels, the management focuses on mapping of operational plan and including needs of equipment, tactics of marketing, cost controls, training of employee and maintenance issues. The budget hotels establish proper standards in every operational area and these standards are formed in accordance with clearly defined needs and expectations of staff and ways of addressing inadequacies (Yan et al, 2016). The top management in budget hotels designs proper operating processes for assisting the managers of hotel in its day to day activities and gives reporting and review controls. These processes explain the standards and norms for operations, payroll, systems of information technology and maintenance.

In most of budget hotels, general managers regularly keep check and balance on operational expenses against the budget for identifying trends and making adjustments in their plan accordingly. In budget hotels, costing is primarily focused however in addition to that management keeps on ensuring high quality of products and services. After the formulation of operating plan, it is communicated to all employees of hotel. In order to ensure high satisfaction level of customers, proper recognition program is set by management of budget hotels. For example, these programs help in sustaining energy and morale of staff members. In order to improve customer service, employees’ motivation and commitment has to be increased (Ren et al, 2016). The prices offered by budget hotels are affordable and spacious rooms are provided to guests. The hotels provide best practices to their guests in best affordable prices like for example Hotel Barcelona Granollers provides business pack to its business customers. In low prices conference room is provided to its business customers for fulfilling their needs related to business meetings, presentations, conferences and other related events.  In budget hotels innovative management solutions are provided to owners for helping them in achieving their objectives related to investment. In case of best practices the hotels give excellent returns to investors and shareholders by ensuring that most efficient structures of financial are used and excellent levels of profitability are delivered. In budget hotels housekeeping considerations are properly ensured that include techniques of cleaning and room scheduling. For increasing satisfaction level of guests, materials and suppliers are properly cleaned, processing of payments, replacement of furnishings and maintenance of records (Rishi and Joshi, 2016).

The budget hotels ensure effective customer service by formulating clear policies and standards for front desk hosts that are crucial for creation of friendly guest environment. The outlining of policies and standards is done through which expectations are set for ensuring satisfaction of customers. Proper training programs are developed through which employees get assistance in developing and refining the required skills and capabilities for presenting the most pleasant experience to guests (Subramanian et al, 2016).

2.2. Customer Satisfaction

Customer satisfaction has considered being a great concern for companies as well as for researchers. The main aim of companies is to increase profits and minimising the cost. Profit maximisation can be gained by increasing sales with fewer costs. One of the significant factors that can assist in increasing sales is customer satisfaction. With the help of customer satisfaction, loyalty of customers can be achieved. In today’s business, customers have become very important during this era of marketing (Cina, 2013). Since the start of consumption era of marketing, the companies have started focusing on customers as era of consumption has been shifted to post-consumption. The companies have obligation of rendering more services in addition to the services provided to customers. The customers’ satisfaction is ensured by different factors focused by companies. Customers are considered to be a key to business. Satisfaction of customers is the most significant tool through which sales and profits of companies can be increased. In addition to this, the significance of customers’ satisfaction has been proven to assist in improving performance of companies (Jaafar et al, 2012).

The definition of customer satisfaction is the post purchase which is evaluative judgment related to a particular buying decision (Bienstock et al, 2015). Customer satisfaction is to feel pleasure and wellbeing that what is acquired by customers through hopes and expectations from the services. It is a philosophy of business that develops value for consumers, to demonstrate ability, manage expectations, and to anticipate the responsibility in order to fulfil the needs. It is similar to the result of perception of customers of the value attained by them in relationship or transaction, where value is equal to the assumed service quality (Ryu et al, 2012). Satisfaction is the level of disappointment or enjoyment, which comes through the expectations related to the product. Satisfaction is termed as the fulfilment response of customer. It is termed as the judgement that is featured by service or product, or the service or product itself, which provides a pleasure level of usage-regarding achievement, involving levels of over or under-fulfilment(Rego et al, 2013).

According to Gounaris and Boukis (2013) customer satisfaction can assist in the identification of the factor that influences the purchase of customer and post-purchase conduct like favourable word of mouth and subsequent purchase and publicity. A guest, who gets satisfied by the service or product, does the promotion of WOM free and with credibility and influence that is far superior to conventional advertisement.

From the point of view of management, customers play a significant role in process of organisation. Before placing strategies and structure of organisation, customers are considered most primarily by management. In case of hospitality industry, customers are considered to be king and management always focuses on reaction of customers regarding products and services in order to yield maximum satisfaction level of customers. The organisations after considering customers, focuses on designing the product, segmenting the market and creating awareness. This does not only depict the significance of customers in the environment of business but also the significance to satisfy them. Customers are always aimed by companies for making maximum satisfied through the products and services that they purchase. In order to enhance level of customers’ satisfaction, there is a need of building relationship with customers and not only on development of products. The customers must be provided with superior value as compared to its competitors (Kotler et al, 2015). The feedback of customers regarding their satisfaction level shows that whether or not a company gives quality products and services to customers. In case of high quality of products and services, higher level of customer satisfaction can be achieved. In most of companies in hospitality industry, quality management programs are adopted that aimed at improving the products and services’ quality. The quality of almost all aspects in an organisation affects the level of customer satisfaction. The performance of products and services has a direct impact on satisfaction level of customers. The significance of customers in the process of business has made it important to always conduct research related to customers. In hotels, the management always feels the need of conducting research on customers, during as well as after sales due to the changes that might be occurred in process of business. It has been stated by Hollensen (2015) that in organisation where there is high frequency of satisfied customers, use to enjoy high retention of customers and higher profits because of increased customer loyalty. Due to this reason, every organisation works hard for winning the hearts of customers through making them satisfied. The customer satisfaction in companies help in making them loyal that increases their sales and profitability.  In order to ensure higher satisfaction level of customers, the companies must focus on various factors. From the last decade, almost all kinds of companies have understood the significance of customers’ satisfaction. It is usually observed by companies that for keeping customers require less cost as compared to winning a new one. There is a strong linkage between customer satisfaction and profitability of a company. Customer satisfaction is a degree of how total product of a company performs in relative to different expectations of customers. According to Rego et al (2013) customer satisfaction is a degree to which perceived performance is matched with expectations of buyers. In case of a match between performance of company and expectations of customers, the customer is satisfied and if performance is exceeded from customers’ expectations then the customer becomes delighted.

Customer satisfaction is resulted due to the linkage between assumption and feelings of customers. Customer satisfaction is specified as the difference between perceived service quality and involvement or perception of customers after experiencing the service. Customer satisfaction relies on different dimensions like assurance, reliability, and ability to give response, compassion and tangibles. In addition to this, there are some other components like product, price and different situational aspects (Cina, 2013). Customer satisfaction assists customers in communicating their requirements direct to the sellers. Customer satisfaction is very significant because it assists in helping to learn related to strengths and weaknesses of business. By knowing about strengths and weaknesses of business, hotels make progression In addition to this, it helps in showing calmness related to creation of better product quality and services for both employees as well as customers. Customer satisfaction does not only help in knowing about strengths and weaknesses of business but it also assists in persuading competitive strengths and weaknesses. Customer satisfaction helps in accommodating a system to inform management of issues or situations that require actual promotion (Selnes, 2013).

It has been claimed in accordance with the theory of expectation inconformity according to which satisfaction is felt by customers when actual performance of services is beyond their expectation. In opposite to this, at the time of under expectation performance, dissatisfaction level of customers arises. In last decade, customer satisfaction has been considered to be a very significant theoretical and practice issue for marketers as well as researchers of marketing. It has been proposed by Rego et al (2013) that satisfaction is an individual perception of being satisfied or dissatisfied as a result of comparison between performances of service in relative to expectation of that person.

It has been stated by Martínezand del Bosque (2013) that customer satisfaction is crucial and significant standard that can be used to determine the quality offered to customers by consuming it. Since, hospitality industry is highly service oriented sector, so there is a need by service providers to take actions for ensuring the fulfilment of service standards and high quality in order to make customers satisfied. Kärnä (2014) claimed that by offering high quality services for satisfying customers is the most crucial challenge for business in 1990s. In service industry, particularly in hospitality industry, it has become a major problem and a challenge for all hotels. The reason behind this is that there is a great difference between attitudes, thinking and perceptions of different individuals. Therefore, might be same service is perceived in different ways by individuals. In contrast to this, it is difficult for hotel industry to standardise the service as compared to tangible products due to the presence of inherent features like intangibility, variability and perishability. Chiariniand Douglas (2015) stated that satisfaction level of guests and intention of revisiting a specific destination relies heavily on assessing various aspects of hotels. Different scholars studied satisfaction of customers as relevant to various attributes of hotels. Delcourt et al (2013) further found that satisfaction has been measured by most of researcher on an ordinal scale and this approach was not an effective because of two reasons. First reason was that mostly satisfaction of guests is measured through pull factors that are relevant to attributes of destination and usually include the favourable aspects. In contrast to this, these do not include negative aspects of destinations. There is a possibility that neglected negative factors are considered to be main determinants of guests’ satisfaction in hospitality industry. The second reason is that the satisfaction level of guests relies on various dimensions of products and services provided by hotels.

When a customer affirms with product or service then it is referred as customer satisfaction. Satisfaction can also be feelings of persons related to pleasure or disappointment that resulted in comparison of perceived performance of product or outcome with expectations. Satisfaction is different for one individual to another or for group of individuals. It is really difficult for today’s organisations to make everyone satisfied or determining satisfaction among group of people. The happiness of client is a sign of customer satisfaction and is considered to be the most important thing for a hotel. Customer satisfaction is defined as response of customer to the measurement of perceived inconsistency between previous expectations and actual performance of product or service as assumed after its utilisation (Jones et al, 2014). Customer satisfaction is considered to be an overall evaluation by customer after purchase. It has been stated by some authors that there is no particular definition of customer satisfaction ad it is specified by a response that involves a specific focus and happens at some specific time. The level of customer satisfaction is determined by cumulative experience of a person at the time of contacting with supplier. The level of customer satisfaction is identified at the time of match between perceived performances of product with experience of buyer. In accordance with Wu (2013)a person’s expectations helps in determining satisfaction of customers with these are compared with perception of customers. In a nutshell, it can be stated that customer satisfaction is a pleasure gained by consuming an offer.

2.3. Customer Experience

In many hotels, the management has understood that competent service is becoming a differentiator for gaining competitive advantage. Through focus on ways of serving customers, organisations are charged with separation of service from customer and ignorance of customers’ experience by visiting the organisation (Schmitt, 2010). In addition to this, service quality is being criticised due to the focus on process as compared to result of delivery of service. Since this outcome can be taken by evaluation of customers at various stages of utilisation process, then there is a need of more holistic concept. Although the concept of customer experience has gained increasing prominence but no agreement has been reached as to its meanings.Since most arguments are theoretical and there is no dependence on empirical evidence. Due to the absence of clearer definition of customer experience, it would be crucial for developing a comprehensive framework that can applicable to this (Rose et al, 2012).

The significance of understanding customer experience cannot be ignored since it has a significant impact on loyalty level of customers and due to the loyalty, profitability of business is affected. In past, hotels used to generate this profitability through strategies related to short term sales like advertising. Meanwhile, due to increase competitiveness and globalisation, now these kinds of advertisings do not generate revenues if customer has bad experience with the hotel. Therefore, it has become important for hotels to carefully use those factors through which good experience of customers can be created (Puccinelli et al, 2009). It has been stated by Ali et al (2014) that value of customers can be increased through providing them memorable experience. It has been stated by them that there is no mutually exclusive relationship between customer loyalty and profit making. Therefore, creation of memorable experience is a significant variable in relative to creation of value for customers. The positive experience of customers results in increasing loyalty level of customers.

It is identified that customers are connected emotionally with each other. These emotions are usually initiated by stimuli which are resulted from the experiences. This prospect is helped by Rawson et al (2013) who described customer experience as group of cues which comprise of emotional and functional components. It is argued by the author that emotional components are activated by mechanics – clues evolved by humanics, and things – clues evolved by individuals. It is also claimed by them that customer experiences happen at multiple stages i.e. long time before a transaction is made by customers with an organisation, during dealings of customers with the organisation, and in their appraisal afterwards. With reference to Wu (2013) total customer experience is created by the mixture of these cues. An ‘Experience Audit’ is recommended by the authors where questions have been asked from customers that how they feel regarding their experiences and stated that customer loyalty is strengthened by customer experience management. On the other hand, they do not give any experimental evidence to facilitate the connection between scores of customer satisfaction and the design of new experience in researches presented by them, nor do they showed confirmation of increased loyalty. The dispute that different phases of value chain are transcended by customer experience is favoured by Yan et al (2016) who described customer experience as subjective and internal response of customers to any indirect or direct contact with organisation across different touch points. Yoon et al (2013) stated that components range from the positive state to the negative state and then grouping of these factors is done into non-interpersonal and interpersonal factors. It was identified that interpersonal engagement and effort of employees which is accounted for the heavy percentage of negative and positive emotions, and therefore satisfaction. The authors stated that formal sample for delight of consumer is required and stated that three of the experience themes they found stated that deeply frustrated values that is prized and seek by American customers. This recommends that generalization of findings cannot be done. It was also noticed that there was less theory continuity as no reference was made towards the findings in the literature. Along with it; river rafting needs skills and consumer is responsible for that experience. That is why; the implementation of such experiences cannot be done in some other conditions where customer is the recipient of services. The influence of interpersonal engagement on experiences of customers was found in a study done by Wong (2013). From their results, the authors did the grouping of factors into business-to-consumer and business-to-business experience factors and they argued that personalisation is the major factors for BTC. Ali et al (2014) identified that service is the major part of the consumer experience. In the work, the authors stated five factors that constitute the customer factors, these five components are as follow: emotional and social impact, atmosphere, peer-to-peer and relationship. Though, they identified that customer experience is related to context and identified the requirement for sector related research.

The results of Nasermoadeli et al (2013) identified that personal connection with other consumers play a major role in the experiences of customers. Ren et al (2016) identified their study utilising focus groups in retail context. They stated that along with the existence of customers, multi-store shopping like shopping in different stores rather than getting everything in single store, customer identification of staff that proves to be helpful, and arrangement and size of mistakes and sore by staff all influence the experiences of customers.

In accordance with Bilgihan et al (2016) experience is defined as actually observing or practically acquitance with facts or events. The customer experience becomes real with an interaction is done between customer and an organisation. An organisational experience is defined as a way to fus tangible and intangible features and co-created by consumers and marketers for creating a pleasurable and memorable event. Customer experience is defined as engagement act of co-creating a provider and consumer wherein encountering of consumer perceive value is done. There are five dimensions of customer experience are novelty, surprise, learning, engagement and personal relevance. McColl-Kennedy et al (2015) claimed that customer experience is a process of learning that occurs during the time period for which a customer interacts with different aspects of service.Customer experience is defined as an act of engagement for co-creation between service provider and consumer.

Customer experience is a feeling of an individual. Due to an experience a memory is left that can stay for a longer time period and it might have a great impact on customer relations. Customer experience is a sum of different meetings, feelings, perceptions and visions that is formed by customers from operations of company. An experience of a customer is a link between a company and a customer. It is a mixture of physical performance of company, the stimulated sense and evoked emotions. This mixture is evaluated on the bass of expectations of customers across moment of contact with the company (Meyer and Schwager, 2007). When a company meets a customer, then it is a moment of occasion that involves humane and truth that shows the success or failure of a meeting. In every organisation there is a significant question of resolving and that is the ratio between company’s cost and advantages of customer.

It is considered that consumers are very emotional and need even more than just functionality. These types of emotions get activated through a stimulus which is the outcome of experiences (Rawson et al, 2013). Lemon and Verhoef (2016) has supported this view, they have defined customer experience as being the total cues that involve both emotional and functional components. The authors stated that mechanics and humanises stimulate emotional components. Humanises is defined as clues which are emitted through people, and mechanics as being clue emitted through things. They also state the experience of customers takes place at various steps like long before the customer does the transaction with the organisation, within the dealings with organisation, and in the assessment(Ali et al, 2014).

In accordance with Teixeiraet al (2012) when all these cues are summed up that the total customer experience is produced. The authors suggest that ‘Experience Audit’ where customers are asked about their feelings related to experience and states that customer experience management empowers the loyalty of customer. However, none of the empirical proof is provided for supporting the connection in between the current experience design and scores of customer satisfaction in researches presented by them, and they do not even show the proof of extended loyalty. Customer experience transcends different steps of value chain gets support through McColl-Kennedy et al (2015) who gives the definition of customer satisfaction being subjective and internal response of customer related to indirect or direct contact with the organisation.

In accordance with Sheng and Teo (2012) total customer experience involves both emotional and physical factors that consists of all of the phases of value chain, are evolve through interaction with consumer. They state that experience are existing, and customer dependent in customer’s mind, and context-particular. The authors state that testing of reliability and quality of total experience of customer is its ability to exchange positive word-of-mouth, and the characteristics to leverage re-buy. It resulted into the fact that if customer loyalty needs to be high, assumed customer value, emotional experience, and product attribute satisfaction should be high.

Srivastavaand Kaul (2016) also has the view that consumers wish to shape and to transform into co-creator of their own experiences. The authors also stated that experiences which customer get through services of company are dependent on the needs of customers and it should be personalised. Along with it, they state that services or products develop experiences that do the transcending even beyond offering. They hold the view that customer makes judgment through offering of organisation, not because of its characteristics, but through the limit to which it provides them the experiences they want. This argument recommends that experiences and features are different offerings. Fawcett et al (2014) shared this view; seminal authors proposed that experiences should be treated like ‘different offerings of economy.

In accordance with Srivastava and Kaul (2014) for experience of customer to be effective like marketing tool, it should be memorable, compelling, robust and engaging. Such robustness recommends a holistic experience view. Ali et al (2016) states the experience of customer should be seen through holistic approach, which includes improvement of service and product offering and states that loyalty is explained through total experience of customers.

2.4. Factors Affecting Customers’ Experience and Satisfaction in Budget Hotels

It is important for all organisations particularly in service industry for realising that without customers, it is not possible for them to establish for continuing their existence. The competitiveness of hotel industry has been increase all around the globe due to the growth in destination. Due to the increase in competition, it is therefore necessary for creating awareness of products and services offered to customers and delivering promises for keeping customers happy and long term satisfied. In order to get competitive advantage through increased satisfaction level of customers and making the best experience, the budget hotels focuses on keeping low cost and providing high quality products and services to customers. There are different factors that can affect satisfaction level of customers (Ren et al, 2015). 

There is a strong role of hospitality industry in boosting economy of any country. In order to get more market share and high profitability, the management of hotels has to focus on satisfaction of customers. The hotels must ensure that their marketing efforts are arranged and managed in such a way through which satisfaction level of customers can be increased. Due to the continuous increase in demand for hotels and request for increasing standards by guests, the hotels’ management has been enforced to focus highly on their marketing efforts for gaining competitiveness. The services provided at hotels must be of high quality because this helps in increasing satisfaction level of customers. This assists in improving performance of hotels. With the help of good marketing efforts and service quality, hotel industry can improve their level of profitability. The customers must be satisfied by one hotel in such a way through which they can compete their competitors. For obtaining loyalty and for outweighing other competitors, there is a need of providing higher satisfaction level of customers for the services offered to them (Sheng and Teo, 2012).

2.4.1. Product

Products are defined as something that can be given in market for the sake of attention, utilisation or consumption through which a need might be satisfied. In accordance with Jobberand Ellis-Chadwick (2012) a service is offered by a service product that can be explained depending on the key service through which key benefit and secondary service is explained. Through the benefits given by a product, both tangible and augmented levels of products are represented. The main characteristics of a product are quality, features, size, design and brand name.

Product is the major element present in the strategy of marketing mix that retailers can provide quite unique characteristics that are different from the products which are owned by the competitors. The characterisation of product is done through brand sizes and name, features, design, and quality (Selnes, 2013). Product is the thing that is provided to market for consumption, acquisition, use or attention that satisfies need or want. It is physical place, person, idea, service or good any services or goods that are provided in order to satisfy and meet the requirements, wants and needs for customers. Therefore, a product is intangible and tangible that is offered for making purchases or customers use it. Tangible product is the one that can be touched by customers, like beverages and food. Intangible product is termed as the service which cannot actually be touched like room service.The goods of budget hotel are quite simple; the main products are guest room, and linked service, budget hotel also give beverages and food (Oliver, 2014).

2.4.2. Price

Price is the second factor present in the marketing mix. The price of service or product is total money that customer want to pay for obtaining the rights to use service or product. Price is total money which is charged for service or product, or total value that are exchanged by customers for advantages of using or having the service or product (Yoon et al, 2013). Along with it, price is the total values that are used in order to make exchanges of satisfaction of human. Along with it, price is used to make decision related to purchase of services.

Price is actually the amount of money given by a customer in exchange of a product or service. It tells the total value exchanged by consumers for advantages to have or use the product or service Hollensen (2015)price usually becomes a key indicator of quality due to the intangible nature of services. Price is considered to be a significant aspect of measuring intentions of repeat purchase. It has been proven that customers give high priority to the thinking that whether their value for money has been received or not. Therefore, products are bought by customers through the price rather than other different aspects.

Economic thinks that if they will keep cheaper prices of similar products that it will cause more sales. The cost of budgets hotel is cheap when it is compared with luxury hotels like Hilton Hotel; the cheaper price is the most significant factor that influences the customer (Joon Choiand Sik Kim, 2013).

2.4.3. Place

Place is the set of companies that combine together in order to do the processing to make a product available for customers (Lin and Huang, 2006). Place is termed as the location where there services and products for consumption. Along with it, place is also termed as given service/product. This availability implies that where there is product in the marketplace or how often the location of product can be identified (Wilson et al, 2012).

Place is defined as the ease of getting access to associates of potential customers like location and distribution. There is a strong need of paying attention to decisions related to place, due to this significance of service and utilisation occurring at similar time and at same place. A place of an organisation is a source of giving all necessary information to customers and competitors. A considerable attention must be paid to the way of delivering the services at right time and right place. There is also a need of focusing towards channel that must be used for delivering the service. The services of a firm have to be effectively distributed through the place of among marketing channels (Kotler et al, 2015).

Budget hotels are present in the place with total set of facilities like store. The place having convenient traffic is also important, like the one present near downtown, railway station and bus station for making the travel of tourists even more convenient. There are some budget hotels which are present near universities or schools for providing services to family members, friends, and students and also giving convenience to teachers (Jobberand Ellis-Chadwick, 2012).

2.4.4. Promotion

Sambhanthan and Good (2013) said that promotion is the public relations, personal selling, direct marketing, advertising, and sales promotion. Promotion is termed as the decision related to how best the product is related to the market and how to persuade people to buy such products. Promotion involved different methods of communications to consumers of what should be offered by hotels and promotion involves different activities like exhibitions, special offers, corporate identity, public relationship, direct promotion, advertising, and branding (Law et al, 2015). Promotion is a plan having perspective to enhance the sales of services or products in shorter time period; it assists in stimulating consumers to make decisions related to purchases of services or products in the market (Maleviti et al, 2012).

According to Lusch and Vargo (2014) the basic elements of promotion are sales promotion, personal selling, direct marketing, advertising and public relations. Promotion is related to the decision through which a product or service is marketed to target customers and ways of persuading consumers to purchase it. In case of promotional strategies to be successful, there is a need of having an effective communication program because it has three significant roles; giving required information and suggestions, persuading target customers for buying a particular product and motivating target customers for taking action at particular times and place. The activities of promotion help in influencing customers’ ways of perceiving, thinking, experiencing and buying. Promotion is a technique of selling, in any program of marketing. It must have an involvement with promotion. The advertisements of products or services are delivered by sales individuals, TV, magazines, press, radio, internet and different kinds of media.

In techniques of marketing, the most important factor is communication program, due to the reason that it play three of the major roles: giving the required advice and information, affecting focused consumers of the benefits of the particular good, and to motivate them to take actions. The active activities of promotion in budget hotel are as follows: advertisement on websites, newspaper, internet and TV; distribution of loyalty card for retaining customers that let the customers to come again and again, to get discount and taking online reservations (Hutagalungand Adiningrum, 2015).

2.5. Theoretical Framework

 

 

 

2.6. Hypothesis

Ho1: There is no impact of product on customer satisfaction in budget hotels.

H1: There is significant impact of product on customer satisfaction in budget hotels.

Ho2: There is no impact of price on customer satisfaction in budget hotels.

H2: There is significant impact of price on customer satisfaction in budget hotels.

Ho3: There is no impact of place on customer satisfaction in budget hotels.

H3: There is significant impact of place on customer satisfaction in budget hotels.

Ho4: There is no impact of promotion on customer satisfaction in budget hotels.

H4: There is significant impact of promotion on customer satisfaction in budget hotels.

Ho5: There is no impact of product on customer experience in budget hotels.

H5: There is significant impact of product on customer experience in budget hotels.

Ho6: There is no impact of price on customer experience in budget hotels.

H6: There is significant impact of price on customer experience in budget hotels.

Ho7: There is no impact of place on customer experience in budget hotels.

H7: There is significant impact of place on customer experience in budget hotels.

Ho8: There is no impact of promotion on customer experience in budget hotels.

H8: There is significant impact of promotion on customer experience in budget hotels.

 

2.6. Conclusion

The above analysis of previous literature shows that customer experience and satisfaction are considered to be very important elements in hospitality industry. In order to get success and competitive advantage, budget hotels have to focus on elements of marketing mix. The satisfaction and experience of customers tell about the success of hotels. The customers must be provided with better quality products and services for increasing their level of satisfaction and to make their experience of visiting the hotel as positive. The other factors are price, place and promotion. These factors must be considered highly by the hotel for ensuring success and competitive advantage.

 

CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

3.0. Introduction

Chapter of methodology gives the description of processes and procedures which are used during the selection of collected and sample data. The chapter has used the (Saunders et al., 2009) research onion base for making up the methodology structure of study. This chapter consists of the discussion which has been done on the methods of research, philosophy, sampling, and sample size. In addition to this, weaknesses and strengths of methodology are also present at the chapter end because of the fact there are some limitations of methodology of research. Some of the imperfections should also be discussed. In addition to this, before acquirement of methodology of research, it is important to select the sample size and to make contact with people through which data is collected, due to the reason that they are basic source for provision of data. For this perspective, customers were provided with the questionnaires of Holiday Inn from researchers and the basic objective of research was delivered. In addition to this, the organisation has also given permission to provide data. Relevant to this, University was the basic support as it provided the formal letter which was then displayed to the organisation.

Research methodology plays an important role in the researches. The research validity is based on the given methodology (Healy and Perry, 2000). There are some major threats related to the reliability and validity of research in conditions when there is no specific planning of methodology (Joppe, 2016). The generalization of research cannot be done in case of rigorous methodology (Patton, 2002). The research methodology which has been used in the recent research is explained over here. The researcher has made different attempts for the maintenance of standards of research and then he has done compliance with the standards. The researchers have made sure that there is zero biasness as the biasness concludes into the impairment of research results and because of it the acquired results can be misleading. Therefore; the researchers have considered the issues during the conduction of research methodology.

3.1. Type of Study

In terms of nature, the research is exploratory. The researchers expect to get more information about the problems of research. The recent research has done the analysis of the influence of factors affecting customers’ satisfaction and experiences at budget hotels in China. The researcher has done the identification of measurements and steps which have been taken for ensuring the satisfaction and experiences of customers through various factors. That is why; the research has been done to identify the effective and important factors that can have influence on customer satisfaction and experiences.

3.2. Steps involved in a research

As given above, that the research follows the Saunders et al (2009) research onion for making the design of research methodology, due to the reason that these steps provide detailed and comprehensive analysis of the most suitable methodologies of research. This heading includes the kind of collected data, research instruments, and processes for research, philosophy and strategy of research.

3.3. Philosophy of the Study

Philosophy of research is the procedure through which development of new information has been done which refers to the research philosophy. This is an over-arching term. It is connected with the information nature which is developed during the research work (Offredy and Vickers, 2010). Through philosophy, the methodology can be developed and the answers to the research questions can be done in the most effective way (Saunders et al., 2009).

Research has adopted different research philosophies which gives the general outlines of important perceptions relevant to various processes through which a research makes attempts to look over the problem. These perceptions help to underpin the research techniques which are develop during the research conduction by the researcher (Johnson and Onwuegbuzie, 2004) has explained this point. They explained that researcher belonging to the field of management should have some knowledge of the philosophy connected with the research being followed, as for completing the research. This has some affect over the investigation done by researchers. The subject nature assists in analysing the research philosophy that the researcher should follow. An overview of research philosophies is given for having the image of philosophies and for the selection justification of research philosophy which is suitable for research. In current research, positivistic philosophy has been adopted according to which

3.3.1. Pragmatism

Pragmatism is called as the first philosophy. The possibility to integrate various processes has been defined under the philosophy. The integration of qualitative and quantitative approaches can be done under this philosophy (James and Vinnicombe, 2002). The integration of various methodologies of research is quite appealing. The philosophy defines that researcher should not analyse just in one particular direction. Evaluation of various perspectives of research should be done by researcher. The researcher should not base only on the observed and debated facts. To have the most accurate information, this philosophy helps in identifying the significant factors with the help of research philosophies. Through various processes, an analysis of significant factors should be done. The partners of mixed procedures are called as pragmatism. It helps in providing knowledge and enquiry that helps in underpinning the processes which are involved in the quantitative (positivism) and qualitative (interpretivism). Different discussions have been done on pragmatism. In few discussions, it is called approaches fusion and in some researches it is called as alternative in which both qualitative and quantitative researches are needed for having suitable research results (Tashakkori and Creswell, 2007) sometimes it called as new orthodoxy which means that mixed processes need to be used in social researches for having required results, at last, it called as expedient pragmatism, a philosophy does not assist in the achievement of proper outcomes. Interpretivism should be used with positivism. Therefore, the philosophy seems to be quite more appealing as compared with other philosophies. However, the time and constraint may not allow a research to embark this type of philosophy. In current research, positivistic philosophy has been adopted according to which previous theories have been analysed for testing hypothesis. In this research, facts and figures are used for drawing conclusions and findings. So, for analysing factors affecting customers’ satisfaction and experience on budget hotels, positivistic philosophy is used.

3.3.2. Positivism

Positivism is the second type of philosophy which has been used in the business research in the current era because of the reason, that philosophy has more links with the scientists’ stance. The researchers who follow such philosophy work with even more reality which can be seen. According to (Remenyi et al., 1998) with the help of this philosophy, the implementation of law more generalized can be done on the population. The researcher has utilised past theories for generating data and for the development of hypothesis. The hypothesis has been tested dependent on the fact which is obtained through the collected data (Blaikie, 2000). The report related to the observable realities has been made. The facts’ reporting has been done according to the way they happened (Easterby-Smith et al., 2008). In addition to this, such methodology should be followed by the philosophy which has higher structure and is suitable for replications. This particular philosophy is not suitable for researches (Saunders et al., 2009). In addition to this, quantitative research is used with the philosophy in which facts, figures and information is interpreted (Blaikie, 1993).

3.3.3. Realism

Realism is philosophy based on social events and inquiries. This philosophy explains the presence of various objects dependent on the minds of human. This reality is different when compared to the perceptions. The realism philosophy is quite opposite as compared to the idealism. The realism approach is similar to positivism as it does the identification of matters’ inquiry. The researchers following this philosophy follow the inquiry for the knowledge development. The data collection has been done through this philosophy and understanding has been made relevant to the nature of data (Saunders et al., 2009).

3.3.4. Interpretivism

Interpretivism is termed as philosophy used for understanding of differences in human being and the differences in the role that are played by them in the society (Denzin and Lincoln, 2003). The humans should be treated like objects. The research should not follow the similar perspective while studying human being that is followed during the study on objects and events. This philosophy has close connection with the allegory of theatre in which the interpretation of roles which basically people play(Eriksson and Kovalainen, 2008). The researches that target the conduct of human follow this philosophy (Saunders et al., 2009). This philosophy is used with the qualitative researches where interviews and observational researches are conducted (Saunders et al., 2007).

The methodologies given above have been applied according to the needs and nature of research. Pragmatism is used when much information linked with the problem of research is identified. The implementation of positivism is done where the suitable results are required. Realism considers the real life events. When detailed analysis required, then interprevitism is needed.

3.3.5. Research Philosophy Adopted

In current research, the adoption of positivism research philosophy has been done as the target of research is to find out the results of the influence of factors affecting customers’ satisfaction and experiences. While using this philosophy, facts and figures are used for getting results. As this research includes hypothesis, so in order to test these hypothesis, positivistic philosophy has been selected.

3.4. Research Methods

Two kinds of methods can be selected by researchers for conducting the study. These methods include qualitative research method and quantitative research method. There are different merits and demerits of every kind of research method. Below is detail of both research methodologies;

3.4.1. Qualitative Research Method

In case of qualitative research method, interpretation is done by researcher through different processes. Qualitative research method is helpful in case of execution of details analysis. The researcher uses different methods for the purpose of data collection that include focus group, observations and interviews. With the help of qualitative research method, a large amount of data can be collected. The use of qualitative research method results in high level of biasness as it involves personal biasness of research. It is difficult for researcher to manage his or her biasness. In case of qualitative research method, the data collected from respondents is not in written form and researcher has to note down the responses of interviewees, so chances of biasness are high. Due to the presence of inadequacy in qualitative research method, it is not reliable to use qualitative research method in studies that involves examination of relationship between variables, as there is no need of detailed information in this case. The use of qualitative research method might be resulted in questionable findings.

3.4.2. Quantitative Research Method

Another method that can be used for conducting research is quantitative research method. In this method, every aspect of research is quantified. Quantitative research method helps in examining the relationship between variables. The key characteristic of this research method is quantification. Quantitative research method is beneficial as it does not involve any kind of biasness. The data is collected from respondents in a written form. The quantitative research method helps in drawing conclusions through facts and figures. Through this method, more productive outcomes can be generated and generalizability of this method is also high.

3.4.3. Research Method for present study

Quantitative research method is usually used in researches related to subjects of economics, management and finance. The basic characteristic of this research method is quantification of different events and items. The variables that are studied according to quantitative research method can easily be quantified. This feature helps in getting reliable results. With the help of this research method, different phenomenon can easily be measured (Robson and McCartan,2016). The results got through this method have high generalizability. Through this research method, the researcher controls the biasness level. In this research, researcher has followed quantitative research method. This research method has helped the researcher in generating reliable results for the research. It was not possible to use mixed research method as more time and high cost is needed in this. Due to lack of resources and time available with researcher, the researcher has adopted quantitative research method (Mackey and Gass, 2015).

On the basis of above explanation and description, researcher has selected quantitative research method for conducting the study. On the basis of quantitative research method, questionnaires are used for the purpose of data collection. In this research, quantitative research fits for the research topic as the results of quantitative research can be generalized to represent the general population. The research topic is to investigate general customers’ attitudes towards budget hotels. The qualitative research would limit the research scope of customers and hence it is inappropriate. In addition, it is feasible for the researcher to reach out a large number of general potential customers of budget hotels.

3.5. Research Strategy

In order conduct a research, different types of techniques can be used. The most general strategies of research are experiments, case study, survey, action studies and observations. In this study, survey strategy has been selected and on the basis of this budget hotels are selected. In selected method, a research instrument is used for data collection and survey is done in different organisations. Moreover, this research strategy also helps in increasing the understanding related to research issue (Sekaran and Bougie, 2009). This method is used for analysing situational perspective and it also assists in testing actual situations. It is considered to be most feasible and easy method in management science researches. The reason behind selection of this method is that it allows analysing wide issues with the help of appropriate and effective ways. Moreover, the survey strategy assists in getting real responses for questions of research as compared to other strategies. This research strategy was more suitable in present study as it helped in getting unexpected and innovative outcomes through which new directions are provided to research.

3.6. Data Collection

In order to conduct a research, two kinds of data can be collected through different methods. These are primary and secondary data. The primary data is that kind of data that is collected for the first time by researcher just for the purpose of current research. In present study, primary data has been collected from customers of budget hotels in China. The primary data has been collected from customers with the help of questionnaires. In addition to this, current study also focuses on secondary data collection. The secondary data is collected through various internet sources, articles, books, newspapers and so on. This data has been collected for analysing literature review. The secondary data related to factors affecting customers’ satisfaction and experience was collected in literature review. This helped in building foundation of study and researcher became capable of producing a path that must be followed while conducting the research. In current study, both primary and secondary data is collected for drawing valid conclusions.

3.7. Sampling Technique and Sample

In this study, all of the Chinese economy hotel customers are our target population. However, it is difficult to study all of the target population, so sampling is necessary. In this paper, we take a convenience sample intercept cheap hotel entrance passing customers, as the object of study. On the basis of convenient sampling, 100 customers from 10 budget hotels were selected. Those budget hotels will be selected that are operating in China. The data will be collected during day time for one month time period by distributing questionnaires to customers. The questionnaires will be distributed to customers by visiting hotels physically.

3.8. Research Instrument

In order to collect primary data in accordance with quantitative research method, questionnaire (Attached in Appendix A) was used. In questionnaire there were different sections for different variables. The first section of questionnaire was for demographic variables. After this, the next section was for factors that are Ps of marketing mix (price, product, place and promotion). The last section in questionnaire was for dependent variables that are customer satisfaction and customers’ experiences. The researcher used email and phone for contacting respondents. The questionnaires were distributed online to customers. They were not forced to fill those questionnaires and were provided with enough time to return those questionnaires after filling. This research instrument helped in getting responses of customers about impact of various factors on satisfaction and experience level of customers.

3.9. Validity and Reliability

In order to use questionnaire in a research, it is very important to check its validity and reliability. The researcher tested the construct, content and faces validity of questionnaire before distributing it to customers (Carter and Porter, 2000). The researcher contacted different practitioners related to factors affecting customer satisfaction and experiences in hotels and on the basis of their comments and feedbacks, different changes were made in questionnaire. This is important to be done for ensuring valid results.

In addition to validity of questionnaire, it is very important to test reliability of questionnaire. There is an integration of reliability with dependability of data (Carter and Porter, 2000). There are advantages of reliable data with respect to getting inference in addition to a doubt. The data collected from respondents with the help of questionnaire must not have an impact on research quality. However, this data must assists in solidifying of facts. The reliability of questionnaire was tested in pilot testing. If instrument is not reliable then study may not be enough capable of fulfilling the needed perspective. This can result in invalid results.

3.10. Pilot Testing

The pilot testing is helpful in testing reliability of instrument used in research (Healy and Perry, 2000). In pilot testing, researcher distributed questionnaires to only 20 respondents and inter-item consistency, total analysis of items and total reliability was tested. The value of Cronbach alpha was analysed and those items were removed that have less than 0.6 value of Cronbach alpha.

3.11. Data Analysis

After collection of data, it is important to analyse data for getting results and findings. In order to analyse data collected from customers of budget hotels in China, SPSS 20 was used.  This software was used for running regression, correlation and reliability tests. This helped in analysing the relationship between dependent and independent variables. With the help of SPSS software, regression and correlation analysis are used to test the relationship between dependent and independent variables. In addition to this, reliability analysis is used for testing the reliability and consistency of research instrument with the research issue. In case of reliability analysis, Cronbach alpha is used.

3.12. Ethical Considerations

The conduction of research is required to be in compliance with ethical standards (Smith et al, 1991). While collecting both primary and secondary data, researcher followed ethical practices. In case of primary data collection, researcher did not force any respondent to fill questionnaires. The researcher also ensured confidentiality of participants. In case of secondary data, researcher properly cited all data collected from various sources.

 

 

 

CHAPTER 4: THE RESEARCH

4.0. Introduction

This chapter deals with the analysis of data collected from respondents with the help of different tools and techniques. First of all, demographic analysis is done for the demographic variables studied through the use of questionnaires. After that, relationship between variables is analysed. In the end, item-wise analysis is done for the questionnaire. This chapter is used to draw findings from the data collected during conduction of research.

4.1. Demographic Analysis

 

 

 

Gender
		Frequency	Percent	Valid Percent	Cumulative Percent
Valid	Male	49	49.0	49.0	49.0
	Female	51	51.0	51.0	100.0
	Total	100	100.0	100.0

 

For the conduction of this study and for finding reliable results related to factors affected customers satisfaction and experience in budget hotels, questionnaires were distributed to 100 customers of 10 different budget hotels. Before answering questions related to variables of study, respondents were asked about their demographics like age and gender. There is no influence of gender on results on study, but for identifying number of males and females who participated in study, this question was asked from them. Among 100 customers in total, the analysis shows that there were 49% males and 51% females. This means that more female customers participated in the study as compared to males.

 

 

Age
		Frequency	Percent	Valid Percent	Cumulative Percent
Valid	15-19	10	10.0	10.0	10.0
	20-29	22	22.0	22.0	32.0
	30-39	24	24.0	24.0	56.0
	40-49	20	20.0	20.0	76.0
	50-59	24	24.0	24.0	100.0
	Total	100	100.0	100.0

 

In addition to the analysis of gender of respondents from whom questionnaires were got filled, they were also asked about their age. The respondents had to select from different options regarding their age. There were almost similar frequencies of respondents under each specified age group. 22% customers belonged to 20-29 years of age bracket, 24% were from age group of 30-39 years. Moreover, 20% were from 40-49 years and 24% were from 50-59 years of age bracket. This means that data was collected almost equally from people belonging to all age groups.

 

 

4.2. Descriptive Analysis

 

 

Descriptive Statistics
	N	Minimum	Maximum	Mean	Std. Deviation
Gender	100	1.00	2.00	1.5100	.50242
Age	100	1.00	5.00	3.2600	1.31518
P	100	2.60	5.00	3.8160	.53762
PRI	100	2.00	4.75	3.6950	.60363
PL	100	2.75	4.75	3.8950	.49770
PRO	100	2.75	4.75	3.9000	.51981
CS	100	2.38	4.00	3.2825	.41954
CE	100	3.00	4.67	3.9000	.44064
Valid N (listwise)	100

 

Descriptive analysis is used for getting a summary of whole sample from which data is collected. It can be seen from above table that for all variables the minimum and maximum values of responses that all responses are towards agree and strongly agree option that is from 3 to 5. For age the value of mean is 3.

 

4.3. Regression Analysis

4.3.1. IV= Product, Price, Place, Promotion; DV= Customer Satisfaction

 

Variables Entered/Removeda
Model	Variables Entered	Variables Removed	Method
1	PRO, PL, PRI, Pb	.	Enter
a. Dependent Variable: CS
b. All requested variables entered.

 

 

Model Summary
Model	R	R Square	Adjusted R Square	Std. Error of the Estimate
1	.906a	.821	.813	.18128
a. Predictors: (Constant), PRO, PL, PRI, P

 

The above table gives the summary of results for analysis of regression between all four independent variables that are product, price, place and promotion and customer satisfaction as dependent variable. In above table, the value of R depicts that strength of relationship between independent and dependent variables. As the value of R is 0.906, so it depicts that with one unit change in independent variable the dependent variable will be changed with 0.9 units.

ANOVAa
Model		Sum of Squares	df	Mean Square	F	Sig.
1	Regression	14.304	4	3.576	108.820	.000b
	Residual	3.122	95	.033
	Total	17.426	99
a. Dependent Variable: CS
b. Predictors: (Constant), PRO, PL, PRI, P

The ANOVA table is used in studies for analysing the significance level of relationship between variables. The above table depicts that value of F is 108.820 and significance value is 0.000. In order to have significant relationship between variables, the value of F must be greater than 2 and significance value must be less than 0.05. So, for Product, Price, Place, Promotion and Customer Satisfaction, the relationship is highly significant. 

 

Coefficientsa
Model		Unstandardized Coefficients		Standardized Coefficients	t	Sig.
		B	Std. Error	Beta
1	(Constant)	-.267	.200		-1.337	.185
	P	.495	.059	.635	8.435	.000
	PRI	.328	.033	.472	9.942	.000
	PL	.327	.037	.388	8.812	.000
	PRO	.212	.059	.263	3.615	.000
a. Dependent Variable: CS

The table of Coefficients is used to assess the relationship between each independent variable with dependent variable. The values of t and significance are used for taking decisions related to acceptance or rejection of hypotheses set in the study. In table the value of B is the value of beta. Beta tells the change that may occur in dependent variable due to the change in independent variables. For the relationship between Product and Customer Satisfaction, the value of beta is 0.495 with 0.000 as significance value. This means that one unit change in Product will bring 49.5% positive change in customer satisfaction. This depicts that by focusing on products, the hotels can increase customer satisfaction.

Similarly, for the relationship between Price and Customer Satisfaction, the value of beta is 0.328 with significance value as 0.000. This shows that one unit change in price will bring 32.8% increase in customer satisfaction. As value of beta is positive so it means change is significantly positive.

For the relationship between Place and Customer Satisfaction, the value of beta is 0.327 with 0.000 as value of significance. This means that one unit change in Place will bring 32.7% positive change in customer satisfaction.

The last independent variable is promotion for which the value of beta is 0.212 with 0.000 as significance value. So, with one unit change in promotion, the customer satisfaction will increase by 0.212.

As, the value of t for all variables is greater than 2 and significance value is less than 0.05, so all of four hypothesis; H1, H2, H3 and H4 will be accepted and all of their null hypothesis will be rejected.

4.3.2. IV= Product, Price, Place and Promotion; DV= Customer Experience

This is the regression analysis for relationship between factors and customer experience in budget hotels.

Variables Entered/Removeda
Model	Variables Entered	Variables Removed	Method
1	PRO, PL, PRI, Pb	.	Enter
a. Dependent Variable: CE
b. All requested variables entered.

 

 

Model Summary
Model	R	R Square	Adjusted R Square	Std. Error of the Estimate
1	.793a	.629	.613	.27410
a. Predictors: (Constant), PRO, PL, PRI, P

The above table shows the summary of regression analysis between all four independent variables and Customer Experience. The value of R is .793 which means that with one unit change in all four independent variable, the customer experience will increase 0.793 units. This means that overall relationship between all four independent variables and Customer Experience is positive.

 

ANOVAa
Model		Sum of Squares	df	Mean Square	F	Sig.
1	Regression	12.085	4	3.021	40.211	.000b
	Residual	7.138	95	.075
	Total	19.222	99
a. Dependent Variable: CE
b. Predictors: (Constant), PRO, PL, PRI, P

The above ANOVA table is used for taking decisions related to significance of relationship between variables. For having significant relationship, the value of F must be greater than 2 and significance value must be less than 0.05.

 

Coefficientsa
Model		Unstandardized Coefficients		Standardized Coefficients	t	Sig.
		B	Std. Error	Beta
1	(Constant)	.272	.302		.901	.370
	P	.141	.089	.172	6.584	.017
	PRI	.040	.050	.054	10.795	.029
	PL	.502	.056	.568	8.952	.000
	PRO	.528	.089	.623	5.957	.000
a. Dependent Variable: CE

The above table of Coefficients is analysed in order to take decision related to acceptance or rejection of hypotheses. As relationship of four independent variables between dependent variable is to be analysed, so value of beta separately for each variable is analysed.

The value of beta for relationship between Product and Customer Experience is 0.141 with 0.17 as significant value. This means that with one unit change in product the customer experience will be increased by 14.1%.

Similarly, the value of beta for the relationship between Price and Customer Experience is 0.040 with 0.029 as significance value. This means one unit change in price will bring 4% change in customer experience.

In addition to this the value of beta for the relationship between Place and Customer Experience is 0.502 with 0.000 as significance value. This depicts that one unit change in place will bring 50.2% increase in customer experience.

In the end, for the relationship between Promotion and Customer Experience, the value of beta is 0.528 with 0.000 as significant value. This means that with one unit change in promotion, the customer experience will increase by 52.8%.

The above table shows that value of t for all four independent variables and customer experience as dependent variable is greater than 2 and significant value is less than 0.05, so all four alternate hypothesis; H5, H6, H7 and H8 will be accepted.

4.4. Reliability Analysis

 

Case Processing Summary
		N	%
Cases	Valid	100	100.0
	Excludeda	0	.0
	Total	100	100.0
a. Listwise deletion based on all variables in the procedure.

 

 

Reliability Statistics
Cronbach's Alpha	N of Items
.777	28

Reliability analysis is used for assessing the consistence of research instrument with the research issue. In order to test the reliability, the value of Cronbach alpha is used. For having reliable instrument, the value of Cronbachs alpha must be greater than 0.6. The value of Cronbach’s alpha for current research is 0.777 which means that questionnaire used in this research is reliable.

 

Item Statistics
	Mean	Std. Deviation	N
The hotel has comfortable guest room	3.6800	.97318	100
The hotel has clean guest room	3.7800	.94900	100
The hotel has good atmosphere in guest room	4.1200	.59084	100
The hotel has good quality of product in guest room	3.5800	1.17362	100
There are added-value facilities in guest room	3.9200	.87247	100
The hotel offers reasonable prices for its services	3.9000	.81029	100
It offers lower price than similar other hotels	3.5600	.87985	100
It has good price range for guest room	3.4000	1.42134	100
The hotel has consistent pricing policy	3.9200	1.16930	100
There is good geographic coverage of hotel network	4.2800	.96484	100
The hotel is at convenient location	3.6200	1.11718	100
There is enough parking area	3.5200	.94794	100
There is central reservation system	4.1600	.67749	100
There are attractive advertisements of hotel	4.0200	.65103	100
The hotel provides various benefits for its members	3.6800	.97318	100
The company provides discounts for online reservations	3.7800	.94900	100
The hotel gives loyalty cards to its guests	4.1200	.59084	100
I am satisfied with the guest room	3.5800	1.17362	100
I am satisfied with the price	3.9200	.87247	100
I am satisfied with the location	3.9000	.81029	100
I am satisfied with the promotion	3.5600	.87985	100
I am satisfied with the atmosphere	3.4000	1.42134	100
I am satisfied with the service	3.9200	1.16930	100
Overall, I am satisfied with this budget hotel	4.2800	.96484	100
Overall, I am satisfied with service quality in budget hotel	3.6200	1.11718	100
I have good experience of staying in this hotel	3.5200	.94794	100
I really liked the services provided by hotel	4.1600	.67749	100
I share the pleasure staying experience about this budget hotel with others	4.0200	.65103	100

 

 

 

4.5. Item wise analysis

4.5.1. Product

 

The hotel has comfortable guest room
		Frequency	Percent	Valid Percent	Cumulative Percent
Valid	Strongly Disagree	6	6.0	6.0	6.0
	Disagree	4	4.0	4.0	10.0
	Neutral	20	20.0	20.0	30.0
	Agree	56	56.0	56.0	86.0
	Strongly Agree	14	14.0	14.0	100.0
	Total	100	100.0	100.0

 

 

 

 

 

From the analysis of customers done through questionnaires it has been seen that from 100 customers 56 percent of the customers agreed that hotel have comfortable guests’ rooms for them. On contrary to this, 4 percent of them disagreed with them. It shows that weighted of people who are satisfied is more than the dis-satisfied ones. It implies that the hotel has comfortable guest room for people.

 

The hotel has clean guest room
		Frequency	Percent	Valid Percent	Cumulative Percent
Valid	Strongly Disagree	6	6.0	6.0	6.0
	Disagree	2	2.0	2.0	8.0
	Neutral	16	16.0	16.0	24.0
	Agree	60	60.0	60.0	84.0
	Strongly Agree	16	16.0	16.0	100.0
	Total	100	100.0	100.0

 

 

 

According to the analysis, it has been seen that from 100 percent of customers, 60 percent of customers agreed with the statement that hotel has clean rooms for guests. Whereas, only 2 percent disagreed with this that hotel has no clean guest rooms. So it implies that hotels maintain cleanliness of guest rooms.

 

 

The hotel has good atmosphere in guest room
		Frequency	Percent	Valid Percent	Cumulative Percent
Valid	Neutral	12	12	12	12
	Agree	64	64	64	76
	Strongly Agree	24	24	24	100
	Total	100	100	100

 

 

Customers were asked about the atmosphere of guest room. 64 percent of customers agreed on the statement that hotel has good atmosphere. 24 percent of the customers strongly agreed on this statement that hotel has good environment. From the analysis, it can be seen that hotels have good environment for customers.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The hotel has good quality of product in guest room
		Frequency	Percent	Valid Percent	Cumulative Percent
Valid	Strongly Disagree	8	8.0	8.0	8.0
	Disagree	12	12.0	12.0	20.0
	Neutral	14	14.0	14.0	34.0
	Agree	46	46.0	46.0	80.0
	Strongly Agree	20	20.0	20.0	100.0
	Total	100	100.0	100.0

 

 

 

The customers were asked about the quality of products which are provided to them in hotel. From 100 customers, 12 percent of the customers disagreed with the statement that they get god product quality whereas 46 percent of them disagreed with the statement of having good product quality. From the results, it can be seen that product quality is average. Hotels need to make more improvements in the quality of their product.

 

 

 

 

 

 

There are added-value facilities in guest room
		Frequency	Percent	Valid Percent	Cumulative Percent
Valid	Strongly Disagree	2	2	2	2
	Disagree	4	4	4	6
	Neutral	18	18	18	24
	Agree	52	52	52	76
	Strongly Agree	24	24	24	100
	Total	100	100	100

 

 

 

 

 

Customers have been asked for if they are provided with some extra facilities. 24 percent of the customers strongly agreed the statement that they get extra facilities. 52 percent of them agreed that they get extra facilities. On contrary to this, 2 percent of the customers strongly disagreed with the statement that they get extra facilities. 4 percent of them disagreed with the statement. It depicts that they are provided with extra facilities.

 

4.5.2. Price

 

The hotel offers reasonable prices for its services
		Frequency	Percent	Valid Percent	Cumulative Percent
Valid	Disagree	8	8.0	8.0	8.0
	Neutral	14	14.0	14.0	22.0
	Agree	58	58.0	58.0	80.0
	Strongly Agree	20	20.0	20.0	100.0
	Total	100	100.0	100.0

 

 

 

The customers were asked for if they get reasonable prices for the services they get. 58 percent of the customers agreed with the statement that they are fine with the prices. Whereas 14 percent of people disagreed with the statement, that they get reasonable prices. It depicts that there are reasonable prices for customers. But still there is a need to reduce the prices.

 

 

 

 

 

It offers lower price than similar other hotels
		Frequency	Percent	Valid Percent	Cumulative Percent
Valid	Strongly Disagree	2	2	2	2
	Disagree	12	12	12	14.
	Neutral	22	22	22	36
	Agree	56	56	56	92
	Strongly Agree	8	8	8	100
	Total	100	100	100

 

 

 

According to the questionnaires filled up by the customers. It has been seen that the 56 percent of the customers actually think they are offered with lower prices as compared to other hotels. On contrary to this, 12 percent of people disagree with the statement that they get lower prices. It implies that prices of hotel are lower than other similar hotels.

 

 

 

 

It has good price range for guest room
		Frequency	Percent	Valid Percent	Cumulative Percent
Valid	Strongly Disagree	22	22	22	22
	Neutral	16	16	16	38
	Agree	40	40	40	78
	Strongly Agree	22	22	22	100
	Total	100	100	100

 

 

People were asked for if they get good price range for guest rooms. From 100 percent of customers, 40 percent of the customers agreed with the statement. 22 percent of the customers strongly agreed with the statement. 40 percent of people agreed with the statement. It depicts that customers get good price range for guest rooms.

 

 

 

 

 

4.5.3. Place

 

There is good geographic coverage of hotel network
		Frequency	Percent	Valid Percent	Cumulative Percent
Valid	Strongly Disagree	2	2.0	2.0	2.0
	Disagree	4	4.0	4.0	6.0
	Neutral	12	12.0	12.0	18.0
	Agree	28	28.0	28.0	46.0
	Strongly Agree	54	54.0	54.0	100.0
	Total	100	100.0	100.0

 

 

In order to analyse the place as a factor for budget hotels, respondents were asked few questions about place of budget hotels. First of all, they were asked about their satisfaction level with geographic coverage of hotels. The above table depicts that 54 percent of respondents strongly agreed and 28 percent customers agreed with the statement. This means most of customers are satisfied with geographic location of hotels.

 

 

 

The hotel is at convenient location
		Frequency	Percent	Valid Percent	Cumulative Percent
Valid	Strongly Disagree	2	2.0	2.0	2.0
	Disagree	16	1	16.	18
	Neutral	28	28	28	46
	Agree	26	26.	26	72
	Strongly Agree	28	28	28	100
	Total	100	100	100

 

 

 

According to the survey being done through questionnaires, it has been seen that people are neutral about the statement that hotel is present at a convenient location. From 100 percent, 26 percent of the customers stated that hotel is located at a convenient position. 16 percent of them disagreed with the statement. 26 percent of the customers were neutral about the statement that location of hotel is feasible for them. It implies that hotel should be located at a convenient place for more profit and for attracting more number of customers. It should be located at some place, where there may be fewer hotels around.

 

There is enough parking area
		Frequency	Percent	Valid Percent	Cumulative Percent
Valid	Strongly Disagree	4	4.0	4.0	4.0
	Disagree	10	10.0	10.0	14.0
	Neutral	26	26.0	26.0	40.0
	Agree	50	50.0	50.0	90.0
	Strongly Agree	10	10.0	10.0	100.0
	Total	100	100.0	100.0

 

 

In case of hotels, parking area is considered to be a very important factor while analysing place of hotels.  So, respondents were asked that whether or not there is enough parking area present in hotels as this has significant impact on customer satisfaction level as well as on their experience of visiting the hotel. Among 100 customers, 50 percent and 10 percent respondents agreed and strongly agreed with the statement. Among 100 customers only 14 customers disagreed with the statement that enough parking area is available. This means budgeted hotels focus on parking areas in order to make customers satisfied and to make their experience better.

 

 

 

4.5.4. Promotion

 

There are attractive advertisements of hotel
		Frequency	Percent	Valid Percent	Cumulative Percent
Valid	Neutral	20	20	20	20
	Agree	58	58	58	78
	Strongly Agree	22	22	22	100
	Total	100	100	100

 

 

Customers were asked for if they are attracted by the advertisements of hotels. Like if there are much attractive advertisements for the customers. Through survey, it has been seen that number of people who agreed with this statement are more. 58 of the customers agreed with the statement that there are many attractive advertisements of hotel. 22 percent of customers strongly agreed with the statement. It implies that hotel owns some attractive advertisements for attracting customers. But still the number of benefits can be increased. Members can be provided with bonuses and extra facilities for encouragement. They can be given some prices or bonuses in case of efficient services.

 

 

The company provides discounts for online reservations
		Frequency	Percent	Valid Percent	Cumulative Percent
Valid	Strongly Disagree	6	6.0	6.0	6.0
	Disagree	2	2.0	2.0	8.0
	Neutral	16	16.0	16.0	24.0
	Agree	60	60.0	60.0	84.0
	Strongly Agree	16	16.0	16.0	100.0
	Total	100	100.0	100.0

 

 

Through questionnaire, customers were asked about the availability of discounts through online reservations. 6 percent of the customers totally disagreed with the statement. According to them they do not get any discount. 2 percent of people disagreed with the statement. On contrast to this, the number of people who agreed with the availability of discount is more. 60 percent of the customers actually agreed with the statement they get extra discounts for online reservations. 16 percent of them strongly agreed with the statement. This implies that hotel provides discounts to the customers for online reservations as the number of people who agrees on this statement is more than the ones who disagree.

 

The hotel gives loyalty cards to its guests
		Frequency	Percent	Valid Percent	Cumulative Percent
Valid	Neutral	12	12	12	12
	Agree	64	64	64	76
	Strongly Agree	24	24	24	100
	Total	100	100	100

 

 

According to the survey it has been seen that customers get loyalty cards from the hotel. Through questionnaire, customers were asked for if they receive loyalty cards from hotel. From 100 percent of them, 24 percent of the customers strongly agreed with the statement. 64 percent of the customers agreed with the statement that they get loyalty cards. Moreover, 12 percent of them gave a neutral response.

 

 

 

 

 

The hotel provides various benefits for its members
		Frequency	Percent	Valid Percent	Cumulative Percent
Valid	Strongly Disagree	6	6	6	6
	Disagree	4	4	4	10
	Neutral	20	20	20	30
	Agree	56	56	56	86
	Strongly Agree	14	14	14	100
	Total	100	100	100

 

 

According to the survey being done, it has been seen that from 100 customers, 56 percent agrees with the statement that hotel gives different benefits to the members. 14 percent of the customers strongly disagreed with statement that members get different benefits. On contrast, 4 percent of customers disagreed with the statement. 6 percent of them totally disagreed with the statement the members get extra benefits.  It implies that members are provided with various advantages.

 

 

 

 

4.5.5. Customer Satisfaction

 

I am satisfied with the guest room
		Frequency	Percent	Valid Percent	Cumulative Percent
Valid	Strongly Disagree	8	8.0	8.0	8.0
	Disagree	12	12.0	12.0	20.0
	Neutral	14	14.0	14.0	34.0
	Agree	46	46.0	46.0	80.0
	Strongly Agree	20	20.0	20.0	100.0
	Total	100	100.0	100.0

 

 

According to the survey, it has been seen that not all of the customers are satisfied with the guest rooms provided to them. They were asked for if they are satisfied with the guest room they get. From 100 percent, 20 percent of them strongly agreed with the statement, 46 percent of them agreed with the statement. 12 percent of the customers disagreed and stated that they are not happy with the guest room. On contrast to this 14 percent of them were neutral. 8 percent of customers totally disagreed with the statement. It implies that number of satisfied customers is more as compared to the unsatisfied ones. Hotel should make more improvement for increasing the number of satisfied people. As if more people will be satisfied, then they will work as an asset for the hotel. They can ask other people to visit the hotel. It can in turn increase the profit of the hotel.

 

I am satisfied with the service
		Frequency	Percent	Valid Percent	Cumulative Percent
Valid	Strongly Disagree	10	10	10	10
	Disagree	2	2	2	12
	Neutral	6	6	6	18
	Agree	50	50	50	68
	Strongly Agree	32	32	32	100
	Total	100	100	100

 

 

 

In addition to this, customers were asked about their satisfaction level for service of hotels. Most of customers show that they are satisfied with services of hotels which shows that due to four factors that are product, price, place and promotion, customers become satisfied with budget hotels.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

4.5.6. Customer Experience

 

I have good experience of staying in this hotel
		Frequency	Percent	Valid Percent	Cumulative Percent
Valid	Strongly Disagree	4	4.0	4.0	4.0
	Disagree	10	10.0	10.0	14.0
	Neutral	26	26.0	26.0	40.0
	Agree	50	50.0	50.0	90.0
	Strongly Agree	10	10.0	10.0	100.0
	Total	100	100.0	100.0

 

 

For analysing experience of customers while staying in this hotel, this item was added in questionnaire. The data collected from respondents show that 60 percent of customers had good experience of staying in this hotel. In contrast to this, there were just 14% customers who did not have good experience of staying in this hotel.

 

 

 

 

 

 

I share the pleasure staying experience about this budget hotel with others
		Frequency	Percent	Valid Percent	Cumulative Percent
Valid	Neutral	20	20.0	20.0	20.0
	Agree	58	58.0	58.0	78.0
	Strongly Agree	22	22.0	22.0	100.0
	Total	100	100.0	100.0

 

 

 

 

 

 

In the end, customers were asked that whether or not they share their positive experience of hotel with others. The responses show that 70 percent of respondents share their experiences with others like with their relatives and friends. None of the customers disagreed with this statement. So, it means most of customers are happy with hotel and share their positive experience with others.

 

 

 

4.6. Discussion

The study has found that customers get influenced by different factors of rooms services provided by hotel. In case when a budget hotel provides clean, comfortable and better environment in rooms of hotels, then customers can be made satisfaction and their experience is affected positively. This is consistent with the findings of Ren et al (2015) in which they found that budget hotels have to focus on services offered to customers in order to increase their level of satisfaction. In addition to this, the current study has found that there is significant positive impact of prices offered by budget hotels to satisfaction and experience of customers. In order to increase satisfaction level of customers, budget hotels have to ensure that they offer reasonable prices to their customers and high quality of products. This is consistent with the research conducted by Rishi and Joshi (2016).

By focusing on various elements in hotel, the management can ensure high satisfaction level of customers. When a customer visits a hotel then various factors affect his or her experience of visiting that hotel. It is because of the reason that happy and satisfied customers use to come back for enjoying more services and it also helps in increasing chances of creating potential customers (Peng et al, 2015). Therefore, it has become very important for hotels to satisfy their customers through understanding of their needs as this can be acted as costless strategy to generate new business. The findings have revealed that there is a significant relationship between products, price, place, promotion and customer satisfaction and experience. Different kinds of promotional activities like advertisements, bonuses, gifts and so on can help budget hotels in increasing the satisfaction level of customers. In addition to satisfaction, experience of customers is also positively affected by various promotional activities of budget hotels. The analysis shows that the management of budget hotels must ensure considerable focus on these factors in order to get high market share and competitive edge through high satisfaction and better experience of customers.

 

 

 

4.6.1. Acceptance and Rejection of Hypothesis

Hypothesis	Accept	Reject
H1	√
H2	√
H3	√
H4	√
H5	√
H6	√
H7	√
H8	√

 

 

 

Chapter 5: CONCLUSION

This research has been conducted on ten budget hotels of China in order to identify factors that can have an impact on customer experience and satisfaction. For the purpose of data collection, questionnaires were used. In current study, 4Ps of marketing mix are taken as independent factors and their effect on experience and satisfaction of customers has been studied. The study has found that there is significant positive impact of product, price, place and promotion on experience and satisfaction of customers. In order to increase satisfaction of customers and for making positive experience of customers, the management of hotels should focus on products, price, place and promotional activities.

In businesses, it is not adequate to implement the strategy of one size fits all. It has become important for companies to search for ways through which their products, services and experiences can be tailored. Customer experience is a total of interpretations done by an individual. It is not a logical decision but this is an experience that has gained by an individual during his or her visit to the organisation. This is the reason it is not easy for management of company to influence the kind of experience owned by a customer. Companies have possibility of affecting the type of experiences created and offered by them. In companies, often customer experience management is forgotton or it is rarely considered in agendas of meetings. Companies can use customer experience for the purpose of gaining competitive advantage (Verhoef et al, 2009).

In case of getting higher satisfaction level of customers, it is very important to focus on marketing of products and services. In case of marketing, the most significant element is marketing mix. In order to increase level of customers’ satisfaction, there is a need of focusing on marketing mix of an organisation.

With reference to Li et al (2013) both emotional and physical aspects are encompasses by total customer experience that emerge at every phase of value chain, are holistic and advance from customer interaction. It is argued by them that these experiences depend upon customers, prevailing in customer’s minds, and specific to the context. It is purposed by the authors that test of reliability and quality of total customer experience is its potential to influence re-buy, generate loyalty, exchange encouraging word-of-mouth and close that for customer loyalty to be greater, emotional experience, product feature satisfaction and customer value perceived is also required to be greater. 

5.1. Limitations and Recommendations for Future Research

There are many positive points and advantages of this research but besides these there are some limitations to this research as well. In present study, quantitative research method has been used so there is low generalizability of research. In future, mixed method can be used for getting detailed insights about the research. In addition to this, due to the lack of time, sample size was 100 customers from 10 budget hotels. In future, research should be conducted on larger sample size.

 

 

 

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Appendix A

Questionnaire for analysing the influence of factors affecting customers’ satisfaction and experience at budget hotel

Name: ______ (Optional)

Gender

1. Male
2. Female

Age

1. 15-30 years
2. 31-45 years
3. 46-60 years
4. More than 60 years

Kindly select one number from 1-5, where

1= Strongly Disagree

2= Disagree

3= Neutral

4= Agree

5= Strongly Agree

Factors	1	2	3	4	5
Product
The hotel has comfortable guest room
The hotel has clean guest room
The hotel has good atmosphere in guest room
The hotel has good quality of product in guest room
There are added-value facilities in guest room
Price
The hotel offers reasonable prices for its services
It offers lower price than similar other hotels
It has good price range for guest room
The hotel has consistent pricing policy
Place
There is good geographic coverage of hotel network
The hotel is at convenient location
There is enough parking area
There is central reservation system
Promotion
There are attractive advertisements of hotel
The hotel provides various benefits for its members
The company provides discounts for online reservations
The hotel gives loyalty cards to its guests
Customer Satisfaction
I am satisfied with the guest room
I am satisfied with the price
I am satisfied with the location
I am satisfied with the promotion
I am satisfied with the atmosphere
I am satisfied with the service
Overall, I am satisfied with this budget hotel
Overall, I am satisfied with service quality in budget hotel
Customer Experience
I have good experience of staying in this hotel
I really liked the services provided by hotel
I share the pleasure staying experience about this budget hotel with others