Marriott Hotels

Order Description

Group Report
Marriott (www.marriott.com) is a worldwide operator and franchisor of more than 3700 properties and related facilities in more than 73 countries. Quality and consistent service is Marriott’s main focus and keeps the company in the top position in its industry. The company is responsible for pioneering segmentation in the hospitality industry. With a wide array of hotels, Marriott meets the needs of various customer segments. Before developing any additional hotel chains and their respective brands, the company always tests properties first. Marriott is active in soliciting feedback from its customer base and focuses on really understanding its customer targets.

Assignment:
1. Describe the variable used to segment consumer markets. What type of market segmentation strategy is Marriott following? For each, relate specific examples of hotel services tailored to various target markets.
(The following link: http://www.marriott.com/marriott/brands.mi offers a brief description of 6 brands of various Marriott hotels catering to different types of customers.)
2. Is Marriott’s portfolio of brands an advantage or disadvantage? Assess the pros and cons of operating in so many segments of the market.
3. What kind of positioning strategy should the company adopt for the JW Marriot Hotel?
4. Draw a perceptual map for any one of the six brands of Marriott.

Submission: 22nd April, 2015
Maximum Limit: 3000-4000 words
Group Size: 3-5

The course Learning Outcome (CLO) this report helps to test is as follows:
• Apply market segmentation and target marketing strategies considering the different stages of product life cycle for the purpose of ensuring updated product offerings to the right customers and to counter the competition
It covers concepts from Chapter 8 and 10.
Important: Please provide in text citation as well as bibliography.

Reminder, this is not a research paper nor an assignment to only include facts and details of the video. Use that information to articulate and write an intelligent marketing commentary that showcases what you’ve learned in the class and weeks prior. Link to video: http://www.hulu.com/watch/452204 For this assignment, respond to this prompt: Watch the video above about the New Orleans Marriott and about the corporate entity of Marriott hotels. You’ll watch a bit about the history, the competitive makeup and their attention to details in their service, given credit to the standardization model of the hotel experience. Briefly describe this New Orleans location featured about who are the common customers and what does the revenue makeup look like? From this example, think about Product from our class and describe the Marriott Product. Describe their “science of room pricing” and Revenue Management process. What is the role of the Department of Customer Knowledge in this question? Ultimately in an industry that is highly competitve, often compared and decided on by price, does their model give them a competitive advanvantage? Why or why not? Does that hurt or it does not hurt their brand overall? Last, what is your overall impression on how they differentiate and market their brand? What is something you really like? Don’t like? Or a new idea / opportunity? Use what you’ve learned in the class so far and think back to the previous topics and themes discussed. Is there something from a previous writing assignment that comes to mind? Use articles, resources, social media, or other websites/information to backup your claims.