The aim of this book is to enhance theoretical and practical understanding of quality management in tourism and hospitality. It provides a benchmark of current knowledge, and examines the range of research methods being applied to further develop tourism and hospitality service management research. It is hoped that this book will stimulate new research questions by highlighting tensions and challenges in the area.

The Second European Edition of Services Marketing: Integrating Customer Focus Across the Firm by Wilson, Zeithaml, Bitner and Gremler uniquely focuses on the development of customer relationships through quality service. Reflecting the increasing importance of the service economy, Services Marketing is the only text that put the customer's experience of services at the centre of its approach. The core theories, concepts and frameworks are retained, and specifically the gaps model, a popular feature of the book. The text moves from the foundations of services marketing before introducing the gaps model and demonstrating its application to services marketing. In the second edition, the book takes on more European and International contexts to reflect the needs of courses, lecturers and students. The second edition builds on the wealth of European and International examples, cases, and research in the first edition, offering more integration of European content. It has also be fully updated with the latest research to ensure that it continues to be seen as the text covering the very latest services marketing thinking. In addition, the cases section has been thoroughly examined and revised to offer a range of new case studies with a European and global focus. The online resources have also been fully revised and updated providing an excellent package of support for lecturers and students.

We welcome you to the proceedings of the 5t International Conference on E- CommerceandWebTechnology(EC-Web2004)heldinconjunctionwithDEXA 2004 in Zaragoza, Spain. This conference, ?rst held in Greenwich, United Ki- dom in 2000, now is in its ?fth year and very well established. As in the four previous years, it served as a forum to bring together researchersfrom academia and commercial developers from industry to discuss the current state of the art in e-commerce and Web technology. Inspirations and new ideas emerged from intensive discussions during formal sessions and social events. Keynote addresses, research presentations and discussions during the c- ference helped to further develop the exchange of ideas among the researchers, developers and practitioners present. The conference attracted 103 paper submissions and almost every paper was reviewed by three program committee members. The program committee - lected 37 papers for presentationand publication, a task which was not easy due to the high quality of the submitted papers. We would like to express our thanks to our colleagues who helped with putting together the technical program: the program committee members and external reviewers for their timely and rigorous reviews of the papers, and the organizing committee for their help in the administrative work and support. We owe special thanks to Gabriela Wagner, Mirella Köster, and Birgit Hauer for their helping hands concerning the administrative and organizational tasks of this conference. Finally,wewouldliketothankalltheauthorswhosubmittedpapers,authors who presented papers, and the participants who together made this conference an intellectually stimulating event through their active contributions.

Many enterprises are moving their applications and IT services to the cloud. Better risk management results in fewer operational surprises and failures, greater stakeholder confidence and reduced regulatory concerns; proactive risk management maximizes the likelihood that an enterprise’s objectives will be achieved, thereby enabling organizational success. This work methodically considers the risks and opportunities that an enterprise taking their applications or services onto the cloud must consider to obtain the cost reductions and service velocity improvements they desire without suffering the consequences of unacceptable user service quality.

In a world where there is increasing choice for just about every kind of product and service, winning and holding the best customers is key to the success of any business. Customer Relationship Management, or CRM, is a concept that senior managers in any kind of business ignore at their peril. At its heart is the successful management of customer retention by being customer-focused as an organization. The concept is not rocket science, but its implementation is more of a challenge. It involves a fundamental change within the organization. In this book, John Murphy introduces "The Lifebelt" - quite literally an aid to keeping afloat in this pressured environment. The Lifebelt is a framework that offers a practical way forward to integrating and mobilizing the entire oragnization toward a holistic CRM programme. The proprietary framework features six key factors identified as being essential for consistent delivery of service: customer focus, processes, employee involvement, training, measurement, and continuous improvement. John Murphy outlines how each of the factors should be owned by an appropriate member of the top management team. When this framework is systematically and effectively implemented and managed it will considerably enhance the customer retention capacity of the company. The logic of the framework applies to virtually all industries internationally. Managers and marketers across the board will find this book one of the most practical gudies to retaining customers published to date.

Though customer orientation is recommended in Business Process Management, current modeling methods still have a strong focus on the company’s processes. To ensure a long-lasting requirement of a firm’s service, one should consider the customer activities in order to offer an added value that effectively addresses his or her needs. Thus, the customers’ perspective and their process chains before, during and after the interaction need to be captured in Business Process Management. Michael Hewing takes a design-oriented research approach to show how the integration of well-grounded marketing methods enables the visualization and analysis of the customer’s point of view in Business Process Management. By enhancing this method, information on usage processes as well as on the value-in-use can be provided for a comprehensive and process-based customer management.

Advancements in the field of information technology have transformed the way businesses interact with each other and their customers. Businesses now require customized products and services to reflect their constantly changing environment, yet this results in cutting-edge products with relatively short lifecycles. Innovative Solutions for Implementing Global Supply Chains in Emerging Markets addresses the roles of knowledge management and information technology within emerging markets. This forward-thinking title explores the current trends in supply chain management, knowledge acquisition and transfer mechanisms among supply chain partners, and knowledge management paradigms. This book is an invaluable resource for researchers, business professionals and students, business analysts, and marketing professionals.

This book is a practical handbook for entrepreneurship in tourism related industries. The book will provide students and prospective entrepreneurs with the knowledge, know-how and best practices in order to assist them in planning, implementing and managing business ventures in the field of tourism.