Key Drivers of Customers’ Perception towards Hotel Brands through Online Booking Stages and Implications for Hotel Management
Year: 2015
Type: article
Abstract: Building strong brand image in the online context can be considered as akey driver for hotel business’s success. Hotels use their brand names, signs, logos(tangible) and images (intangible) to differentiate themselves from their competitors.Customer perception about a hotel brand is created from both offline and onlinecontexts but only few studies have investigated the formation of brand image in onlinecontexts, especially in hotel business. The paper primarily focuses on, and examines,the factors that determine online hotel brand-image from customers’ perspectives.This is one of a few studies to discuss the dimensions of online brand-image for hotelbusiness and provides an understanding of factors that hotel operators need to addressin order to create a positive brand image in an online context.In order to investigate the key drivers of online brand-image, semi-structuredinterviews and a scenario-based study with twenty hotel customers in UK and Thailandwere conducted. The respondents were hotel customers who previously searched andbooked hotels online in the last 18 months. Thematic analysis was used to classifyand organize data according to key themes, concepts based from previous literatureand emergent categories relevant to brand image, online brand-image and brandattributes. The findings significantly reveal that search engines, online travel-agentwebsite information, website attributes such as site appearance, content, prior offlinebrand-image and online reviews and rating sites, influence customer perceptions onhotel brand-image in an online context. These results provide both academic andpractical implications for the hospitality field.
Source: Thammasat Review
Author: Duangthida Nunthapirat
Institution: Bangkok University
Language: English
Subfield: Marketing
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: bronze
OpenAlex ID: W2316645026