Investigation of Factors Influencing Customer Loyalty in Malaysia and Jordan Hotel Industry

Abstract

This study aims to proffer solutions to customer loyalty challenges at these destinations by proposing and validating customer loyalty model using relationship marketing and social exchange theory. Based on the underpinning theories, this study analyzed the direct and indirect influence of brand image, trust, convenience and emotion on customer loyalty of five star hotels in Malaysia and Jordan. Further, the mediating effect of customer satisfaction on the relationship between exogenous latent variables and endogenous latent variable was investigated. A total of 384 and 371customers respectively of three famous hotels under the management of Starwood were sampled using convenience sampling method for data analysis from Malaysia and Jordan. SPSS version 21.0 software was used for the analysis. However, the empirical results showed partial mediation effects on the relationship between brand image, trust, convenience, emotion and customer loyalty in respect of Malaysian hotel customers. In Jordan hotels, satisfaction does not mediate the relationship between trust and customer loyalty but partially mediate between emotion, brand image, convenience and customer loyalty. In summary, the findings of this study will narrow the perception of the top echelon of these hotels on the actual factors to focus in order to earn loyalty of their valued customers. This study also contributed to frontier of knowledge by integrating the variables of relationship marketing from the perspectives of two developing countries.