Customer Relationship Management as an Important Relationship Marketing Tool

Abstract

Nowadays, the traditional four P's of marketing are not enough, especially in hospitality services, because of the permanent need to satisfy the customers, in order to keep them loyal. This chapter aims to understand the application of customer relationship management (CRM) in order to manage client retention and how this can translate into a competitive advantage for the hospitality industry. The chapter has a theoretical framework on the main concepts, such as relational marketing and CRM, and their importance and application to hospitality. The Estoril Coast in Portugal was chosen because it is considered as an international brand due to the importance for national and international tourism. For that, the authors made online questionnaires to hotels in this geographical area. The results allow to measure the use of CRM in the sample hotels and understand the importance of relationship marketing.