Blogs as a tool for maintaining customer relationship in travel markets: Antecedents and consequences
| Autor: | Pei-Chun Lee, 李蓓純 |
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| Rok vydání: | 2011 |
| Druh dokumentu: | 學位論文 ; thesis |
| Popis: | 99 In Taiwan, many travel agents and guiders are bloggers to conduct their own blogs individually or on the company’s Websites. Business blogs can be viewed as a developing and essential relationship marketing channel in travel and tourism industry. As travel blogs increase in popularity, it is of importance to investigate blog effectiveness for relationship marketing. Thus, this study proposes a conceptual model based on relationship quality model of Crosby et al. (1990) with extended variables to gain better understanding of reader (customer) behaviors on business travel blogs. Specifically, it attempts to present a theoretical and empirical analysis that business travel blogs can make to successful relationship marketing. The proposed model was empirically tested using AMOS 16.0 with a survey data collected from 288 readers of blogs that were written by travel agents and guiders. The research results indicated that availability of information plays a dominant role in influencing relationship marketing, i.e. satisfaction and trust. However, contrary to our hypotheses, the characteristics of blogs, such as interactivity and entertainment, have no significant direct effect on readers’ satisfaction and trust. Trust has an effect on satisfaction. Satisfaction is a key predictor of readers’ loyalty toward business travel blogs, whereas trust has no significant direct effect on loyalty. Notably, the research finding indicates that readers’ loyalty significantly affects their purchasing intention for travel products. As this study has shown, travel-related corporations can select from an option of providing information to manager customer relationships successfully. |
| Databáze: | Networked Digital Library of Theses & Dissertations |
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