Tourism Destinations Information seeking and dissemination behaviors on social networking sites
34 Journal of Science Ho Chi Minh City Open University – No. 3(15) 2015 – August/2015
TOURISM DESTINATIONS INFORMATION SEEKING AND
DISSEMINATION BEHAVIORS ON SOCIAL NETWORKING SITES
Nguyen Minh Dang1, Vo Thanh Thao2
1Xuan Oanh Trading and Services Limited Liability Company
2 SaigonTourist College
Email: nmdang24@gmail.com
(Received:26/05/2015; Revised: 07/08 /2015; Accepted:14/08/2015)
ABSTRACT
Social networking sites (SNS) are a modern form of communication used by the young
people across the world. Many young people discuss on forums and exchange information,
opinions on SNS. This study empirically examines the effects of consumer opinion leadership
(COL) and consumer susceptibility to interpersonal influence (CSII) on young people’s tourism
destinations information seeking and dissemination behavior on SNS from consumers’ point of
view. The study aimed to answer the following questions: Does COL and CSII affect young
people’s tourism destinations information seeking and dissemination behavior on SNS? Is there
gender difference in young people’s tourism destinations information seeking and dissemination
behavior on SNS? The data generated from various instruments were organized into emerging
themes to validate the findings. The results indicated COL and CSII only affected tourism
destinations information seeking and dissemination behaviors on SNS of young people. Gender
was not supported by the research. These findings suggest that, marketing activities and tactics
should be engaged to attract opinion leaders.
Keywords: Consumer opinion leadership, consumer susceptibility to interpersonal
influence, social Networking Websites.
and social media. Young consumers are also
an important market segment of the tourism.
Therefore, this study aims to explore tourist
1. Introduction
Since the development of the Internet,
social networking sites (SNS) have grown
rapidly in popularity. Modern SNS are
increasingly used in business, creating new
channels for consumers to connect with
companies and other customers. Many SNS
provide consumers with an opportunity to
write reviews of and provide feedback about
products and services they used. Young people
are the most popular user of SNS. They can
find or share information of some destinations
they had visited on the SNS. They consult
more than friends and relatives when they
visited somewhere by turning to online guide
destination
information
seeking
and
dissemination behavior of young people with
regard to information about SNS to help
marketers and researchers understand young
consumers and social media marketing more
clearly by trying to answer these quesions:
1. Does consumer opinion leadership
(COL) affect young people’s tourism
destinations information seeking and
dissemination behavior on SNS?
2. Does consumer susceptibility to
interpersonal influence (CSII) affect
Tourism Destinations Information Seeking And Dissemination Behaviors On Social...
35
young people’s tourism destinations
information seeking and
dissemination behavior on SNS?
3. Is there gender difference in young
there has been a rapid and dramatic growth of
its usage, which has changed the purpose, and
functionality of the Internet (Kelly, Kerr &
Drennan, 2010). SNS provide an engaging,
interactive platform with a greater control of
information flow for their users. SNS are used
for developing relationships, disseminating
information, expanding social networks,
people’s
information
tourism
destinations
and
seeking
dissemination behavior on SNS?
The trend of using social network sites
(SNS) is a globally widespread phenomenon.
SNS such as Facebook and Twitter have
approximately 465 million, 115 million, and 4
to 5 million global users respectively
(Gonzalez et al., 2012). The Report by
ComScore shows that more than 770 million
users visited SNS in July 2009, and SNS
reached almost 70% of the total global online
audience (Nguyen, 2010). In USA, 73% of
wired American teens and 47% of online
adults use SNS (Lenhart et al., 2010).
Approximately 24% of the Malaysia
population use Facebook (Gonzalez et al.,
2012). Media Metrix Report stated that 67%
of Malaysian Internet users are SNS users
(Nguyen, 2010). According to a new survey
conducted by the UK Online Measurement
Company (UKOM), the British spend more
time on social networks and blogs than any
other online activity (Burrows, 2010, cited in
Mun, Li & Fernandez, 2011).
entertainment,
etc.
Previous
research
suggested that SNS mainly support pre-
existing social relations (Boyd & Ellison,
2008). In addition, research found that SNS
are more likely to be used by youth as an
avenue for communication and hanging out
with friends. Similarly, connecting with
friends was found to be the main reason of
SNS usage among 91% of the American teens
(Lenhart & Madden, 2007, cited in Boyd &
Ellison, 2008). Therefore, SNS now serve
extensively as a large network for developing
relationships and peer-to-peer communication.
The use of SNS among youth is related
to the attitude towards SNS. Although past
studies have shown a negative attitude towards
SNS, the majority viewed SNS favorably
(Hirst et al., 2012). Recently, those who see it
as a golden opportunity to reach their target
market have adopted SNS as a new medium
for advertising. Although past studies generally
SNS are web-based services providing
indicated
a
negative attitude towards
the functions of creating a public or semi-
public profile that displays a list of other users
with whom they are linked to (Boyd &
Ellison, 2008). SNS consist of various
features such as a profile page, which contains
the individual user’s personal information like
location, education background, status,
birthday information, and interests among
other things. Other features available on SNS
include photograph or image albums, list of
connections that they have approved of, wall
for posting comments, instant and email
messaging options. Users are also able to
create and join groups, as well as organize
events and make announcements on SNS.
Since the introduction of SNS in 2004,
advertising (Wang et al., 2002), the attitude
towards advertising on SNS should be re-
evaluated since it is a new medium consisting
of novel and interactive applications. Eun and
Kim (2009) argued that consumers’ attitude
toward Web advertising may not be the same
as their attitude toward the Web as a medium
itself. Media context have a significant
influence on the advertising value. The factors
affecting attitude toward advertising are
“Entertainment”,
“Informativeness”,
“Interactivity”, “Irritation”, “Credibility”, and
“Demographic” (Wang et al., 2002).
The extensive use of SNS is not only a
trend among consumers. Likewise, the
increased usage of SNS can be observed in
36 Journal of Science Ho Chi Minh City Open University – No. 3(15) 2015 – August/2015
many organizations. Many firms such as
Whole Food Market, Johnson & Johnson, and
McDonald’s are using SNS to increase brand
image (Dragger et al., 2010). Professional
service firms also utilize SNS as a marketing
tool to execute social media marketing plan in
order to achieve the firms’ goals (Dragger et
al., 2010). Thus, advertisers adopting SNS
should provide relevant and added value
commercial message to their advertisements
(Kelly, Kerr & Drennan, 2010).
contexts in Information Systems literature
such as computer-related attitudes and
behaviors (Whitley, 1997); video games
(Bilgihan et al., 2014); and e-learning
(Gonzalez-Gomez et al., 2012). Although
there were no studies investigating such
behaviors across genders in relation to
tourism, but previous studies reveal that
gender differences exist in the use of SNS
(Trammel
&
Keshelashvili, 2005). To
examine consumer characteristics, the
theoretical foundations for this study derive
from marketing literature: consumer opinion
leadership (COL) and consumer susceptibility
to interpersonal influence (CSII). These traits
likely are important in SNS, because
consumers can influence one another in
various ways: as role models, as imitators of
purchase and consumption behavior, as
spreaders of message through word-of-mouth,
and as advisors to other consumers with less
knowledge or experience with shopping
(Flynn et al., 1996).
The most visited online social network
is Facebook, founded in 2004 and with over
600 million users and presence in over 70
countries (Carlson, 2011). Facebook allows
users to create a profile of them and explore
the profiles of others, gaining an insight into
others’ lifestyle and interests (Acar &
Polonsky, 2007). In Vietnam, according to
Vinalink Media Company (2011), about 53%
Internet users (15 million people) were using
at least one social network. Many Facebook
users suggested that information shared on
SNS were always cared and attracted,
especially photos from a journey they had
passed. For these reasons, young people are
the focus of this study.
2. Literature review and hypotheses
Web 2.0
The term Web 2.0 or social media was
officially defined by O’Reilly (2005) as “the
network as platform, spanning all connected
devices” and its applications are “those that
make the most of the intrinsic advantages of
that platform “(O’reilly, 2005). Based on the
original definition of O’Reilly, several
definitions have been proposed. Hoegg et al.
(2006) defined Web 2.0 as “the philosophy of
mutually maximizing collective intelligence
and added value for each participant by
formalized and dynamic information sharing
and creation”. Andersen (2007) defined this
term in two ways: Short description refers to a
group of technologies that have become
deeply associated with the term: blogs, wikis,
podcasts, RSS feeds and so on; technologies
contributing to a more socially connected web
where everyone is able to add to and edit the
content. The long definition is more
complicated, touching on economics,
SNS are mostly for young consumers.
This is a channel for them to interact with
others. In the US, college students browse
Facebook an average of 10–30 minutes daily
(Ellison et al., 2007), responsible for $200
billion annually in expenditures, or as much
as “half the spending in the economy”
(Djamasbi et al., 2010). It would be a great
channel for the tourism economy to invest. In
the context of Tourism Malaysia, the launch
of the latest Tourism Malaysia Internet
advertising was claimed to reflect the
significance of the internet as the most
preferred media platform from which
travellers can obtain travel information
(Yaakop & Hemsley-Brown, 2013).
In the context of SNS, gender likely
affects information dissemination. Gender
differences were investigated in various
Tourism Destinations Information Seeking And Dissemination Behaviors On Social...
37
technology and new ideas about the connected
society (Constantinides, Romero & Boria,
2009). And Nielsen (2008) proposed four
components encapsulating what he considers
as the Web 2.0 defining elements: Rich
internet applications (RIA); community
features, social networks, and user-generated
content; mashups (using other sites’ services
as a development platform); and advertising.
Based on these above definitions,
who share interests and activities, or
who are interested in exploring the
interests and activities of others. It
provides various ways for users to
interact - chat, messaging, email,
video, file sharing, blogging and
discussion groups”.
Originally, most SNS were member-
based, Internet communities that allowed
users to communicate in innovative ways.
Now they are increasingly used in business,
creating new channels for consumers to
connect with companies and other customers.
Companies can easily identify their target
customers, then communicate and distribute
information to them on SNS. On the other
hand, consumers can click “follow”, post
comments, discuss to other consumers on
SNS, and so on. The social communication
services provided by SNS in turn affect the
company–customer relationship, including
brand image and brand awareness (Jansen et
al., 2009). According to Zhang et al. (2011),
one of the main reasons making Facebook, top
used SNS, become an effective tool for
marketers is that “it developed several
marketing instruments that can directly be
employed by companies, including banner
advertisements, groups, and fan pages”. For
example, Facebook allowed Amazon, an
American international electronic commerce
company; to create an application that
Facebook user can write reviews, share with
their friends on Facebook and even buy books
from Amazon. EBay is talking with both
Facebook and MySpace about making it
easier for their members to access the auction
site (Stroud, 2008).
Constantinides, Romero and Boria (2009)
proposed a detailed illustration of Web 2.0
along three main dimensions: Application
types,
Technologies.
Social Networking Sites (SNS)
social
effects
and
enabling
According to Boyd and Ellison (2008),
SNS are “web based services that allow
individuals to construct a public or semi-
public profile within a bounded system,
articulate a list of other users with whom they
share a connection, and view and traverse
their list of connections and those made by
others within the system”. Thus, they
emphasized building online connections
among people who share interests and
activities and provide ways for users to
interact. Like Web 2.0, SNS, which is one of
Web 2.0’s tools, also has many definitions.
These are three viewpoints from the
perspective of strategy, research and
technology companies (Stroud, 2008):
(1) Quarterly
McKinsey:
“Social
networking refers to systems that
allow members of a specific site to
learn about other members’ skills,
talents, knowledge or preferences”.
(2) Pew/Internet: “A social networking
site is an online location where a
user can create a profile and build a
personal network that connects him
or her to other users”.
(3) Wikipedia: “A social network
service focuses on the building and
verification of online social
networks for communities of people
In order to integrate SNS into the
marketing strategies, we should understand its
effects on the consumer’s decision-making
process, and the customer motives for using
SNS. According to Constantinides et al.
(2009), customer preferences and decisions
are increasingly based on inputs provided by
parties beyond the control of online
38 Journal of Science Ho Chi Minh City Open University – No. 3(15) 2015 – August/2015
marketers: peer reviews, referrals, blogs,
tagging, social networks, online forums, and
so on. In general, with the development of
internet and advantages of SNS, marketers
can use SNS as a new advertising tool, a
channel to manage customer relationship, and
empower customers to participate in their
marketing activities: branding review, product
development, product evaluation, and
customer service. This is the basis of a
transparent and pleasant.
According to Bilgihan et al. (2014),
consumers have information seeking and
information sharing behaviors. However,
information sharing behavior in Bilgihan et
al.'s (2014) scale corresponds to information
dissemination of Walsh and Mitchell (2009)
view on information sharing. Therefore, the
two dimensions used in this study are now
labeled as information seeking and
information dissemination.
as complex systems, represented as a network
by enumerating the stakeholders composing it
and the linkages that connect them”.
While there is a significant literature on
the importance of the relationships between
tourists and service organizations and
connecting tourism companies (Tinsley &
Lynch, 2001), few works are available which
examine a tourism destination from a network
point of the measurement of tourism
destination image has been important for both
researchers and practitioners. An accurate
assessment of image will help destination
marketers design an effective marketing
strategy (Baloglu & Mangaloglu, 2001).
Online social travel networking is also
changing the way tourists plan their trips.
These websites allow users to interact and
provide reviews on hotels or on local tourist
attractions. Some examples of these websites
are TravBuddy.com, Travellerspoint, WAYN,
Woophy, Passportstamp, and TripAdvisor.com.
The latter is probably the largest travel
community on the Web. It was founded in
2000 and currently covers 212 000 hotels,
over 30,000 destinations, and 74 000
attractions worldwide (Miguéns, Baggio &
Costa, 2008).
Tourism Destination
There have been many studies and
models of development based around what is
referred to as the tourism destination. These
studies tend to perceive the tourism
destination as a system containing a number
of components such as attractions,
accommodation, transport, and other services
and infrastructure (Tinsley & Lynch, 2001).
Determining a definition of tourism itself is a
complex and unresolved issue as Pearce
(1989) illustrated in his attempt:
“Tourism has been defined in various
ways but may be thought of as the
relationships and phenomena arising out of
the journeys and temporary stays of people
travelling primarily for leisure or recreational
purposes. While writers differ on the degree to
which other forms of travel (e.g. for business,
for health or educational purposes) should be
included under tourism there is a growing
recognition that tourism constitutes one end of
a broad leisure spectrum”.
Consumer Opinion Leadership
Consumer Opinion Leadership (COL)
has been of interest to marketers for a long
time and has been defined in different ways.
Originally, It is based on the idea that there
are “certain people who are most concerned
about the issues and as well as most
articulate” (Lazarsfeld et al., 1948). They
referred to these people as opinion leaders,
and they exert interpersonal influence. Katz
and Lazarsfeld (1955) defined opinion leaders
as “individuals who are likely to influence
other
persons
in
their
immediate
environment”. It can also be regarded as
social communication between opinion givers
and opinion seekers as interpersonal
communication refers to an exchange of
information between individuals (King &
Baggio, Scott and Cooper (2010)
defined tourism destinations “were considered
Tourism Destinations Information Seeking And Dissemination Behaviors On Social...
39
Summers, 1970).
Merton (1957) made a distinction
opinion leaders, and they had a higher level of
subjective knowledge of the Internet. Flynn et
al. (1996) concluded that perceived
knowledge and the willingness to discuss the
Internet with others impacted the agents’
attitude toward the Internet. They also
concluded that younger agents would play a
major role in how the Internet would be used.
The Technology Acceptance Model
(TAM) was used and applied by O'Cass and
Fenech (2003) to assess the adoption of
Internet for retail usage among a convenience
sample of Australian web users. Among the
constructs in which they were interested were
opinion leadership and its role in impacting
web usage. They found that it was one of the
antecedents that impacted users’ perceptions
of the usefulness and ease of use of the Web
for retail purchases.
The above studies showed that opinion
leadership have an impact on consumers’ use
of product review websites. Bailey (2005)
also made a new definition for opinion
leadership in the online domain as “E-opinion
leadership” and adapted the offline definition
of the construct for the online domain:
Consumers’ ability to influence other online
consumers’ opinions (Flynn et al., 1996;
Reynolds & Darden, 1971). E-opinion leaders
are more likely than non-E-opinion leaders to
give their opinions and the Internet provides a
forum for them to dispense these opinions
(Bailey, 2005).
Flynn et al. (1996) applied the concept to
marketing by stating: “opinion leadership
occurs when individuals try to influence the
purchasing behavior of other consumers in
specific product fields”. In the marketing
perspective, Hazeldine and Miles (2010) stated
that opinion leaders were motivated by seeking
and dissemination information with others, and
they tended to be more interconnected with
their peers than the other segments.
Consequently, they can influence other people
through interpersonal communication more
frequently and effectively.
between those opinion leaders that influence
opinions in limited spheres and those opinion
leaders who exert interpersonal influence in
several different spheres. Previous studies
have also examined the characteristics of
opinion leaders and addressed their influence
on other consumers’ purchasing behaviors in
various shopping contexts. In a study of
opinion leaders in the women’s fashion
segment, King and Summers (1970) found
substantial differences between fashion
opinion leaders and non-leaders, using
demographic,
sociological,
attitudinal,
communication, and fashion involvement
measures. Corey and Erickson (1971) posited
that they were “models of opinion who could
be influencers on marketing efforts by word
of mouth communication to people around
them”. And most of the literature on opinion
leadership
relates
to
interpersonal
communication in an offline sphere (Corey,
Flynn et al., 1996), with a few studies
investigating opinion leadership in an online
sphere (Eastman et al., 2002; O'Cass &
Fenech, 2003; Bailey, 2005).
Eastman et al. (2002) focused primarily
on insurance sales agents, their use of
Internet, also as their attitudes toward the
Internet. They developed opinion leadership
scores, subjective knowledge scores, for these
sales agents using opinion leadership scale of
Flynn et al. (1996). Next they compared these
scores to attitudes toward the Internet, and
found that agents with a higher level of
subjective knowledge about the Internet were
more likely to be opinion leaders about the
Internet. In addition, opinion leaders and
agents with higher levels of subjective
knowledge had a more favorable attitude
about the Internet. However, according to
Bailey (2005), they found significance only
for the relationship with opinion leadership.
Sales agents who were younger than the mean
age of 46 years old were more likely to be
40 Journal of Science Ho Chi Minh City Open University – No. 3(15) 2015 – August/2015
As mentioned in above chapter 2.2.2,
opinion leaders are a major source of eWOM
communication and regarded as valuable
information sources because they frequently
communicate with others. More than that,
they have knowledge and expertise that will
guide the decision making of opinion seekers
(Bertrandias & Goldsmith, 2006). They are
trusted to be credible as they share both
positive and negative information. Self-
confidence has also been shown among the
characteristics of opinion leaders because
when an individual has self-confidence; there
is less need for him or her to seek information
from others (Reynolds & Darden, 1971).
According to Bilgihan, Peng and
Kandampully (2014), from a marketing
perspective, opinion leaders are characterized
by influence, expertise, communication, and
interpersonal word of mouth. They are also
motivated by seeking and sharing information
with others. Therefore, the first hypothesis
which is linking COL with young people’
tourism destinations information seeking and
information dissemination on SNS is
formulated as below:
H1a: Consumer opinion leadership
(COL) has positive effect on young people’s
tourism destinations information seeking
behavior on SNS.
H1b: Consumer opinion leadership
(COL) has positive effect on young people’s
tourism destinations information dissemination
behavior on SNS.
Consumer Susceptibility to Interpersonal
Influence
Consumer Susceptibility to Interpersonal
Influence (CSII) has long been a source of
interest for marketers and consumer behavior
acquisition and use of products and brands,
the willingness to conform to the expectations
of others regarding purchase decision, and the
tendency to learn about products and services
by observing others and/or seeking
information from others.”
Bearden et al. (1989) argued that CSII
constitutes a stable trait that varies across
individuals and is related to other traits and
characteristics. In order to measure these
inter-individual differences, they developed a
scale that consisted of two separate
dimensions,
namely,
susceptibility to
normative influence (SNI) and susceptibility
to informative influence (SII).
Research building on the research of
Bearden et al. (1989) has mainly focused on
the scale’s normative dimension (SNI).
Consumers high in SNI have been shown to
prefer products with visible social benefits
such as style (Batra et al., 2001), to be less
skeptical of advertising (Mangleburg et al.,
2004), and are more likely to engage in
protective self-presentation in consumption
situations (Wooten & Reed, 2004). People
possessing this trait tend not to see themselves
as autonomous and independent, but rather as
individuals who need to connect with and be
respected by others. Hence they are easily
influenced by the opinions and wish of
persuasive others when making decisions, and
readily comply with the suggestions of the
latter in order to avoid their disapproval
(Bearden et al., 1989). Seiler et al. (2013) also
stated that SNI is a measure of how easily a
person can be swayed to change his position
on a certain topic. The more easily a person's
opinion can be changed, the faster the disease
or cure can spread. Those who have larger
social networks are better able to spread the
disease or cure simply because they come in
contact with more people.
researchers
(Bailey,
2005),
usually
conceptualized as a general personality trait
that varies across individual consumers and
relates to other consumer traits or behaviors
(Orth, 2005). Bearden et al. (1989) defined
CSII as “the need to identify or enhance one’s
image with significant others through the
Bearden et al. (1989) defined susceptibility
to informative influence (SII) refers to an
individual’s tendency to ask friends and
relatives for advice and to observe what
Tourism Destinations Information Seeking And Dissemination Behaviors On Social...
41
brands and products other people are using
before making a purchase decision. Hofstede
(1984) also noted that relations and friends get
better deals than strangers and this is the way
it should be. These showed that once a
relationship is established between a retailer
and a customer, then the retailer could expect
a higher loyalty from the customer. Similarly,
the customer can expect the service and
product quality rendered to be higher than at
an unfamiliar outlet. Further, consumer
complaint behaviors might be impacted
(Milner, Fodness & Speece, 1993).
Fundamentally, high susceptibility
indicates a tendency to be influenced by
others when making decisions; low
susceptibility indicates more independence in
making decision (Clark & Goldsmith, 2006).
Social influence has been generally
recognized as an important force shaping an
individual’s consumer behavior and these
influences may occur prior to purchase (e.g.
word of mouth, information seeking). Young
people may yield to friends’ influence because
they possess relevant information. They also
tend to provide necessary information to their
peers because such behavior helps them
construct positive self-identities (Mangleburg
et al., 2004). Therefore, we assume that:
H2a: Consumer susceptibility to
interpersonal influence (CSII) has positive
effect on young people’s tourism destinations
information seeking behavior on SNS.
H2b: Consumer susceptibility to
interpersonal influence (CSII) has positive
effect on young people’s tourism destinations
information dissemination behavior on SNS.
Gender Differences
Previous studies revealed that gender
differences exist in the use of SNS (Trammel
& Keshelashvili, 2005). Schler et al. (2005)
stated that female bloggers use more words
than males. Nowson and Oberlander (2006)
found that females put more effort into
posting online content than males. For
example, females tend to self-disclose more to
their good friends (Caldwell & Peplau, 1982),
change the level of self-disclosure more
depending on the intimacy of relationships,
are more sociable and sensitive, have more
intimate social networks, are more actively
involved in intimate conversation (Walker,
1994), are more motivated to create and
maintain relationships by the avoidance of
isolation (Tannen, 1992), and to form more
socio-emotion-oriented
social
networks
(Karweit & Hansell, 1983) than males.
Tannen (1992) expounded in her book “You
Just Don’t Understand” that women and men
fail to understand each other because they
speak in different language codes and listen
with different priorities. She stressed that the
differences needed to be revealed and
understood so that communication between
the sexes could be improved.
Females would also form more stable
relationships than males, because socio-
emotion-oriented networks develop emotional
bonds that build solid relationships (Hirschi,
1969). In contrast, males are more likely to
spend time in common activities (Walker,
1994), to communicate with the purpose of
gaining and maintaining social position
(Tannen, 1992), and prefer task-oriented
social networks (Karweit & Hansell, 1983).
These results indicate that females tend to be
more interested in personal and emotional
communication, and in building more stable
relationships than males. Some studies have
also found that females have more extensive
social networks (Walker, 1994), suggesting
that females’ friendship behavior within their
social networks may be more active than
males’. More recently, Lu et al. (2010) stated
that information sharing behavior or
information dissemination behavior is
influenced by gender.
Such gender differences have already
been
found
in
computer-mediated
communication. For example, females use PC
e-mail to communicate about private matters
more than males, and are more satisfied with
42 Journal of Science Ho Chi Minh City Open University – No. 3(15) 2015 – August/2015
communication via PC e-mail, and are more
likely to utilize it to build intimate
relationships (McKenna, Green & Gleason,
2002). Therefore, we would expect that
females will have more personal, more
emotionally involved, and more stable
friendships, and expand their social
networking site when compared with males.
The hypothesis is formulated as below:
young
people’s
tourism
destinations
information seeking behavior on SNS will be
strongly influenced by gender.
H3b: The impact of COL and CSII on
young
information dissemination behavior on SNS
will be strongly influenced by gender.
Based on the above studies, a model is
proposed. Details about model and its
hypotheses as follows.
people’s
tourism
destinations
H3a: The impact of COL and CSII on
Consumer opinion leadership
(COL)
Influence
Expertise
Communication
H1b (+)
H1a (+)
Interpersonal word of mouth
Destinations
information
dissemination
behavior on SNS
Destinations
information
seeking
behavior on
SNS
H3a (+)
H3b (+)
Gender
Consumer susceptibility to
interpersonal influence (CSII)
H2a (+)
H2b (+)
Susceptibility to normative
influence (SNI)
susceptibility to informative
influence (SII)
Figure 1. Research Model
participants to report their age, their gender
and whether they use SNS or not, what SNS
they use. The second section included six
questions about participants’ use of SNS and
tourism destinations information seeking and
dissemination behaviors. The third section
included seven questions to measure COL and
CSII. These items were used by Bilgihan,
Peng and Kandampully (2014), reflected
insights from the broad literature review,
involving studies of SNS (Bilgihan et al.,
2011; Zhang et al., 2011) and information
seeking and dissemination behavior (Kiel &
Leyton, 1981).
3. Research method
The Design and Sample
The model and hypotheses were tested
from a self-administered survey conducted
among young people, from teens to people in
their early 35, who usually use SNS in
Vietnam. A total of 350 questionnaire forms
were sent to respondents by email and directly
on the SNS websites. The 202 usable
questionnaires collected represented
response rate of 57%.
a
All the variables were measured using
scales adapted from previous research studies.
A three-section questionnaire was developed
to detail tourism destinations information
seeking and dissemination behavior on SNS
of the respondents. The first section asked
To measure COL, this study adapted a
scale developed by Reynolds & Darden (1971):
Tourism Destinations Information Seeking And Dissemination Behaviors On Social...
43
Table 1. COL scale
No.
Item
1
2
My friends and family often ask my advice about some tourism destination.
I sometimes influence my friends’ choices tourism destination.
My friends come to me more often than I go to them for information about tourism
destination.
3
4
I can think of at least two people whom I have told about choosing tourism destination in
the last six months.
To measure CSII, Bailey (2005) used the
applicability of each item to the tourism
destinations information seeking and
dissemination behavior context, three of the four
items could be retained. Item omitted was “to
make sure I buy the right product or brand, I
often observe what others are buying and using”.
four items measured on seven-point scales
anchored by Strongly disagree and Strongly
agree to measure informational influence, which
are also appropriate for measuring consumer
behavior on the internet. In terms of the
Table 2. CSII scale
Item
No.
1
I often consult other people to help choose the best tourism destination
2
If I have little experience with a tourism destination, I often ask my friends about it.
I frequently gather information from friends and family about a tourism destination before
I go.
3
Respondents evaluated the frequency of
disagree” to 5 = “strongly agree”) in the third
section.
Scale items of information seeking and
dissemination behaviors were also adapted from
Bilgihan, Peng and Kandampully (2014).
their use of SNS on a five-point Likert scale
for answers (1 = “not at all” to 5 = “very
frequently”) in the second section and a five-
point Likert scale for answers (1= “strongly
Table 3. Scale of Seeking and Dissemination Behaviors
No.
Item
Information Seeking
1
2
3
Do you “become a fan” of or “like” some tourism pages on SNS?
Do you look for tourism destination information on SNS?
Do you click on ads of deals and coupons about tourism destination on SNS?
Information Dissemination
4
5
6
Do you update status on Facebook about a tourism destination you have been to?
Do you check in locations of a tourism destination on SNS?
Do you upload photos on SNS about your tourism destination experience?
44 Journal of Science Ho Chi Minh City Open University – No. 3(15) 2015 – August/2015
The original questionnaire was in
English, and was translated into Vietnamese
for respondents unlikely to be sufficient fluent
in English. Double-translation technique
(Marin & Marin, 1991) and Back-translation
technique (Brislin, 1980) were used to ensure
equivalence of meanings. Firstly, the English
version of the questionnaire (the Original
Language) was translated into Vietnamese
(the Target Language) by the author’s
supervisor. The author then took the
Vietnamese version and translated it into the
English version without consulting with the
supervisor. Next, the author compared the two
English versions to make sure that there is no
significant difference in meaning from the
intended goal of the project and to identify
problems with the translations (odd wording,
improper meaning, and incomplete sentences).
Finally, the author engaged the supervisor in
discussions as to what had been done and how
to resolve discrepancies.
4. Analysis and results
In table 1, it contains some general
information about the participants. The 202
respondents included more women (70.3%)
than men (29.7%). The dominant age group
was people born between 1989 and 1996
(52.5%, ages 18–25 years at the time of the
study). In terms of SNS use, 86.6% of the
respondents interacted on Facebook, 9.4%
used Google+, 2% used Zing me, and others
were 2%. Facebook is undoubtedly the most
popular SNS among respondents at the time
of the study.
Table 4. Respondents Demographic
Frequency
Percent
29.7
70.3
100.0
52.5
47.0
0.5
Valid Percent Cumulative Percent
Male
60
29.7
70.3
100.0
52.5
47.0
0.5
29.7
Female
Total
142
202
106
95
100.0
Gender
Age
18 -25
26 - 35
36 - 45
Total
52.5
99.5
100.0
1
202
100.0
86.6
9.4
100.0
86.6
9.4
Facebook 175
86.6
96.0
98.0
100.0
Google+
Zing me
Others
Total
19
4
2.0
2.0
SNS
4
2.0
2.0
202
100.0
100.0
Measurement Assessment
Cronbach’s alpha
.709 for CSII. It showed that the internal
consistency was acceptable.
The results indicated that all scales
which were higher than .6 satisfied the
requirement for reliability: 0.678 for tourism
destinations information seeking behavior,
0.617 for tourism destinations information
dissemination behavior, .749 for COL, and
Exploratory factor analysis (EFA)
All the variables were run through the
Principal Axis Factor analysis, using the
Promax rotation method to reduce the set of
observed variables to a smaller, more
Tourism Destinations Information Seeking And Dissemination Behaviors On Social...
45
parsimonious set of variables. After rotation
of independent variables, the communalities
of independent variables were .612 and factor
loading of items was higher than .5 satisfied
the requirements. The communalities of
dependent variables were 2.772 and factor
loading of items was higher than .6 also
satisfied the requirements. The KMO measure
of sampling adequacy was .786 and .808
(higher than .7) indicating a good acceptance
(Hutcheson & Sofroniou, 1999). This means
that the variables are correlated highly enough
to provide a reasonable basis for factor
analysis. Barlett’s test having significance
level at p < .001 indicated that the data is
suitable for factor analysis because the
assumption of multivariate normality is met
and the correlation matrix is not an identity
matrix. Hence this result is acceptable.
the merge of two dimensions “information
seeking” and “information dissemination”.
Therefore, according to Gordon et al. (2003)
and Walsh & Mitchell (2009), in this case, the
merged scale can be labeled as “information
sharing” which reflects information seeking or
acquisition and information dissemination.
Gordon et al. (2003) defined this is a process
that “collecting information from the
membership” (Seeking behavior) and
“disseminate that information to the
members”
(Disseminating
behavior).
Additionally, Walsh and Mitchell (2009) also
defined opinion leaders as “knowledgeable
online
information
gatherers
and
disseminators who provide
a
personal
recommendation service for family, friends
and colleagues”. It means that sharing is a
parallel behavior. Thus, the revised research
model is as below:
Two factors of dependent variables
cannot be split after rotation. Results reveal
Consumer susceptibility
to interpersonal
Consumer opinion
leadership (COL)
influence (CSII)
Gender
H3b (+)
H3a (+)
H1 (+)
H2 (+)
Destinations
information sharing
behavior on SNS
Figure 2. Revised Research Model
Pearson Correlation Coefficient
Table 5. Pearson Correlation Coefficient
Sharing
1.000
Gender
COL
CSII
Sharing
Gender
COL
0.003
1.000
-0.101
-0.054
Pearson
Correlation
0.457**
0.493**
1.000
CSII
0.550**
1.000
**. Correlation is significant at the 1% level (2-tailed).
46 Journal of Science Ho Chi Minh City Open University – No. 3(15) 2015 – August/2015
The
correlations
between
the
websites usage (Bailey, 2005), wine brand
choice (Orth, 2005), drinking and smoking
behavior (Kropp et al., 1999).
independent variables (COL, CSII, and
Gender) and dependent variables (Sharing
behavior) were tested by using Pearson
correlations. Result of Table 4.10 indicated that
there was a strong, positive correlation
between the variables. Sharing behavior has a
significant correlation with both COL (r =
.457, p < .001) and CSII (r = .493, p < .001).
Hence, COL and CSII have significant impacts
on sharing behavior. Gender doesn’t have
correlation to other variables. COL and CSII
have high correlation with each other (r = .550,
p < .001). These two variables can be seen that
they are measuring two different concepts. So
the high correlation between them could be
explained as COL also has positive impact on
CSII. The correlation matrix of table 2
indicated there are not any correlations above
.8 with p < .01. That might be happen weak
multicollinearity and supported for the test-
retest reliability of the variables.
The results confirmed that young people
are heavy users of a wide variety of SNS. It
also reflected their attitudes toward SNS as
well as their information sharing behavior.
These findings highlight the importance of
social media marketing. Hence tourist
companies and marketers must recognize and
exploit the power of social media. They
should create their own SNS to help
everybody find and engage with them online.
On SNS, they also could post the video clips
or main information about tourism
destinations.
Opinion leaders tend to share more
tourism destinations information. Thus,
marketing activities and tactics should be
engaged to attract opinion leaders. Doing so
may result in fan engagement in SNS, so
providing one of the fastest and most cost
efficient ways to build a significant marketing
tool for tourism.
The findings also indicate that young
people who are highly susceptible to
interpersonal influence tend to share more
tourism information on SNS than less
susceptible consumers. By associating CSII
with SNS usage, this study substantiates the
fundamental relationship between CSII and
consumer behavior and offers insights into the
information seeking and dissemination
behaviors of young people. Besides, they can
send and receive both positive and negative
messages from other SNS users regarding the
tourism destination they visited and how they
were treated there, how the services are, how
they feel and whether they would return again.
These messages are likely to influence their
tourist decisions and will continue to be
heavily relied upon in the future. These would
help the marketers get more information and
build the strategy to develop the tourism
destinations more effectively. Finally, the lack
Regression Analysis
The Anova table showed F = 27.596
with p < .001 is significant. This indicated
that the combination of the predictors
significantly predict math achievement. Sig.
of COL and CSII was p < .001 at 1%
significance level, thus supporting H1 and H2.
Sig. of Gender p > .005thus failed to support
for H3.
5. Discussion, conclusion and limitations
Discussion and Implications
COL concept in this study, which was
applied for tourism, are still consistent with
previous researches that associated COL with
insurance (Eastman et al., 2002), computer
software (Hazeldine & Miles, 2010), and
product review websites (Bailey, 2005). The
findings also indicate that young people who
are highly susceptible to interpersonal
influence tend to share more tourism
information on SNS than less susceptible
consumers. This finding is consistent with
previous studies that linked CSII to review
Tourism Destinations Information Seeking And Dissemination Behaviors On Social...
47
of gender difference in information seeking
and dissemination behaviors suggested that
both man and women attach equal importance
to social networking sites.
Because Facebook is becoming a new
marketing tool for companies to enhance their
brand awareness, they need to adopt new
marketing policies and strategies that are
different from the traditional ones. Marketing
teams need to learn new communication
strategies about how to maintain and improve
long term relationships with existing
customers and also how to reach out to other
prospective customers (Gil-Or, 2010).
Mangold and Faulds (2009) proposed the
following to guide interactions in order to
have a positive impact on the organization:
(1) Create communities of people who
share interests.
This study has aimed to raise marketers’
awareness of young consumers. And to
market successfully to this generation,
marketers should realize where these young
consumers tend to spend their time and
money. The results of this study further
confirm that young people are heavily users of
Facebook. They seek and share tourism
information on SNS at moderate frequency.
Additionally, a small proportion of them show
very active information sharing behavior.
Hence tourism marketers must recognize and
exploit the power of SNS, especially
Facebook. Marketers should open new
channels on Facebook to reach this emerging
growth segment. For example, they might
build Facebook fan pages to connect with
tourists who used their services in the past and
post videos or promotions on SNS. The
benefits of marketing on Facebook are lower
communication costs, personalized and
directed advertising, immediate feedback
from customers, word-of-mouth referrals and
positive influence on consumer behavior.
Ertell (2010) believed that loyal
customers want to connect with businesses
through social media, but it is how businesses
interact with them once they get there that
foster greater loyalty and the likelihood to buy
in the future. He went on to state that 49% of
customers join to find out about special offers
or promotions, while 45% would like more
product information. Hence marketers should
give them product information they want
without sounding too much like salespersons.
Ireson (2010) also suggested the main reason
that Facebook marketing will work is because
the organization will enter a community and
engage as a friend to customers and that
Facebook itself is based around the premise of
friendship implying trust.
(2) Engage customers using social
networking tools such as blogs.
(3) Appeal to a range of customers by
combining marketing tools.
(4) Disseminate product information.
(5) Give customers a notion of exclusivity
regarding certain products.
(6) Create
products
that
make
customers converse with each other
and the organization.
(7) Appeal to the customer’s affinity
with causes.
(8) Create memories through storytelling.
(9) Think outside the square and
challenge extremes.
It also is critical to understand
consumers’ online information sharing
behavior. The results show that COL and CSII
applying to tourism sector can explain sharing
information behavior of young people on SNS.
Limitation and Future Research
Considering the exploratory nature of
this study, it contributes to a greater
appreciation of the importance of studying
young consumers. As is the case for most
exploratory studies, the generalizability of
these results is limited. The sample used for
this study consisted of young people in
Vietnam. This study was founded only on
customers from one nation, thus the study
48 Journal of Science Ho Chi Minh City Open University – No. 3(15) 2015 – August/2015
cannot be generalized to tourists from other
nations. Additional studies should recruit
more participants, spanning the entire range of
the notion and age. On the other hand, the
study ignored other elements that might
change the results such as region,
geographical location, social class, education
level and so on.
Data of this study is cross-sectional
data. The survey was conducted in 2014, one
specific point in time. Hence the results for
one time period are to be assumed valid at
some different point in time. In this study,
opinion leaders engage in information sharing.
The results can also provide guidance for
future studies that aim to better understand the
motives for sharing information and opinions
on SNS. For example, Facebook can be
considered as an example where consumers
boost their self-confidence through sharing
information. They constantly post in their
Facebook wall what they do, where they have
been, their desires and dislikes and more.
Trying to enhance self-confidence has been
found in this study as one of the major
motivations of opinion leadership.
respondents
cannot
answer
questions
Besides, future research may look at the
involving past events such as frequency of
uploading photos, sharing tourism information
on SNS with perfect accuracy. This either
magnifies or minimizes the effects of certain
variables, affecting the cross-sectional study’s
results.
This study centers on consumer
behavior and confirms the importance of
social media marketing. People seek and share
opinions online, just as they do offline, which
affects the sales of products and services
(Goldsmith and Horowitz, 2006). Therefore,
additional studies should examine social
media from a corporate angle. For example,
they might consider the return on investments
in social media. Such extended examinations
of social media marketing can offer additional
insights to increase understanding of this
growing area of interest in the restaurant
industry.
From tourism marketer view point,
enabling online or physical social sharing
environments where consumers can boost
their self confidence may help to diffuse the
information on a faster pace. However, it is
difficult for them to identify opinion leaders
and consider them as a market segment. In
order to target and influence opinion leaders
and to motivate positive word of mouth
communication, marketers need to understand
the motivations and circumstances why
innovative dimension in order to examine if
the motivations differ. Conflicts might exist
concerning the proximity of opinion leaders
with the people they influence. Some
participants stressed opinion leaders to be
similar to them in terms of values, beliefs, and
social status, but some others thought that
opinion leaders should have a different view
so that they will provide a different, richer
perspective. Hence future research should
investigate whether opinion leaders are
similar or not to the people they influence.
This study has only examined customer
behavior on SNS and tourist sector that are
significantly different when compared to other
contexts. It would be interesting to examine
the generalizability of the model and whether
the findings could be replicated to other
contexts and different types of businesses
other than the tourist industry. Future research
could exam other consumer behaviors on SNS
or information sharing behavior relating to
fashion, restaurant, vehicles and so on.
The structural model might be applied
to other sectors, rather than just tourism, to
validate the model and make further
refinements on the structural model to show
whether the findings of this study hold true or
not. Bearing in mind that the measures used in
the current study in the tourist context cannot
be adapted exactly to measure the constructs
Tourism Destinations Information Seeking And Dissemination Behaviors On Social...
49
of interest in another context, some constructs
would be irrelevant. Furthermore, some of the
results of this study were unexpected, e.g. the
gender differences were not supported in this
study but might be supported in other
contexts. Therefore, future research could
investigate this issue further.
This study was based on one nationality
of respondents. Therefore, the study cannot be
generalized to the whole population of
tourists, neither in Vietnam nor in other
countries. Future studies should be conducted
with respondents from other nationalities or
cultures to confirm whether the model still
provides the same results and to make further
improvements on the theoretical model.
Conclusion
the context of SNS. Opinion leaders tend to
seek and share more tourism information than
non-leaders. This study also adds to our
understanding of why young consumers share
information on SNS. The results show that
young people who are highly susceptible to
interpersonal influence tend to share more
tourism information on SNS than others.
Besides, the lack of gender difference in
information sharing behavior suggests that
both young man and woman attach equal
importance to SNS when it comes to tourism
information sharing behaviors. This study
focuses on consumer behaviors and confirms
the importance of social media marketing.
People seek and share opinions online, just as
they do offline, which affects the sales of
The research problem focuses on the
relationships between young people’s
behaviors and explores what are the
products and services (Goldsmith
&
Horowitz, 2006). Hence SNS does not replace
the traditional marketing tools but can be used
as a complement to existing traditional
promotional tools.
antecedents
of
tourism
destinations
information sharing behaviors of them within
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