BPMM3083 SERVICE MARKETING

SECOND SEMESTER 2018 / 2019 SESSION (A182)

LECTURER:

Prof. Madya Dr. Ismail bin Lebai Othman

GROUP: B

GROUP ASSIGNMENT
HARD ROCK HOTEL PENANG

NO. NAME MATRIC NO.

1. WONG SOON NEE 252934

2. LIM JIA YI 253013

3. ONG SAW LING 253828

4. SNOWY WONG YUEN SYUEN 253852

5. WONG SWEE LING 255008

6. MARIANA BINTI MAT KHORI 256374

 TABLE OF CONTENT

NO CONTENT PAGES

PART A - NEW SERVICE REPORT

1. Executive Summary 1

2. 1.0 Introduction 2

3. 2.0 Situation Analysis (SWOT) 3-5

2.1 Strength
2.2 Weakness
2.3 Opportunity
2.4 Threat

4. 3.0 Environmental Analysis 6-10

3.1 Internal Environment Analysis
3.2 External Environment Analysis

5. 4.0 Service 1 11-12

6. 5.0 Service 2 13-14

PART B - BLUE PRINT PRESENTATION

7. 6.0 Blueprint Process 15-21

6.1 Reason pf choosing this blueprint

6.2 Physical evidence revealed in the that influence the
customer’s experience.
6.3 Identified the potential bottlenecks and fail-points
6.4 Suggest solution to address these potential problem

8. 7.0 Conclusion 22-23

PART A - NEW SERVICE REPORT

Executive Summary

This assignment is about the service quality at Hard Rock Hotel Penang. Hard
Rock Hotel Penang is to be chosen from our group to describe the possible service that
could be implemented and how the service of Hard Rock Hotel Penang can be described
into the Blueprint process. Hard Rock Hotel Penang has provided five-star services to
their customer. Services play an important role in Hard Rock Hotel Penang because it
will keep in mind of customer perception of their hotel service quality to maintain their
loyal customers and get the new customers into their market. Service define as an
intangible product are difficult to clarify because they are closely associated with good,
instantly perishable, cannot be stored and when services are sold, it does not have any
ownership can be transferred. The good quality of service can provide profit for the
company and fulfill customer satisfaction. When we are delivering or provide a high
quality of service, it will achieve the satisfaction of customer needs and wants. Ankur
as a department of hotel marketing stated that it is important for any marketers to put
more attention on improvement of service quality. This probably because of a good
service will attract and maintain customer in the hotel for the long run benefits.

However, this assignment that carries out by our group members is used to
develop an understanding of service blueprinting and to employ service blueprinting to
analyze the service process at Hard Rock Hotel Penang. Besides that, we will create
three possible services that can be implemented by the hotel. One service will be using
through Blueprint process which is reception service while another two services will be
explain using written in a report which is providing service robots and providing
culinary recommendation card to the customer.

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1.0 Introduction

Hard Rock Hotel Penang is a five stars luxury resort located along the famous beach of
Batu Ferringhi. It situated at the location of Jalan Batu Ferringhi, 11100 Georgetown,
Pulau Pinang, Malaysia. It just 200 meters away from the beach of Batu Ferringhi and
just 3.45km away from Escape Adventure play Theme Park.

Hard Rock Hotel Penang provided a complete facility and service in order to satisfy
different consumers’ needs. Hard Rock Hotel Penang featured 250 guestrooms of a
contemporary feel with 10 room types, all the rooms are with well design and equipped
with complete facilities and consumer in mind. Besides that, Hard Rock Hotel Penang
has provided with free Wi-Fi connection, BOSE sound system, 50-inch LED screen TV
and free HD Blockbuster movies on demand. The customer can stay connected with
their loved one and be entertained with 24 hours by enjoying the free HD Blockbuster
movies.

In addition, Hard Rock Hotel Penang is iconic and bringing the multicultural Penang to
new heights with its authentic Hard Rock experience. This hotel is suitable for the
whole family and couples to come to relax and enjoy their holiday. It provides a large
swimming pool and facilities that attract the families to come to their resort relaxing.
The resorts provide 10 types of room which are pool view deluxe, sea view deluxe, sea
view deluxe terrace, lagoon deluxe, roxity kids’ suite, roxity kids suite with courtyard,
rock loyalty sea view deluxe and sea view studio suite.

Besides that, Hard Rock Hotel Penang located at a strategic place which is Penang.
Penang is famous with local traditional food that can attract the tourist to come here to
enjoy the delicious food. The restaurant that around the Hard Rock Hotel Penang such
as Hard Rock Café, Enca Café, Pak Mid Café, Boatman Restaurant, Ferringhi Garden
Restaurant, Guan Guan Café and so on. This strategic place will increase the attention
of guests come here to enjoy their holiday.

Last but not least, Hard Rock Hotel Penang always provides a good attitude to their
guests like they will speak politely, quickly solve the problem faced by guests and give
good service to them. The workers at the resort always give a good performance in their
job scope. So, Hard Rock Hotel Penang has a good image in the customer’s perception.

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2.0 Situation Analysis (SWOT)

STRENGTH  Great location

 Unique facilities available
 Worldwide internet booking, convenient counter for walk-in
guest and mobile booking
 Surrounded by the beautiful environment

WEAKNESS  High cost of maintenance

 High price of hotel room packages
 Limited equipment facilities
 Lack of efficiency of the employee

OPPORTUNITIES  Changing market trend

 Network internationally and locally
 High-tech technology
 Located at holiday center area, in the Pearl of Orient

THREATS  Direct and indirect competition from low budget

 Not initiate to cooperate with other institution

 Lack of government supporting

 High competition

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2.1 Strengths

Strengths are defined as what each business does best in its variety of operations
which can give it an upper hand over its competitors. Strengths are generally the core
competency of the business.
Hard Rock Hotel Penang located in a strategic location which also a location
for live performances. The business always chooses a great location for the hotel which
has a high catchment area and people can easily access the location. This step can help
the customers to detect their location easily. Besides, Hard Rock Hotel had unique
facilities available such as restaurant, free high-speed WIFI, laundry service, swimming
pool and others. The decor of the restaurant is imperial and the architecture inspirational
and the service quality is consistent across all its properties. Hard Rock Hotel also
provided the worldwide internet booking, convenient counter for walk-in guest and
mobile booking such as Agoda, Trivago and booking through their application. This
step is very helpful for customers who always busy with their work and easy for them.
Hard Rock Hotel has a number of distinctive features such as nearby the beach with a
beautiful environment which provide guests and customers with warm and relaxing
experience.

2.2 Weakness
Weaknesses are used to refer to areas where the business or the brand needs
improvement. The weakness of this hotel is the high cost of maintenance because of
the cost of living in Penang quite high. The hotel has a lot of focus on the maintenance
of facilities and amenities which are high end. The hotel also trains its employees on a
regular basis which also acts as a higher cost factor. The other factor of weakness is
about the high price room packages. The price of each package should appropriate to
guests since guests mainly comprised of workers of factory and tourist. Sometimes this
step has been able to create a loyal customer base. For this hotel, there are a lot of
facilities but it’s is limited. The equipment is limited in terms of accessing the internet
to watch movies on the Blockbuster HD movie when requested. They also lack of
efficiency of the employee during peak seasons like special holidays so sometimes it
might lead to poor customer services.

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2.3 Opportunities
Opportunities refer to those avenues in the environment that surrounds the business
on which it can capitalize to increase its returns. Some of the opportunities include
changing market trends. The trends in the hospitality market are changing. The
customer is demanding but willing to pay more for value-added services. This means
that hotels by focusing more on personalized attention can charge higher for their
facilities. Those who patronize Hard Rock Hotel network internationally and locally.
Therefore, Hard Rock Hotel stands a prospect to obtain a large market share through
effective marketing strategy and a strong management team. Besides, they have high-
tech technology, they are expanding the business to other states and corporate with
other company such as bank and restaurant in order to increase the convenience of
consumers. Moreover, the hotel also located at holiday center area, so it had more
chances for Hard Rock Hotel to organize some event related to the nature area. For
example, is bringing them to the best place for the see of sunrise. This hotel situated in
the Pearl of Orient, Hard Rock Hotel Penang is iconic.

2.4 Threats
Threats are those factors in the environment which can be detrimental to the
growth of the business. Some of the threats include the competition from the direct and
indirect competition from low budget such as guesthouses and lodging, budget and
premium hotels in the district. This hotel will do the promotion or annual sales to rely
on the workers, supervisors and tourist since they are not initiating to cooperate with
other institution for extra business. Actually, this hotel is not under the government so
that this hotel facing the problem which is lack of government support. Last but not
least, this hotel high competition with other hotels including the price reasonable
surrounding hotel.

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3.0 Environmental Analysis
3.1 Internal Environment Analysis
Internal environment analysis is necessary to be considered on a succeeding
strategy. Before starting planning customer target, internal environment analysis is
needed to organize because it is important for the company to identify the strength to
build on and the weakness to overcome when formulating strategies. Besides that, the
internal environment gives a strong benefit on the performance in finance, marketing,
production and human resources department. Next, this analysis will provide enough
information about measure the part of SWOT analysis. Internal Environment analysis
includes three component needs to consider which is company culture, employees and
supplier. All of these three components will influence the performance and revenue of
the company.
3.1.1 Company Culture
A strong company culture will strengthen the firm performances by facilitating
internal behavioral consistency. For company culture, it has three values need to adapt
to marketing strategies which are customer closeness, organizational values and market
orientation. These three values will give a great effect on the performance in the hotel
industry.
First and foremost, customer closeness is important in an overall view of the
organization from the perspective of the customer, a service orientation, an obsession
of service quality and an innovative spirit. So, Hard Rock Hotel Penang always ready
to give the good service for their guests and they will let their guests write the feedback
on social media platform such as Facebook to improve their business performance. So,
this analysis will increase the relationship with their business customer and keep their
loyal consumer and get new consumers.
Next, in order to emphasize a great quality of service, the organizational value
is significant to be considered in business performance through a team to motivate staff
in a company. This is because we need to fulfill customer satisfaction to keep their
brand recall. Organizational value can encourage entrepreneurship, innovation, and free
communication in the enterprise. Lastly, the market-oriented focus is important as a
key determinant of corporate action in the marketplace.

3.1.2 Employees

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 Employee loyalty is significantly related to service quality that has an impact
on customer satisfaction and customer loyalty that can lead to the firm probability in
the high-contact service industry. One of the most important factors of employee
performance is to achieve the goal in Hard Rock Hotel Penang. The attitude and
behaviors of the employee are critical to the overall of company performance. Business
leader or the top management team needs to know the key benefits of employee
performance so that can easily create the objectives and goal to be a success in the
future. Besides that, evaluations of employee performance need to be implemented. The
purpose is to create a positive working environment. When the employee did not
perform its effectiveness, consumers will feel the hotel is apathetic to their needs and
will change to other hotels that have good services.

Besides that, the workers in the Hard Rock Hotel Penang need always provide
good performance, hardworking, responsibility, good attitude and speak politely with
their business customer. When the brand image of the hotel higher, it will increase the
sales and revenue of the resort. So, it is important for the hotel industry to have
effectiveness and productive employee in the organizational structure.

3.1.3 Supplier

In order to improve the service level towards customers, it is important to build

great relationships with suppliers and work with an ordering system. The supply chain
is one of the significant elements within the hotel and catering industry. Cutting-edge
hospitality chains are reaching beyond inventory control systems to spend intelligence
tools, which help gather, rationalize, and analyze historical and real-time purchasing
information. The creation of a supply chain leads to a better understanding of the whole
chain and thus the implementation of common standards becomes easier. It is implied
and obvious that in the coming era of hyper-competition the basis of competition in
many industries will revolve around supply chain development. For the hotel logistics
and supply chain management, supplier partnerships and relationships are very
important. The long-term partnership helps the organization and its suppliers achieve
major benefits through their direct, long-term union, and encourage joint planning and
problem solving efforts. These strategic relationships allow hotels to work well with a
small number of vital suppliers who are prepared to share accountability for the success
of the products and work together to reduce inefficient time and effort. Relationships
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are used to improve customer satisfaction and prevent customers from going to the next
hotel. With changes to customization and personalized service for customers, building
relationships has become important for corporate survival. The relationships allow
hotels to differentiate themselves from competitors, maintain loyalty, and in turn pass
off value to its customers.

3.2 External Environment Analysis

An external environment is composed of all the outside factors or influences

that impact the operation of the business. It defines all those conditions and forces
which are external to the business and beyond the individual business unit, but it
operates within it. The business must act or react to keep up its flow of operations.
External environment refers to the environment that has an indirect influence or impact
on the business. The factors are uncontrollable by the business. The external
environment can be split into two types which is the microenvironment and the macro
environment. The microenvironment consists of the factors that directly impact the
operation of a company whereas the macro environment consists of general factors that
a business typically has no control over. The success of a company depends on its
ability to adapt. The macro environment consists of different forces such as
demographic, economic, political, ecological, socio-cultural and technological forces.

3.2.1 Demographic factors

Demographic factors define the population which expressed statistically such
as age, sex, education level, income level, marital status, occupation, religion, birth rate,
death rate, the average size of a family and average age at marriage. According to the
demographic in the industry area, the population of workers in factory, supervisor and
coordinator is in large numbers followed by Muslim and non-muslim residents. Mostly,
the supervisor will book the hotel room for any celebration, club events or having dinner
in the restaurant since Hard Rock Hotel provide good facilities and delicious food in
the restaurant. Moreover, Hard Rock Hotel is also a target on the tourist. On the other
hand, the coordinator will book the room for a business meeting or make a vacation to
reduce stress. Hard Rock Hotel l is very concerned about the rating of the facilities and
services because their responses will impact the image of Hard Rock Hotel directly.

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3.2.2 Economic factors
Economic factors such as level of employment, rate of inflation, rate of interest,
demographic changes and fiscal and monetary policies which determine the state of the
competitive environment in which a firm operates. These forces affect the outcome of
the firms marketing activities by determining the volume and strength of demand for
its products. According to the research, most of the customers of Hard Rock Hotel are
the workers and supervisor. However, the price of Hard Rock Hotel was quite high and
expensive. Hard Rock Hotel provides a higher price with each package like food
package, room package and the member package. To overcome this price problem,
Hard Rock Hotel should offer some affordable packages to the workers and supervisor
of the factory. If the price of food package Hard Rock Hotel expensive due to the
expensive raw material, they can change the raw material for their use. For example,
use local ingredients in preparing food.

3.2.3 Socio-cultural factors

Social and cultural factors are important to consider while creating and implementing
a marketing strategy of a company. These often linked but somewhat different factors
have diverse effects on the decisions of consumers and buyers. Sociocultural factors are
customs, lifestyles and values that characterize a society. More specifically, cultural
aspects include aesthetics, education, language, law and politics, religion, social
organizations, technology and material culture, values and attitudes. Social factors
include reference groups, family, role and status in the society. Small-business owners
should be aware of and understand these factors' connection with buying habits. Hard
Rock Hotel customers consist of employees and Muslim or non-muslim customers and
the residents. Mostly, the customer will book the Hard Rock Hotel’s room for
celebration or eating in the restaurant since Hard Rock Hotel providing good facilities
and delicious food. The facilities provided by the management have a well- equipment
that customer will have a nice place to relax. Hard Rock Hotel is very concerned about
the rating of the facilities and services because professors and lecturer responses will
impact the image of the hotel directly. Mostly the residents in Pinang will choose this
hotel as a vacation place because they want to enjoy the fresh air and peaceful
environment. There were many packages for Hard Rock Hotel such as family packages
especially when school holiday and public holiday.

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3.2.4 Technological factors
Technological factors are variables that are being used for evaluating available
alternatives with respect to technological capabilities. Technology has brought in a
transformation through which companies collect, record, retrieve and utilize data and
which also helps them in coming up with groundbreaking business strategies. Through
available data, companies are able to monitor and evaluate customer trends and their
demands for a particular product. There are two types of technological factors such as
internet and automated process. Hard Rock Hotel has created a website about the hotel
which makes customers work easier to search and book for the room. Moreover, this
website on the internet also has the sufficient information about the services and
conveniences, dining, drinking and snacking, things to do, ways to relax, internet
access, types of available rooms and related photos of the Hard Rock Hotel which can
comfort customers preferences. Moreover, Hard Rock Hotel also providing the prices
for the rooms and availability of the room. So, it will be easier for the customers to look
for the information earlier before the book the rooms. It helps customers save a lot of
time and effort.

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4.0 Service 1
Providing customer service robots in the hotel
Computer technology is evolving at a speedy rate, and at an equivalent time,
computer science is turning into more and more reliable, significantly among the globe
of business. Artificial Intelligence (AI) involves exploitation of computers or machines
to carry out tasks. Moreover, firms among the hospitality sector are progressively using
AI to perform a large variety of tasks, from basic customer service to advanced
drawback resolution, that is significantly necessary within hotels and resorts.
The first service to be proposed for the company to be launched in the near future is
providing customer service robots in the hotel. The biggest bonuses of using customer
service robots are the efficiency of reaching and responding to the information instantly
which the customer requests. Furthermore, the robots can also respond to the inquiries
about the spa of the hotel, gym, and dining timing. It puts the information and data
among easy and quick reach for the customers which free up the time of staff.

4.1 Three Possible Problems and Solutions

Robots would enhance the efficiency, security and performance. However, the
implementation of the customer service robots would be an unwise decision a hotel will
create because it would ruin what hospitality is concerning, reducing efficiency and
security. There are three possible problems which the hotel will encounter.
Nevertheless, the solutions to the problems are prepared to face and solve the problem
arising from the service offered.
The first problem would be encountered is the technical problem of the
customer service robots, where the information of the robots may be not updated timely.
Customers and staff as well rely on real-time data, for instance, checking the number
of current empty rooms, the exact time for dining period and so on. It may also be
affected by the poor internet connection in the hotel, especially in the lobby. Therefore,
by preventing this problem occurs, the department of customer service should ensure
the information and data is updated timely. Wi-Fi systems can be improved by investing
in superior hardware and internet connectivity.
Next, the second problem would be encountered is the customers are not
familiar to the robot. There are people with less knowledge of using robot especially
the elder people face the difficulty in using the robot. Interacting with something that

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they do not understand may cause anxiety and make the customer feel like they are
losing control.
Thus, in order to overcome this problem, the staff can be along with the
customer when they are using the robot for further assistance. The staff can also assist
the elder people to use the robot as maybe some of them have difficulty in reading the
words appear on the screen of the robots.
Lastly, the third problem would be encountered is the cost of implement and
improve the service of the robot. It is costly in investing and maintenance repairing.
The most common sort of robot maintenance program is preventive maintenance.
Preventive maintenance is the planned maintenance of facilities and equipment,
designed to eliminate sudden breakdowns and increase the lifetime of robots. These
programs are crucial for the performance of a robot to stay reliable.
Hence, the hotel can reduce the admissions to help to arrange enough funds in
order to invest in the robot. This action can also reduce the overload of employees. By
investing and improving the service of the robot, the satisfaction of the customers will
be increased and they will stay loyal as well. Consequently, the revenue and
profitability of the hotel can be maximized.

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5.0 Service 2

Provide culinary recommendation cards in the hotel

In nowadays, many people are willing to travel around the world as the social
media is become the daily use of people and provide varieties of information about a
country when they want to start a trip at there. In a trip, the most important things that
tourist will take attention is about the local food hunt. Most of the tourist will search
and do the survey about the famous food of the country and plan for the road trip. For
a tourist, the recommendation for famous food in the country is playing an important
role to increase the good image of a hotel if they were able to provide useful information
for the tourist.
The second service that we proposed for the company, Hard Rock Hotel Penang
to be launched in the future is to provide culinary recommendation cards in the hotel.
The card can be used to find the best local famous food in their area so that the tourist
no need to ask the front desk for recommendations so that they no need to answer the
same question who is asking by every tourist. The tourist just needs to scan the QR
code that is provided in the recommendation cards, then all the details about the famous
restaurant such as food recommendations, business hour, location and google map is
ready in the apps to help the tourist to get to the restaurant in the right pathway. Tourist
seeks to taste the unique local famous food in Penang as everyone knows that Penang
is famous for the varieties food that is tasty and delicious that makes tourist wants to
become a food hunter. The card can be made in name card size, it concludes all the
famous culinary spots in Penang.

5.1 Three Possible Problems and Solutions

Although the culinary recommendation cards will provide a good image of the
hotel service, it also will make the hotel facing the lacking information and updated for
the details provided in the cards. Even so, we also prepared the solution for every
problem that arises from the service that we offered in the hotel. The problem can be
solved if the action and solution are taken and aware by every employee.

The first problem that we will face for the culinary recommendation cards is the
information provided on the card maybe will not be updated by time to time. The local
street food that sells in the stall may change their business hour as they are not fixed

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working days. Besides that, the location that pinned in the google map may not be
correct because the stall will change their place to open their stall there are any changes
that will affect their business.

The solution that we can prevent for the problem occurs is we must check
properly for the details that we provided on cards and apps is correct before we print
the culinary recommendation card. We need to do the survey and check the details every
three months at least to update the latest and newest information about the restaurant.

The second problem that we will face for the card is the information that we
provided in the cards is not details enough. Some of the tourists which are not familiar
with the social devices may fail to use our QR code service as they don’t have the
knowledge and technology devices. Furthermore, some of the tourists will not easily to
access the internet in the outside of the hotel because they may face the problem of
overused data. The details that put on the name card is too little as it only has a name
card size with a small image with some useful information.

The solution we can make for the problem is we can enhance our card to name
card sized pamphlet so that we can put more details information in the culinary
recommendation cards that at least will help the tourist to find the famous restaurant
easily for the elder tourist or when the tourist technology device is offline in a particular
moment.

The third problem that will face by the hotel is the recommendation that stated
on the card and apps may not suitable for each group of customers due to the different
culture of the country. In Malaysia, halal is a must for Malay tourist as they want to
ensure they been served fully of halal food.

The solution and action that we can take to solve the problem make two
categories of halal and non-halal food into two types of culinary recommendation cards.
After that, we also can make a page for western food for foreign tourists in case if they
might want to have their local food also on their trip. Afterthought, we might also divide
the restaurants based on their price range, restaurant with five stars and the stall with
the cheapest price so that the tourist can make their choice based on their budget of the
trip.

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PART A - BLUE PRINT PRESENTATION
6.0 Blueprint Service

Figure1: Blueprint Process

B1: Luggage Delivering Process

-delayed luggage may occur especially during peak season
F1: Receive Luggage
-customer received wrong luggage
F2: Check in software system
- check-in system breakdown during peak hour
F3 : Payment
-unable to support the Cashless Payment App

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6.1 Reason of selected this blueprint

The reason our group selected this blueprint is that reception service is the most
important part of the hotel. The reception is normally the first service provided to the
customer, deal with enquiries and room reservations made on the telephone, online or
by email and dealing with payments. It is the face of the hotel, the first point of contact
that anyone has when reaching out of the hotel. It provided the first impression to the
customer, potential clients, employees or partners. A warm welcome and pleasant
atmosphere in the reception area can help to get guests' stay off to the best start.
Reception service like greeting the customer on arrival and help the customer
to check in and out of the hotel. The receptionist should use the same standard word to
start their greeting to the customers, so the customers would feel they get the service as
same as before or as what the others told them and their expectation. This also let the
customers feel respectful from the employees. Furthermore, the efficiency of the room
check-in service is also very important. If the service is too slow, the customer might
wait for a long time and lose their patience. In addition, if a problem like a customer
had reserved their rooms by using online booking service but because of things such as
system breakdown, the hotel does not have their reservation and this would really ruin
the customer mood as they get poor experience at their first service. If the receptionist
did not have a solution to settle the problem wisely, this would affect what customer
thinks and feels for the after services as their zone of tolerance had become narrowed.
Furthermore, the receptionist must be alert and speak various type of language
if possible because Hard Rock Hotel Penang is a world-class hotel and there would
have a lot of foreign customers. The receptionist must at least speak fluent English as
English is the commons used language in the world. They also need to have a good
understanding skill as some of the customers might have some accent when they speak
English. It is better if the receptionist could speak other languages such as Chinese,
Japanese, Korean, Spanish and more as some of the customers might not have good
English skill and this would reduce the chances to occur communication gap between
the receptionist and the customer. This also can help the customer to feel more
comfortable in the hotel as they can communicate with the employees with their mother
tongue without worrying any misunderstanding and increase their satisfaction towards
the hotel.

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 The reception service had a big impact on the hotel as it is the first impression
the others towards the hotel and it would affect the reputation of the hotel in the future
also affect the business success or downfall. Because of the services provided is
intangible, so our group decided to do a reception service blueprint so that the services
provided could have the same standard and become more efficient.

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6.2 Physical evidence revealed in the blueprint that influence the customer’s
experience

Our group believes that the exterior and interior design of the hotel is the key
elements of physical evidence revealed in the blueprint. The hotel design plays a
significant role in the hospitality industry as it directly influences the profit and the
success of a hotel in today’s society. A well-designed hotel is pleasing the guests,
thereby creating a positive first impression, a strong direct promotion which has an
impact on occupancy through a greater length of stay and more repeat visits in another
word, the customer loyalty.

The element of exterior design such as the pool area, main entrance, parking
area, garden and landscaping have an impact on the guest arrivals. The interior design
elements such as lobby layout, reception, wall color, painting, dining area had the same
impaction for the customer too.

Most customer would give high priority to the hotel design when booking the
hotel as it contributes to the cleanliness, simplicity, neatness and atmosphere of their
lodgings. The customer would have their own perception when they see the design of
the hotel. For example, the customer would expect to have a luxury design for a 5-star
hotel and the employees are mostly well spoken and polite to serve them. It is a big
deficiency when things like the main entrance were broken or the wall color in the lobby
area started to turn black. All these will make the customer feel like the price was
overstated with all these designs and ruined the guest experience. When the design was
not as what the customers expected, it would decrease the customers' mental
satisfaction, perceptions and also their loyalty towards the hotel.

The lobby layout is an important factor that could affect customer experiences.
The lobby layout would give the customer the first impression of the hotel once they
stepped into the hotel and impact the overall’s guests’ perception and satisfaction. The
lobby should be large enough to provide space for the customer even in peak hour and
seasonal period. As a five-star hotel, the lobby should have provided free-flow drinks
and premium quality snack for the customer. In addition, the hotel should also provide
at least two complimentary newspapers, offered and distributed a welcome gift upon
arrival. This could increase the customer satisfaction and their stay experience.

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 Another design such as the amenities and facilities can also affect customer
experiences. For instant, it would improve the customer experiences if the swimming
pool is well design and family friendly at the same time. Most of the 5-star hotel would
provide a well design swimming pool or infinity swimming pool which are suitable for
the customer to have fun in swimming or taking a nice photo. A well design swimming
pool not only come out well in the photo, but it also boosts customer satisfaction
especially the younger generation who frequently post on social media. They will share
the photo in their social media if the photo taken is pretty and this could be free
advertising for the hotel. If the design of the pool is lack of the consideration of safety,
it would affect the customer experiences if they have a bad memory or get hurt at the
hotel pool. This will lead to bad reviews and damage the hotel reputation.

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6.3 Identified the potential bottlenecks and fail-points (points in the process where
problems may occur)

There are few potential bottlenecks or fail points that might appear in the service
process. First and foremost, delayed luggage may occur in some circumstances
especially during peak season when there are too many congested customers wanting
to check-in their luggage for delivery and there is insufficient staff in the reception
counter. The hotel could not predict the peak period and it causes delayed luggage for
the customer. Slow delivery happens could cause some inconvenience to the customers.
However, during the lean season, there will be too much staff to work in the hotel that
causes wastage of resources in the hotel.

Besides, the failure-points occurs in the process of receive luggage section. It

occurs when employees receive the wrong information from the customers. This will
cause the employees to mishandled luggage for another room. Sometimes, it may occur
because reception counter accidentally or unintentionally gives the wrong key to
employee so they send the wrong luggage to customer and customer received wrong
luggage which does not belong them.

Furthermore, the fail point will occur when the check-in system breakdown
during peak hour or seasonal period. The check-in system that currently used by Hard
Rock Hotel is Near-Filed Communication system (NFC). This system sometime will
be breakdown when there are too many excesses to the system. This will cause
customers to have a bad experience because they need to wait for a long time to check-
in and were stuck in a hotel that seemed to go nowhere.

Another fail point is the hotel currently unable to support the Cashless Payment
Apps such as Alipay, WeChat Pay and so on during customer do payment. As the era
move towards a cashless economy, people are no longer carry wads of cash along with
them. Customer especially those who came from a foreign country may face this
problem when they wish to make their payment by using these payment apps but when
the hotel unable to support this payment method, customers need to spend their time go
to queue up for ATM withdrawals.

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6.4 Suggest possible solutions to address these potential problem

Some solution is suggested to solve the potential fail points mentioned above.
Firstly, to solve slow delivery may occur in the process of luggage carry, efficient
scheduling might be able to help. There will be more staff to work during peak season
and there will few of staff work on normal day. This can make the arrangement more
efficient also save the cost. By doing this, slow delivery of luggage carry will be solved.
Other than that, there can be more department in the registration counter such as one
team of staff will work as a carry and another team will work as send to the customer’s
room. It will be more effective in the baggage handling process.
Next, to solve the problem in the process of receive luggage section, by labeling
the luggage and room key should be done by the hotel. Receptionists should label
customer’s luggage with room number orderly when they check in. By labeling,
employees never get confused with the room number and mistake will not happen.
Employees can refer to the labeling to send luggage to customers. The label must be
clear enough for the employee to easily assign the right luggage to the right room.
Besides, to solve the Near-Filed Communication system (NFC) system
breakdown problem, the hotel also provided manually check-in service at the counter.
And when the system is down, the hotel will open all of the counters to help the
customer complete their check-in procedure in a short time.
Lastly, to solve the problem of cashless payment method, the hotel also receives
cashless payment from customer by using credit card. Hard Rock hotel accepts various
bank cards such as Master Card, Visa Card, Union Pay, Amerika Express. Customer
can choose this payment alternative to make their payment as there is no extra charge
to their card.

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7.0 Conclusion

Hard Rock Hotel is a five stars hotel which located just 200 meters away from
the beach and just 3.45km away from Escape Adventure play Theme Park. Hard Rock
Hotel provided complete facilities and service in order to satisfy different consumers’
needs. Hard Rock Hotel featured 250 rooms with 10 room types, all the rooms are with
well design and equipped with complete facilities.

The strengths of Hard Rock Hotel Penang which its strategic location and the
unique facilities. Besides, Hard Rock Hotel is also a location for live performances.
Besides, the opportunities of Hard Rock Hotel are the high-tech technology, expanding
the business to other states and corporate with other company such as bank and
restaurant in order to increase the convenience of consumers. These are the keys that
make the Hard Rock Hotel a successful business.

On the other hand, the Hard Rock Hotel has its weakness and threat that have
to overcome. The weaknesses of the Hard Rock Hotel are the lack of efficiency of
employee that lead to poor customer service. The treats of Hard Rock Hotel are the
unfair competition between other company and the limited funding of the Hard Rock
Hotel.

Although facilities and services of Hard Rock Hotel are complete and perfect,
the generation of new services is important to the Hard Rock Hotel. For service one,
we have decided to provide customer service robots for the customers of Hard Rock
Penang in order to ensure the convenience of customers. These customer service robots
are able to interact with customers and help customers of the Hard Rock Hotel that need
a guide.

We have also decided to provide culinary recommendation cards for the Hard
Rock Hotel’s customers. Culinary recommendation card can effectively give
information about the famous culinary sport of Penang. Besides, culinary
recommendation card helps Hard Rock Hotel’s customers to save their time for their
journey but not rushing for information.

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 In addition, the front service and lobby’s facilities in the Hard Rock Hotel are
important. This is because they will give the first impression of the hotel’s customers.
The exterior of the hotel, the appearance of employees and even the cart of luggage
must in a good condition. Hospitality language is used in communication while
employees are communicating with customers.

In conclusion, the improvement of hotels has increased the competition of the

Hard Rock Hotel. Hard Rock Hotel must always alert to the change of the environment
which including internal and external in order to face the challenge.

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