The impact of strategic marketing elements on the customer relationship programme for a regional tourism organisation

Abstract

The article focuses on the impact of strategic marketing elements on the customer relationship program of the Tshwane Tourism Association (TTA) in South Africa. Adopting a quantitative approach, random sampling was implemented in collecting data from twenty tourism and marketing experts from ten universities across South Africa. SPSS was applied in the data analysis process. Key findings indicated that strategic marketing elements were essential for the success of the customer relationship program for the TTA. Particularly it was highlighted that the adoption of a customer relationship program was important specifically for effective strategic marketing performance. While there was agreement that customer relationship management improves customer interactions leading to improved customer experience, sales and marketing, the implementation of a successful customer relationship program required clear focus and attention to be afforded to strategic marketing elements from the onset. Suggestions are made for further empirical enquiry into the barriers to developing a customer relationship management program and to investigate its impact on customer loyalty.

Keywords

• customer relationship management
• marketing
• regional tourism organization
• customer loyalty
• customer retention.