Introduction
The emergence of the service industry has greatly influenced the focus of marketing in the modern economy. Unlike the firms in the industries that deal with tangible goods, the firms in the service industry highly depend on their relationships with the customers in order to survive in the market. Due to the high competition and volatility in the service industry, most firms straggle to cultivate long-term relationships with their clients in order to ensure loyalty and satisfaction among the customers.
The same concept has been adopted by other industries due to its effectiveness in creating competitive advantages. The process of developing relationships with customers can only be achieved through public relation and relationship marketing (Sharma, Sheth & Kellstadt 1997, vol. 36 pp. 87-89). Public relation is the process through which organizations attempt to “manage a proactive communication in order to create and maintain a positive image” (Pecky 1999, p. 23).
It aims at facilitating marketing through the established relationships between the firms and their clients. Relationship marketing on the other hand is the process of “establishing and maintaining successful relational exchanges” (Baron, Conway & Wainbz 2007, p. 46) between firms and their customers. Thus it focuses on enhancing customer’s loyalty. The purpose of this essay will be to evaluate the effectiveness of public relation and relationship marketing in the context of promoting an international event.
The event in this case is an international business conference and trade fair that focuses on the challenges of the hospitality industry in Europe. The event was held in London and was attended by managers, regulators and customers’ representatives from all the European countries.
The paper will begin by highlighting the details of the event. This will be followed by a discussion on the public relation and relationship marketing activities of the event. Various theories will then be used to evaluate the effectiveness of the event’s public relation and relationship marketing activities. The essay will end by concluding that the public relation and relationship marketing activities of the event were effective.
Findings
The business conference and trade fair is an annual event that brings together various stakeholders in the European hospitality industry to discuss the challenges of the industry. The purpose of the event was to achieve three objectives which were as follows. First, the participants were to discus the basic quality standards that should be used to benchmark the quality of services in the industry. Second, the participants were to discuss the effects of regulation on the performance of businesses in the industry.
Finally, the conference gave the participants an opportunity to market their firms and products through exhibitions. The event was organized by Hotel Owners and Franchisees Transnational and European League (HOFTEL). HOFTEL is the body that represents the investors in the European hospitality industry. The key stakeholders in the event included consumers’ representatives from various countries.
Thus the investors and the managers had the opportunity to develop relationships with the consumers’ representatives. The representatives are perceived to be opinion leaders and thus they play a critical role in marketing by influencing the decisions of the buyers (Ledingham & Bruning 2001, p. 69). The governments of various countries were also represented in the event.
They were represented by the regulators of the hospitality industry of their respective countries. This gave the managers an opportunity to interact with the government representatives in order to share their ideas on the effects of regulation. The interactions enabled the managers and the regulators to cultivate a long-term relationship that would facilitate cooperation in making decisions.
The general public was also allowed to attend the exhibition sessions. The last category of stakeholders included the managers and owners of hotels in the European countries. My choice for an international business conference and trade fair event was informed by the fact that marketing such events has been a challenge in the past. The challenge is attributed to the fact that conferences involve costs but their benefits are usually indirect. Thus the targeted participants are usually reluctant to attend.
Public relation is a management function that involves “publicizing and promoting an organization’s image” (Wilcox & Cameron 2011, p. 89). This is meant to encourage the potential and existing customers to buy the products of the organization. Public relation makes use of impersonal forms of communication to reach the targeted audience (Wilcox & Cameron 2011, p. 89).
This has always been done through both print and electronic media. Thus it focuses on managing communications between companies and their customers or the general public through the use of news items and topics that are of interest to the targeted population.
Such articles and news items act as a third-party endorsement to the organization and its products. The main concepts of public relation include the following. Corporate communication as a concept in public relation refers to the process of “developing, nurturing and strengthening of relationships that add value to an organization” (Sharma, Sheth & Kellstadt 1997, vol. 36 pp. 87-89).
Thus it relates to the way in which a firm presents its uniqueness to the public. Brand building is another concept in public relation. It involves media coverage of various activities such as awareness programs that seek to popularize a firm and its products. Finally, image building is a concept in public relation that involves conducting SWOT analyses in order to understand the needs of the clients.
The above concepts describe the activities that constitute public relation in an organization. Thus in the context of the international business conference, the public relation activities were as follows. First, the event was advertised through print and electronic media. This involved planning and developing messages about the event.
The advertisement was done in all the countries whose citizens were targeted by the event. Second, the organizers of the event embarked on external communication in order to convey the information about the event to the targeted audience.
This involved the use of controlled as wells as uncontrolled messages that were distributed through the mass media to create awareness about the event. Communication methods such as brochures and pamphlets were also used to reach the stakeholders. Third, lobbying played a major role in promoting the event.
One of the main roles of HOFTEL is to lobby the government and the industry regulators to consider the views of the investors and consumers in the industry. Thus while the media covered the lobbying activities of HOFTEL as news items, the management used the opportunity to inform the public about the event. This was done by linking the subjects of the lobbying activities to the theme of the event.
The organizers also embarked on publicity in order to promote the event. Since HOFTEL is a body that represents the investors, it has the responsibility of educating the public about the dynamics of the hospitality industry. It does this by writing and publishing articles that provide valuable information on issues such as prices and product variety to the customers. Such articles are also published in other print media such as magazine (Wilcox & Cameron 2011, p. 124).
Thus it used such articles to draw the public’s attention to the event and its benefits. Finally, the body also engages in sponsorship activities such as environmental protection initiatives. It does this by donating financial resources to support activities such as environmental protection. Through the sponsorship initiatives, the body was given an opportunity to interact with the public and such opportunities were used to promote the event.
Relationship marketing focuses on building relationships between the organizations, their clients and the general public (Scotts & Breakenridge 2009, p. 143). The focus of relationship marketing is to create loyalty. For example, HOFTEL uses relationship marketing to facilitate retention of its members as well as to ensure active participation of the existing members.
Loyalty benefits businesses due to the fact that it reduces the costs of serving the clients (Broom 2009, p. 56). The main concept in relationship marketing is customer relationship management. This refers to the application of the principles of relationship marketing to cultivate long-term relationships with customers (Johnston & Zawawi 2009, p. 98). The social media is sometimes used to engage the customers in conversations in order to develop trust.
This leads to loyalty and long-term relationships. The application of relationship marketing involves the use of various marketing strategies. Thus the degree to which it is used by an organization depends on the objectives and goals of the organization. For example, HOFTEL’s event aimed at developing relationships between the investors, clients and the industry regulators. Thus it focused on marketing activities that influence the behavior of the stakeholders in order to promote the development of relationships.
The relationship management activities in the event included the following. First, the organizers used referrals to reach the targeted audience. In order to reach the referral market, the organizers relied on the information that was obtained from its loyal members to recruit the participants in the event.
This was particularly used to reach the industry’s experts who gave valuable information through speeches. This enabled the event to gain popularity due to the fact that experts were invited to give valuable information. Second, influence marketing was also used to promote the event. This involved the use of influential members of the body to reach the targeted audience.
For example, CEOs and owners of hotels were asked to use their influence to encourage their peers and clients to attend the event. Third, a promise of rewards such as free exhibitions was used to encourage the stakeholders to participate. The rationale of this concept was based on the fact that mangers will always be interested in using every opportunity to market their businesses and products (Schultz, Utz & Gorlitz 2011, vol. 37, pp. 20-27).
Thus most of them attended in order to take advantage of the free exhibitions. Finally, the event was meant to provide valuable information on the dynamics of the industry and how to overcome them. This formed the basis for promoting the event by emphasizing on the knowledge that the participants were to acquire.
The effectiveness of the above public relation activities can be evaluated by applying the excellence theory. This theory evaluates the value of public relation activities of an organization based on “the social responsibility of an organization, managerial decisions and quality of relationships with stakeholders” (Schultz, Utz & Gorlitz 2011, vol. 37, pp. 20-27). This means that the contributions of an organization towards community development initiatives will form the basis for evaluating the success of its public relation activities.
Thus according to this theory, an organization must focus on decisions that benefit it and all other stakeholders in order to achieve its public relation goals and objectives (Sha 2011, vol. 37, pp. 1-11). This means that organizations will have to scan the community in which they operate in order to identify the stakeholders who are affected by its decisions. Thus in order to achieve long-term and valuable relationships, organizations must take into account both their interests and those of the public.
In the context of the international business conference and trade fair, the publicity activities were effective. This is because they focused on addressing the customers’ problems in relation to the dynamics of the hospitality industry by providing valuable information. The corporate sponsorship activities were also effective. This is based on the fact that supporting community development initiatives such as environmental protection is a social responsibility that benefits the public (Anderson 2006, vol. 6, pp. 285-297).
Thus this helped the organizers to develop a positive rapport with the pubic and this made it easy to promote the event. The advertisements were meant to benefit both the organizers and the stakeholders. The organizers benefited by creating awareness about their event while the stakeholders benefited by learning about the event and its benefits.
This means that the interests of both the stakeholders and the organizers were taken into account (Christopher, Payne & Ballantyne 2002, vol. 23, pp. 1-37). Thus according to the excellence theory, the advertisement activities were effective. The lobbying activities were mainly focused on the interests of the firms in the hospitality industry. Since the firms and their owners are the main clients of HOFTEL, the lobbying activities were effective in promoting the event.
The effectiveness of the relationship marketing activities can be evaluated using the commitment-trust theory. According to this theory, the strength and quality of the relationships that are formed between the organizations and the targeted audience depend on trust and commitment (Gronroos 1999, vol. 46, pp. 327-335).
Thus the relationships will be strong and of high quality if trust and commitment exist. Trust exists in a relationship if all stakeholders have “confidence in the integrity and reliability of each other” (Schultz, Utz & Gorlitz 2011, vol. 37, pp. 20-27).
Commitment on the other hand exists if the parties in a relationship are focusing on long-term relationships. Trust and commitment have two benefits which are as follows. First, they help in promoting cooperation between the stakeholders (Schultz, Utz & Gorlitz 2011, vol. 37, pp. 20-27). Second, they help the stakeholders to focus on the long-term benefits of a relationship instead of the short-term benefits that might be available to them.
In the context of the international conference and trade fair, the influential marketing activities were based on trust. This is because the members who were used to identify the main speakers were influential. They owed their influence to the trust that their peers, clients and general public had in them. Besides, the organizers also had trust in them in regard to marketing the event. Thus the influential marketing activities were effective in promoting the event.
The referral marketing activities were also based on trust and commitment. Getting new clients through referral marketing requires a lot of time and effort (Anderson 2006, vol. 6, pp. 285-297). Thus this can only be possible if there is commitment among the stakeholders. Besides, stakeholders can only refer their partners to their peers if they trust the partners. The fact that the referral marketing activities were based on trust and commitment confirms their effectiveness in promoting the event (Schultz, Utz & Gorlitz 2011, vol. 37, pp. 20-27).
Rewarding the participants was meant to achieve two objectives. First, it was meant to motivate the stakeholders especially the managers to participate in the event. This was meant to enable them to be more committed to the activities of the event as they enjoy the benefits of the rewards. Second, the rewards were meant to create the impression that the stakeholders were valued by the organizers. This facilitated the development of trust between the stakeholders and the organizers of the event.
Therefore, this strategy was effective in promoting the event by facilitating the development of a relationship that was based on trust and commitment (Sharma, Sheth & Kellstadt 1997, vol. 36 pp. 87-89). Finally, HOFTEL is trusted as a source of valuable information in the hospitality industry. This helped the organizers to promote the event effectively by promising to offer valuable information during the event.
Conclusion
The purpose of the easy was to evaluate the effectiveness of both public relation and relationship marketing in the context of promoting an international event. The above analysis indicates that both public relation and relationship marketing are effective in promoting an international event. The analysis focused on international business conference and trade fair as the event that was being promoted by both public relation and relationship marketing activities.
The public relation activities of the event included advertising, use of external communication, publicity, lobbying and sponsorships. According to the excellence theory, these activities were effective since they took into account the interests of both the organizers and all the stakeholders (Sharma, Sheth & Kellstadt 1997, vol. 36 pp. 87-89). The relationship marketing activities on the other hand included referral marketing, influential marketing, and a promise of rewards.
According to the commitment-trust theory, these events were effective since they were all based on trust and commitment (Sharma, Sheth & Kellstadt 1997, vol. 36 pp. 87-89).Due to the effectiveness of the above activities, HOFTEL can consider the following recommendations. First, it should focus on cultivating long-term relationships with its members.
This will help in marketing the conference in future as the members share information about its benefits. Second, HOFTEL should focus on identifying effective communication channels that will facilitate dialogue between its leaders and the members (Sharma, Sheth & Kellstadt 1997, vol. 36 pp. 87-89). This will improve the quality of relationships among them.
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