Brand Loyalty Programmes and Competitiveness of Five Star Hotels in Nairobi

Abstract

Competition among the various hotel brands has led to the need to attract and retain customers and adopt ways of adding greater value to these customers like having brand loyalty programmes. These programmes aim at more or less locking in loyal customers by providing preferential services as a way of rewarding their loyalty. These customers in turn identify With the particular brand and strive to maintain brand loyalty in order to enjoy the benefits of the programme. The hotel brands will therefore enjoy competitive advantage due to these loyal customers. The research was centered on the two concepts of competitive advantage and brand loyalty.

Literature was gathered on these concepts while paying close attention to the practice in the hotel industry. Findings from closely related studies were also considered before embarking on the actual research. Brand loyalty programmes were identified from five star hotels in Nairobi and all the pertinent information relating to the programmes and the performance of the hotels gathered through a questionnaire. The questionnaires were sent through both soft and hard copies and responses were available within five weeks.

Data was collected and collated in a suitable manner for ease of statistical analysis. All the pertinent information relating to the brand loyalty programmes and performace of the hotels were analyzed. A comparison was drawn between the hotels that have actively adopted brand loyalty programmes and those that do not embrace these programmes. The findings revealed that the hotels adopting brand loyalty programs performed better than the hotels without brand loyalty programs. An important conclusion drawn was that brand loyalty programs indeed guarantees some measure of competitive advantage to the five star hotels in Nairobi.