Measuring Customer Satisfaction and Hotel Efficiency Analysis: An Approach Based on Data Envelopment Analysis

Abstract

We propose a network DEA (Data Envelopment Analysis) model that consists of internal and external service processes and employs customer satisfaction as an intermediate factor. Using the proposed model, we calculate four efficiency scores: service productivity score drawn from internal service process, service efficiency score drawn from external service process, overall efficiency score drawn from both internal and external service processes, and management efficiency score calculated without the intermediate output. By analyzing the four efficiency scores, we find that overall efficiency score is well suited to represent a hotel’s comprehensive productivity. Our results support the validity of a network DEA model which includes customer satisfaction for analyzing hotel efficiency. Despite its important role that plays in hotel efficiency, customer satisfaction has been barely considered in the previous hotel efficiency studies. By analyzing hotel efficiency including customer satisfaction, this study sheds new light on the hotel efficiency research area and provides a valuable basis for future research.