Understanding Support For Bleisure Samples †MyAssignmenthelp.com

Question: Discuss about the Understanding Support For Bleisure. Answer: Introduction Bleisure is a term that was coined in the hotel industry to refer to adding a leisure component to business trips. This trend has become common, especially among the Millennials. Bleisure makes employees comfortable, motivated, committed and focused. These factors result in high productivity and profits for an organization. Despite what research has shown the benefits of bleisure, there is a section of people who believe that bleisure should not be encouraged since it is not documented in corporate travel policies. Additional, they argue that it is expensive and difficult to manage. Nevertheless, research has shown that more companies have become accustomed to the concept of leisure thus allocating time and resources for it. However, a gap exists in the literature on bleisure travelers target market. Information is important since it helps hotels to tailor services to fit customer needs. Therefore, this report explains the research steps involved in ascertaining the information used to profile target market for bleisure travelers. This will involve analyzing reasons for support of bleisure, considerations in bleisure travels and bleisure target market demographics. Understanding support for bleisure Since the emergence of bleisure, various businesses have adjusted management to ensure that they prioritize comfort and morale for employees while on business trips. Meaning, they must have established that there are benefits for supporting bleisure (Zahra, 2016). Understanding advantages and support for bleisure will enable hotels to find the basis for developing bleisure activities (arts/culture, sight-seeing, and dining experience) (Zahra, 2016). Bleisure instills a positive attitude in employees thus making them more productive. Admittedly, travel can be an emotional and physical burden on staff (Bridgestreet.com, 2014). Therefore, introducing leisure can make them more productive while overseas. Consequently, businesses experience a better return on investment. Understanding this factor helps hotel management to create activities that are fun for people on business trips (Truong, 2015). For example, they could organize for neighboring city visits, introducing serviced apartments and games. Similarly, businesses support bleisure because it portrays their commitment to employee morale and satisfaction. 30% of trips are done for business purposes (McLeod, 2017). 83% of people in business trips admit taking 3 or less extra days to explore the city or relax (McLeod, 2017). Meaning, even before businesses started incorporating bleisure in their travel policies, employees had ways of ensuring they have leisure during business trips (Luca, 2015). Therefore, by officially supporting bleisure, businesses show that employees comfort is a priority instead of an afterthought. Understanding the basis of support for bleisure is a critical step in developing information to be used in profiling target market for bleisure travel (HJ Crawford, 2015). Apart from helping in creating bleisure schedules, it ensures that services and experiences are fit to the preferences of staff on business trips. Bleisure travels considerations According to a research conducted by Travel Associates, between 20% and 30%, hotel bookings can be classified as bleisure travel (Bridgestreet.com, 2014). This calls for the need to understand factors that influence employees to turn business trips into bleisure trips. Therefore, this section provides the two main factors: business travel location and cost of extending business trips which are considered in bleisure travel. A report by Bridge Street Global Hospitality showed that the further employees travel for business, the more likely they will extend the trip. Meaning, business location plays a key role in bleisure travel (Morschett, 2017). Therefore, it is upon hotel management to profile customers depending on where they are traveling from. This will help in developing a desirable program that will ensure that guests do not get bored while on business trips. Similarly, the cost of extending a business trip determines the likelihood of leisure travel. According to a report on State of Business conducted by Concur Company in 2016, the average business trip is three nights (Morschett, 2017). Further, business travel expenses are usually covered by the business. Meaning, taking extra days to relax and explore, while on a business trip, is cheaper and convenient for employees (Bridgestreet.com, 2014). Additionally, for those going to business trips with family members, bleisure is the best option since one members fare ticket is paid for by the business. Location for business travel and cost determines the likelihood of bleisure travel. This information is important in profiling the target market for bleisure travel (Cho, 2013). It ensures that hotels adjust their prices to attract more bleisure travelers and create strategies that ensure that even those accompanying people on business trips get to have a worthy travel experience. Bleisure travel target market demographics Not everyone goes for business trips. Similarly, not every person in business travel extends days for leisure. This calls for the need to understand bleisure travel target market using demographic features like age, attitude, gender and region (Wilson, 2014). Research shows that in every 10 travelers, 6 are away for business purposes. Out of the six, two travel for 60 or more days. Similarly, people on business travel admit taking three, or less, days for vacation (Bridgestreet.com, 2014). This means that bleisure is unavoidable among people on business trips thus the need to be included in every companys travel policies. Although most business traveler age range between 45 and 55 years, Research shows that business travelers below 35 years prefer bleisure. This group cites love for exploration as the main reason for loving bleisure (Bridgestreet.com, 2014). Further, 61% of them prefer traveling with family members or significant other to business trips (Leiss, 2017). Additionally, although the job market is dominated by men, women prefer bleisure and are more likely to extend for more days. Findings The process of profiling the target market goes through critical stages that assure a hotel success. From this research, it has been established that understanding the support for bleisure, factors considered in bleisure travel and target population demographics. These steps are important in ascertaining information used to profile bleisure target market. In conclusion, information used to profile target market in the hotel industry is important because it gives particular hotels competitive advantage, enable expansion of the market, reducing the cost of marketing mistakes and improving customer experience. However, to achieve effectiveness, research should be conducted in a systematic order. Therefore, this report has cited understanding reasons for support for bleisure, considerations in bleisure travel and target market demographics analysis as the main steps to be followed in ascertaining the information used to profile target market for bleisure travelers in the hotel industry. References Bridgestreet.com. (2014). The Bleisure Report. Retrieved 10 25, 2017, from Bridge Street Global Hospitality: https://www.bridgestreet.com Cho, S. (2013). Toward a Field of Intersectionality Studies: Theory, Applications, and Praxis. Journal of Women in Culture and Society, 38 , 785-810. Creswell, J. (2013). Research design: Qualitative, quantitative , and mixed methods approaches. Sage publications . Hair, J. (2013). Essentials of business research. ME Sharpe . HJ Crawford, G. G. (2015). Humorous advertising that travels: A review and call for research. Journal of Business Research , 569-577. Leiss, C. (2017, 8 20). Bleisure-A new travel category. Retrieved 10 25, 2017, from Tnooz: https://www.tnooz.com Luca, N. (2015, october 9). Towards a service-dominant approach to social marketing theory. Retrieved 12 November, 2016, from sage pub.com: https://www.sagepub.com McLeod, S. (2017, 8 20). The Pros and Cons of Encouraging Bleisure Travel. Retrieved 10 25, 2017, from Travel Port Locomote: https://blog.locomote,com Morschett, R. G. (2017). Determining the Target Markets. In Developing International Strategies , 85-104. Schreier, M. (2012). Qualitative Content Analysis in Practice. Sage , 227-245. Truong, V. (2015). Social marketing quarterly. Elsevier , 230-248. Wilson, J. (2014). Essentials of business research: A guide to doing your research project. Sage. Zahra, S. (2016). Developing theory-grounded family business research: Some suggestions. Journal of family business strategy , 3-7.