ABSTRACT
In this chapter, we review the complex topics of consumer and organizational buying behaviour; and we explore the principles and practice of market segmentation and target marketing. Segmentation and targeting are fundamental marketing disciplines that underpin all marketing strategies and tactics. Segmentation recognizes that hospitality customers are enormously varied, but they can nonetheless be clustered into groups with similar needs, wants, expectations and requirements. Targeting is based on the premise that hospitality organizations cannot hope to satisfy all potential customers, but must choose to focus their efforts on particular clusters that share broadly similar needs and wants. By targeting specific markets or market segments, the company is much better placed to design, brand and deliver their services in a way that delivers enhanced customer satisfaction to the targeted customers, and compete more effectively against other providers.
