Exploring Challenges in Implementing Customer Relationship Management (CRM) for Customer Brand Engagement (CBE) in the Hospitality Industry: A Developing Country Perspective

Abstract

Implementation of the customer relationship management (CRM) for greater customer brand engagement is always challenging in the organisations. However, there is a scarcity of these challenges in relation to the hospitality industry of Bangladesh, which is one of the fast-growing countries in Asia where the hospitality industry is growing in every year. Hence, exploring the challenges can be effective for the managers as well as researchers for decision making and conducting future research respectively. Therefore, this study aimed to identify the challenges in implementing CRM process for the greater for the CBE in the hotel organisations in the hospitality industry of Bangladesh. Based on the qualitative approach, this study carried semi-structured interviews among 12 marketing managers working in different hotels in Bangladesh. The study identified a lack of knowledge, cost of CRM implementation, lack of communication, incorrect implementation, changes in external forces as the major challenges. This study also identified some other challenges such as lack of technology integration, lack of clear objectives organisations, lack of training, absence of the clear, lack of defined goals of organisations. The concluding remarks with the implications of the study and its limitations have also been included at the end of the study.