1. Introduction
The essence of tourism means that people experience life in another way, enjoy different forms of life and feel different natural scenery (Yao, 2020). After 2019, Chinese tourism industry has got into a new stage of development (Zhang, 2021). Meantime, China’s urbanization level has been improved, and rural tourism has gradually become the most popular choice of people’s travel plans (Cheng, 2019). Accommodation is an indispensable activity in people’s tourism activities. Therefore, the study on China B & B customer satisfaction plays an important role in the development of China’s rural tourism, which also plays a significant role in the development of China’s tourism. At present, the study on China B & B customer satisfaction is more scattered in specific areas, but there is no comprehensive summary on the satisfaction and influencing factors of the overall market. In order to relieve this main problem, this paper makes a domain-based analysis on the influencing factors of customer satisfaction in the overall market of China B & B. Starting with the current situation of China B & B development and customer satisfaction, this paper analyzes the overall China B & B market environment, summarizes the factors affecting China B & B customer satisfaction, and puts forward feasible improvement recommendations.
2. Development Status of China B & B
With the continuous development of China tourism industry, China’s total tourism economic revenue has exceeded 6.6 trillion yuan in 2019 (Xu et al., 2020). By 2020, tourism will become one of the primary driving forces of China’s economic development (Sun & Kong, 2021). Moreover, due to the improvement of economic level, people’s spiritual demand has gradually replaced material demand in daily life and become the primary demand (Huang et al., 2021). Therefore, besides paying attention to the needs of traveling, tourists’ spirit also should be taken seriously.
More importantly, in 2019, the total number of tourists was 3.09 billion, an increase of 9.7% over last year, and rural tourists’ number accounting for more than half of the total number, in China (Xu et al., 2020). More, the total income of rural tourism is 1.81 trillion yuan, with an average annual growth of 11.3%, in 2019 China (Xu et al., 2020). The blow data obviously shows that rural tourism carries more than 50% of the number of tourists, but rural tourism income accounts for only about 27% of China’s total tourism income. Thus, the economic benefit of China B & B market is not as good as the whole tourism market.
Another hand, there are some special characteristics that become the label of rural tourism, which are rural style ecology, B & B culture and leisure life experience (Zhang, 2021). Among them, B & B is an important factor and main economic source of rural tourism, that not only plays a role in stimulating local economic development and employment, but also greatly improves the living standards of local villagers and enriches the spiritual culture of local villagers (Chen, 2018). In detail, different from traditional hotels, B & B not only provides tourists with special accommodation and catering services, but also provides tourists with cultural and tourism experience activities (Ye, 2019). Moreover, besides being a part of tourism accommodation, B & B also gradually becoming a tourism feature. For example, Yunnan’s B & B have already become a tourism characteristic, attracting a large number of literary and artistic young people have gone to Yunnan to experience Yunnan’s B & B. In addition, the development of B & B could improve the economic benefits of tourism destinations and reduce the unemployment rate (Wang & Liao, 2017). Correspondingly, in recent years, B & B has become unique and far ahead in the development of China’s rural tourism industry with its unique charm. On the other hand, after meeting the basic travel needs of tourists, tourists’ requirements for the quality and service of B & B experience have been improved. However, affected by the Covid-19, the development of B & B got into a sluggish stage in China (Sun & Kong, 2021). Therefore, this report thinks that China’s B & B is in the golden development period after excluding the impact of Covid-19 factors, and has great development potential and market prospects.
3. Customer Satisfaction Situation of China B & B
Customer satisfaction refers to the gap between customers’ actual feelings after using the product and their expectations before purchasing the product (Ghosh, 2020). Thus, customer satisfaction of B & B refers to the difference between tourists’ expectations and actual experience feelings.
China B & B customer satisfaction presents a low level. Specifically, compared with urban hotel service, there are some key issues that unqualified service quality and poor service attitude exciting B & B service, which will reduce satisfaction rate of customers’ experience (Liang, 2019). Going a step further, because of B & B’s unprofessional management, unreasonable planning, similar design, copying each other, and so on, B & B customer satisfaction shows a downward trend (Yao, 2020). Meantime, the decline of B & B customer satisfaction is one of the main important factors, hindering the development of B & B and reducing rural tourism income (Jiang & Sheng, 2020). Moreover, according to Li’s study, customer perception oriented consumption gradually occupies a leading position in the consumer market. The current overall service attitude and poor service quality of B & B will reduce the level of customer satisfaction (Li, 2018). Moreover, the overall customer satisfaction of China B & B market is less than 60%, which causes B & B managers to adopt the low price strategy mainly, this strategy further reduces the economic income of rural tourism (Yao, 2020). Therefore, this paper believes that the competition in China’s B & B market is fierce, the overall level of customer satisfaction is low, and there is huge space for development and improvement.
4. Analysis of Influencing Factors
With the rapid development of the Internet, the development of Minsu is always under the supervision of the public (Zhang & Tian, 2021). After Covid-19, customer satisfaction plays a crucial role in the sustainable development of Minsu (Zhang & Tian, 2021). Moreover, the improvement of material living standards has resulted in changes in consumers’ requirements for services and products (Xu, 2021). There are three key factors affecting China B & B customer satisfaction: service quality, price and environment and facilities.
4.1. Service Quality
The quality of B & B service refers to the level of services, products, and cultural experience that the owner of B & B could provide for tourists. China B & B industry as a service industry, its service quality has an important impact on customer satisfaction. Furthermore, firstly, the current service characteristics of China B & B are not distinctive, which cannot meet the needs of customers for cultural experience and travel experience, so that seriously reduces the customer satisfaction during B & B experience (Wu & Yu, 2018). Secondly, the customer satisfaction of B & B with high-quality services is higher than low-quality services one, which was because high-quality services tend to promote the interaction between host and guest, increase tourists’ sense of belonging to B & B and enhance tourists experience, thereby increasing customer satisfaction (Tang, 2021). Thirdly, high-quality B & B services not only could make tourists feel at home, but also could deepen the tourist experience impression (Wu, 2021). Simultaneously, high-quality B & B services could not only promote rural tourism, but also improve the customer satisfaction of B & B (Wu, 2021). Thus, high-quality service quality will improve customer satisfaction of B & B, and low-quality service will reduce customer satisfaction.
4.2. Price
The price strategy is a key strategy in marketing, although China B & B mainly focus on emotional and cultural experiences, it still was a commercial behavior, and the ultimate goal is to gain profits (Zhang, 2019). The price of China B & B has a decisive effect on customer satisfaction and willingness to stay. Specifically, the primary factor for tourists to compare when choosing a B & B is the price, and most tourists will choose a low-cost B & B when first time experience (Liu & Liu, 2019). After the actual experience, because the environmental facilities and services of low-cost B & B are at a general level or terrible situation, customer satisfaction was usually showed a lower level (Liu & Liu, 2019). Meanwhile, due to tourism being a seasonal activity, the price of B & B varies in different seasons, which would cause the customer satisfaction was declined to a certain extent (Wang et al., 2022).
In addition, due to the fierce competition in China B & B market, most B & B owners engage in malicious competition with price strategies, ignoring the maintenance of B & B experience levels, which also would reduce the customer satisfaction of China B & B (Zhang, 2019). Therefore, this paper argues that price is one of the main factors affecting China B & B customer satisfaction.
4.3. Environment and Facilities
B & B environment could be divided into internal and external environments. The internal environment generally refers to the internal infrastructure such as the scale and decoration of B & B, and the external environment generally refers to the natural and cultural environment of B & B location. The environment and facilities of B & B would affect the choice of tourists. B & B with more local characteristics and convenient transportation are more popular with tourists and usually produce high customer satisfaction (Yan, 2021). However, in order to attract tourists, many B & B will excessively pursue exaggeration and individuality, lack of local unique local style, ignore the integration of local culture and natural landscape, so that tourists couldn’t understand local culture and rural characteristics, and over time, tourists’ satisfaction of B & B will decline (Zhu, 2021). Furthermore, in order to obtain more economic benefits, many B & B arbitrarily transform the residential structure, aging facilities, excessive noise, private pulling of room wires, full of potential safety hazards and other serious problems, which also leads to the low level of customer satisfaction. Besides, China B & B lack an innovative spirit, and most of the internal decorations were similar, that gives tourists the feeling of aesthetic fatigue, which will undoubtedly reduce customers’ satisfaction with the accommodation experience (Zhu, 2021). Therefore, this paper believes that environment and facilities were the significant affecting factors of B & B customer satisfaction.
5. Suggestion
At present, the development of China B & B was in the primary development stage. In order to improve customers’ satisfaction of China B & B, this part believes that customer satisfaction of China B & B could be improved through the following measures: improve the service requirements of China B & B; strengthen the infrastructure construction of China B & B and enhance the combination of China B & B and local culture. Firstly, strengthening market supervision and macro control ability could solve some pricing security complaints, and reduce the probability of homogeneous competition to a certain extent. At the same time, improving the service requirements of China B & B also means that B & B owners should optimize the spatial layout of B & B, improve the service quality and attitude, and improve the value-added service function of B & B. All of those could conducive to increasing the experience satisfaction of tourists. Secondly, China is carrying out the rural revitalization plan currently. B & B should take this opportunity to upgrade the supporting facilities and infrastructure, and improve the surrounding supporting transportation, catering and entertainment construction, which is conducive to increasing the emotional identity of tourists. Thirdly, most of the tourists who choose B & B usually have literary and artistic feelings. Therefore, paying attention to the combination of local characteristic culture with B & B and creating a B & B brand with creativity and characteristics are beneficial for improving tourism satisfaction. Meantime, the catering, farming experience and other activities provided by B & B should be combined with rural culture to provide rural characteristic services different from urban culture, which are beneficial to enhance customers’ sense of identity and satisfaction with B & B. In short, this paper believes that the above measures will help to improve the customer satisfaction of China B & B.
6. Conclusion
With the rapid development of the number and scale of China B & B, the improvement of quality is ignored, which leads to a low overall level of customer satisfaction. By domain-based study, this paper believes that B & B service quality, price, environment and facilities are the main factors affecting customer satisfaction. And measures such as improving service requirements, strengthening infrastructure construction and combining local cultural characteristics will help to increase tourists’ satisfaction.