The Effect of Interpersonal Relationship on Marketing Performance in the Nigerian Hotel Industry

Relationships are the primary assets of an enterprise, thus many industries today seem to be migrating from transactional mindset to relational mindset in their dealings with customers. Due to highly competitive nature of hotel industry, ability to develop and maintain long-term relationships with customers has become strategic issue. This study is focused on the assessment of the effect of interpersonal relationship on marketing performance in the Nigerian Hotel industry. A survey research design technique was used. The convenience sampling method was employed to select 350 participants. The research instrument was a 30 item validated structured questionnaire. The analytical tools employed are a principal component factor analysis, correlation and multiple regression analysis. The findings revealed that friendly interactions exhibited overwhelming positive effect on customer retention, indicating the importance of the dimension of interactive factor in perceived service quality. It is concluded that interpersonal relationship has become an important competitive weapon in the hotel industry due to its potential in eliciting friendly interaction that fosters commercial friendship, emotional attachment and loyalty to the service providers. It is recommended that effective marketing performance requires good interpersonal communication, effective relational style, sound development of relational atmosphere and ensuring quality friendly interaction towards improved productivity and gaining competitive edge.