The Royal Caribbean is an exotic option for the family holidays and vacation having headquartered in Miami Florida. This is the second largest cruise company having around 398 ships. Basically, the focus of the company is in the North American Cruise market but now, the company is expanding in the international market i.e. United Kingdom, Italy, Germany, Norway, Singapore, China, Australia, Brazil and Spain. The goal of the company is to provide the good experience of the vacations to the customers that they have daydream about a thousand times. Royal Caribbean provides three different travelling destinations to the customers i.e. Caribbean and Mexico destination, Alaskan destinations, and European destination (Orams, 2002). In current time, cruises are becoming more popular and famous among the customers for family or couples vacation. Cruise always focus on the large amount of customers so, it is not focused on one specific demographic. This report provides the deep marketing research of Royal Caribbean and a research marketing plan for the company. This report includes the research objective, literature review, sampling plan, administration plan, questionnaire and ethical consideration for the company (Wild, 2006).
Expanding business in the different markets with customers’ satisfaction is the most critical task in the time of strong competition. It is well known that tourism sector has high level of competition in the market in terms of various services. Cruise tourism is one of the most increasing businesses in present time which has aim to provide best travelling experience to the customers. It can be seen that there are many companies who are providing similar kind of traveling experience at very attractive and affordable cost. There are competitors Royal Caribbean who are trying to provide more qualitative services at very reasonable cost. In such kind of situations, it is very difficult for Royal Caribbean to satisfy the customers with best services with high quality traveling experience (Davidsson & Wiklund, 2013).
The objective of this research is to find out the ways by which Royal Caribbean can satisfy the customers in the competitive environment. The key objective of the research is to identify various methods of marketing which can be adopted by the company to fulfill the needs and wants of the customers. Further, the main aim of the research is to analyze the level of customer satisfaction by the services of the company. By preparing a questionnaire, this research will provide a clear picture about the satisfaction level of the customers in Royal Caribbean. The research will analyze the expectations of the customers from the company and will focus on the improvements which can be done to satisfy them (Nummela, 2011).
Cruise tourism is the fastest growing industry in the travel sector in all over the world. In current trends, cruise ships are becoming larger in economies of scale. Customer satisfaction is important for the success of the company. Customer satisfaction is becoming important component in the tourism industry which can improve the reputation of the company in the marketplace and helpful in gaining market share (Maunier & Camelis, 2013). Tourism industry is the service based industry and the cruise ship and cruise travel can be considered as the floating resort and tourism destination for the customers. There are many studies which reveal the importance of customer satisfaction with the service industries. Based on the studies, it has revealed that Service quality has an important role in the process of customer satisfaction. Along with this, service quality, perceived value and behavioral intensions of the customers are also play important role in the process of customer satisfaction process. So, there are four terms in the sustainable marketing of tourism industry (Johnson, 2002).
Service quality-
Many researchers argued that service quality is the complicated term for service organizations. Service quality is more critical as compared to product quality because in product quality physical issues in the products can be detected easily but service quality is difficult to measure physically. Characteristics of service quality are intangible, simultaneous, heterogeneous and perishable (Carll, 2011).
Perceived quality-
Value is the key part of marketing which can be described as the trade-off between price and quality. Perceived value is not limited to the concept of money; it is related to the concept of benefit, quality and social psychology. Importance of perceived value has created attention from the practical circles. Perceived value has impacted on customer satisfaction in the tourism sector. Many research argued that perceived values are the key elements to analyze the buying intensions of the customers. Consumers and marketers are becoming more focused on the importance of values as values are key factor in current marketplace. Customers perceived values have impact on the customer satisfaction behavioral aspects of the customers. Factors of the values provided by marketers are different for each and every customer (Kester, 2002).
Customer satisfaction-
Customer satisfaction is the base of overall marketing. According to Machleit and mantel (2001), the main purpose of marketing is to satisfy needs and wants of the customers. It is important to satisfy the customers as satisfied customers will reward companies with favorable behaviors. Based on research, it is founded that by improve customer satisfaction, companies will be able to develop higher future profitability. In simple words, customer satisfaction plays a vital role in developing long-term benefits for the companies by increasing customer loyalty and profitability.
Behavioral intension-
Behavioral intension can be described as the profitability by which an individual shows a specific behavior while availing services in the market (Marcussen, 2011). Generally, behavioral intension can be divided into two catagories i.e. favorable and unfavorable. Favorable behavioral intension includes positive behavior towards products and services. On the other hand, unfavorable intension includes negative attitude of individuals towards a product or service. Favorable intension of customers improves their loyalty towards particular brand or service (Brida & Zapata, 2010).
Tourism industry is highly competitive industry so, it is important for the markers to have deep understanding of favorable buying intension of customers in this industry. There are some attributes which show about favorable intension of customers i.e. saying good things about services, recommending the services to others, and repeating services which can provide useful guidance to the companies to attract and retain the customers in the operating market (Kim, 2012).
Sampling method
For this research, qualitative methods will be used. Quantitative research can be done same as common research which includes experimental statement and experimental methods. Now, experimental statements can be described as the defined report related to the real case rather than any kind of assumptions. There is an important definition about qualitative method given by Creswell (1994), qualitative research can be considered as the phenomena by gathering various facts by using scientifically based methods.
There will be some questions which will be planned on the basis of subject in this research. The questionnaire will be helpful in doing research for identifying the way by which Royal Caribbean can satisfy its customers with effective services. For gathering feedbacks form the customers and employees, questionnaire will also be very useful in this research. By this method, company will be able to know about the requirements of the customers so; this is the most convenient method for the company. Questionnaire will have open ended and close ended questions and it will be sent to some regular customers of the company.
In this research, qualitative method will be used with the questionnaire form. The questions were related to the satisfaction level of the customers so; this survey will be planned carefully for the research purpose. This survey will be conducted among the customers of the Royal Caribbean. The number of customers for survey is 35 who are external people of the company. Customers are chosen for the research because they are the important part of the business and the expansion for the company in various markets. Along with this, they can be most trustworthy at the time of research. Analysis of customers is important because by the review of clients, theirs needs and requirements will be identified.
In most of the questions, there are several choices having five options in each question. Along with this, there are some important open questions which will be answered in own words by the customers. The questionnaire will be sent to the email of the customers. Along with this, for conducting secondary data, various reviews and research of different authors will be taken. Thus, theory will be partially based on given guidelines and references of the authors.
Key objective of this research is to identify the needs of the customers in present competitive environment and to provide effective method to the Royal Caribbean to focus on the requirements of the customers. It is clear that company is trying to expand its business tourism in the competitive market place. So, the questionnaire for the survey is designed to identify the various methods to grow the business towards next level. At the time of research, it is expected that result will be positive towards the Royal Caribbean and personal suggestions will be given by the customers to improve the business.
The survey will be conducted based on the questionnaire which was sent to the 35 people who are regular customers of the Royal Caribbean. This research will be conducted for two weeks to get more and more answers as possible. As mentioned above, this survey will be conducted by sending the questionnaires to the respondents. There is no need of respondents to disclose their names. There will be 25 questions in which four are open questions and rests are multiple choice questions. Every multiple choice will have five options including highly satisfied, satisfied, neutral, dissatisfied and highly dissatisfied.
The questionnaire will be based on English language. In the open questions, respondents have to give answer carefully and most of the appropriate answers will be sorted out. After gathering the questionnaire form, answers provided by respondents will be compared with others. Aim of the first question is to identify about the thinking of the customers towards the company and its services and the methods by which company can deliver better services to them. By other questions, the objective is to identify the recommendations of the customers to the Royal Caribbean. There can be both positive and negative response from the customers. Feedbacks from the side of the customers play a vital role in the success of the company. If the customers of Royal Caribbean are not satisfied with the services of the company then company cannot get success in the market. In the questionnaire, customers will be asked to give the suggestions for development.
After preparing the survey questionnaire, it is the time to focus on administration for the successful survey. In this plan, the requirements of the customers will be indentified. So, company will focus on those areas where the services of Royal Caribbean are not available. Company will hire more staff and employees to provide more services in terms of values and high quality services. By hiring more services, company will be able to connect with more customers. Company will also focus on setting affordable prices so that most of the customers will choose its services.
For the Completion of a research project, it is important to maintain the basic ethics during the project. According to the Bryman and Bell (2011), it is not only important to complete the research project properly but it is also important to maintain some ethics during the research project work. Data and the sample provide a big contribution in the way of the success of research report. In this research, researcher has to ensure that data collection process from the customers and guests will be not being disclosed at any situation. Along with this, researcher will also make sure that he or she will be affected by any kind of favorable data during the data collection procedure. This research is completely academic research so, to continue this project, there will not be any kind of monetary transactions.
Conclusion
In conclusion, it can be said that Customer satisfaction is becoming important component in the tourism industry which can improve the reputation of the company in the marketplace and helpful in gaining market share. This report provides the deep marketing research of Royal Caribbean and a research marketing plan for the company. By the market research and survey questionnaire, company will be able to know about the requirements of the customers so; market research is the most convenient method for the company. It is clear that company is trying to expand its business tourism in the competitive market place. So, the questionnaire for the survey is designed to identify the various methods to grow the business towards next level.
References
Brida, J., & Zapata, S., (2010), Cruise tourism: economic, socio-cultural and Environmental impacts: Int. J. Leisure and Tourism Marketing, 1 (3), 205-226
Carll, H., (2011), Cruising Tourism Environmental Impacts: Case Study of Dubrovnik, Croatia: Journal of coastal research, 61, 104-113
Davidsson, P., & Wiklund, J., (2013), New Perspectives on Firm Growth, USA: Edward Elgar publishing limited
Johnson, D., (2002), Environmentally sustainable cruise tourism: a reality check, Marine Policy, 26(4), July, 261-270
Kester, J.G.C., (2002), Cruise tourism: Tourism Economics, 9 (3), 337–350
Kim, C., (2012), Cruise tourism Current situation and trends in /Asia and Pacific: UNWTO Asia Pacific Newsletter, 25, 4-42
Marcussen, (2011), Determinants of tourist satisfaction and intention to return: Tourism, 203-221
Maunier, C., & Camelis, C. (2013), Toward an identification of elements contributing to satisfaction with the tourism experience: Journal of Vacation Marketing, 19(1), 19-39
Nummela, N., (2011), International Growth of Small and Medium Enterprises, UK: Routledge
Orams, M. (2002), Marine Tourism: Development, Impacts and Management, USA: Routledge
Wild, G.P., (2006), Cruise Statistics, GP Wild (International) Limited, London
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