A model development to determine the antecedents and consequences of customer loyalty in terms of relationships marketing in hotel firms

The development of customer loyalty is a strategic objective for most companies. Service organizations are continually looking for ways to increase customer loyalty. Although to tangible goods has been studied extensively by marketing scholars, relatively little theoretical or empirical research has examined loyalty to service organizations. This study extends previous loyalty research by examining service loyalty and factors expected to influence its development. The purpose of this study was to examine the antecedents and consequences of loyalty in hotel industry and developing a measurement model of service loyalty that incorporates behavioural, attitudinal as well as cognitive measures. A literature review is combined with analysis of data collected from hotel industry to develop a model of service loyalty that includes five antecedents ? perceived service quality, perceived value, customer satisfaction, trust and image. Based on data from 248 individual customers within hotel industry, a conceptual model is proposed and tested emprically using Structural Equating Modelling (SEM). Exploratory and Confirmatory Factor Analysis was performed to examine the reliability and validity of the measurement model and the structural equation modelling techniques were used evaluate the causal model. The latent variables contributions to loyalty is estimated on the attribute level, based on path coefficients. Although seven hypotheses were rejected the resultant structural model showed significant relationship between the dimensions included.