below is the case study and the answer should be 500 words

Customer Information Systems Help Enhance Customer Relationship

The potential of todays customer information systems far exceeds any traditional marketing information system that has gone before. The amount of information about individual customers that can now be captured allows the organisation to customise to the individual level what previously would have been undifferentiated services.

HILTONS OnQ SYSTEM

Hilton Hotels has an integrated technology platform called OnQ that provides the basis for its customer relationship management (CRM) system. OnQ centralises all of the personal profile information that guests provide to Hilton via the hotel or central reservations, their websites, or membership in the HHonors loyalty programme to create a Guest Profile Manager. Profiles are created for any guest who is a HHonors member or simply visits a Hilton hotel at least four times within a year. Such a system requires an extraordinary investment in information technology to capture information from Hiltons over 4,600 hotels and nearly 760,000 rooms in six continents across 100 countries and territories worldwide. The information collected via OnQ is combined with the customers stay history and any prior complaints made during previous visits. The entire packet of information enables many of Hiltons 300,000 employees to recognise and reward guests with appropriate welcome messages, room upgrades, or information related to previous visits.

USING THE INFORMATION TO DEVELOP RELATIONSHIPS WITH CUSTOMERS

OnQ provides a mechanism for Hilton Hotels to learn and remember customer interests and preferences. Tim Harvey, former chief information officer for Hilton, describes it this way: Its like when your grandmother comes to your house. You know exactly who she is. You know exactly what she eats for breakfast. You know what kind of pillow she likes. You know whether she can climb the stairs or not so you know what room to put her in. We have the same passion for our hotel business. We want to know who our customers are and we want to take care of those customers every time we have an opportunity to touch them. So the value of OnQ is primarily having that information with that in-depth knowledge about customers. Collecting information on all of its customers is not an easy task, particularly given the many different hotels in the Hilton family of brands: the company owns, manages, or franchises a hotel portfolio of some of the best known and highly regarded brands, including Hilton, Conrad Hotels & Resorts, Doubletree, Embassy Suites, Hampton Inn, Hilton Garden Inn, Homewood Suites, and the Waldorf-Astoria. OnQ provides a method for capturing and managing information on Hilton customers across a diverse set of properties, differing brands, and various countries with local requirements.

QUESTION 4 The customer relationship lifecycle indicates the pattern the relationship will follow in its development. With relevant examples and the aid of a diagram/table, discuss the FOUR (4) phases of a customer relationship policy. (20 marks)