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The purpose of this study is to analyze the influence of booking website (hotel or third-party) characteristics and hotel star-rating classification, as signals of quality, on travelers’ relationships with hotels or hotel chains, taking into account the moderating effect of travelers’ tendencies to seek variety.

To test the hypothesized relationships, structural equation modeling was performed. A multi-group analysis was also conducted to test the moderating effect of travelers’ variety seeking.

Both booking website quality and star rating improve customer satisfaction with specific experiences at hotels and behavioral intentions toward hotels. The results also show that travelers’ variety-seeking levels (low/high) exert a moderating effect on their overall relationships with hotels, and quality signals are more relevant for those who are less inclined to seek variety in their travel experiences.

This paper analyzes the importance of quality signals on travelers’ relationships with hotels in an electronic shopping environment. Furthermore, the influence of travelers’ variety-seeking in the hotel sector in particular is studied. For hotel managers, a better knowledge of this personality trait can help to apply successful segmentation strategies.

Este estudio analiza la influencia de las características del sitio web de reserva -web propia del hotel o de un tercero- y del número de estrellas del hotel, como señales de calidad, en la relación del cliente con el hotel o cadena, teniendo en cuenta el efecto moderador de la tendencia del viajero a buscar variedad.

Para probar las hipótesis, se llevó a cabo un modelo de ecuaciones estructurales (SEM). También se realizó un análisis multi-grupo para probar el efecto moderador de la búsqueda de variedad del viajero.

Tanto la calidad del sitio web de reserva como las estrellas favorecen la satisfacción del cliente con la experiencia concreta en el hotel y, finalmente, las intenciones de comportamiento hacia el hotel. Además, el análisis muestra que el nivel de búsqueda de variedad del viajero (bajo/alto) ejerce un efecto moderador en su relación global con el hotel y que las señales parecen ser más relevantes para los individuos con menor tendencia a buscar variedad en sus experiencias de viaje.

Este trabajo analiza la importancia de las señales de calidad en la relación de los viajeros con los hoteles en un entorno de compra electrónica. Además, se estudia la influencia de la búsqueda de variedad de los viajeros en el sector hotelero en particular. Un mejor conocimiento de este rasgo de la personalidad puede ayudar a los gerentes de hotel a aplicar estrategias de segmentación exitosas.

摘要

本研究的目的是分析作为品质判断因素的预订网站(酒店或第三方)特征和酒店星级评分分类对游客与酒店或连锁酒店关系的影响，并考虑游客寻求多样性倾向的调节作用。

为了检验假设的关系，我们进行了结构方程建模。本研究还采用多组分析的方法来检验旅客的多样性寻求的调节作用。

预订网站的质量和星级评分都可以提高客户对酒店具体体验的满意度和对酒店的行为意向。结果还表明，游客的多样性寻求水平(低/高)对他们与酒店的整体关系具有调节作用，而质量因素对那些不太倾向于在旅行体验中寻求多样性的人更相关。

本文分析了在电子购物环境下，品质因素对游客与酒店关系的重要性。此外，本文还特别研究了游客的多样性寻求对酒店行业的影响。对于酒店管理者来说，更好地了解这一个性特征有助于成功地应用细分策略。

Different from manufacturing resources allocation problems, the prices and amounts of limited public service resources could not be changed with the consumers’ requirements and social fairness is the most important objective for improving allocation efficiency. To measure social fairness reasonably, the purpose of this paper is fourfold: first, divide social fairness into longitudinal comparative fairness and crosswise comparative fairness, therefore providing their calculation formula and describing the comprehensive fair degree by using the interval numbers. Second, the comparison regulations of interval numbers are given and the corresponding features are also described. Third, an extension of VIKOR method is put forward for evaluating social fairness of different allocation alternatives with interval numbers. Finally, a numerical example illustrates the proposed method and clarifies the main results developed in the paper.

In this paper, the author depicts the social fair degree as an interval number, and thus proposes the comparison method between any two interval numbers. Based on the basis procedure of the VIKOR method, the paper proposes an extension of the fuzzy VIKOR method with the interval numbers to rank and select the compromise allocation alternatives. Finally, a numerical example illustrates the practicability of the proposed method.

The comparison of interval numbers is very important when the author evaluates the decision alternatives. Through analyzing the present comparison methods, the paper proposes the simple method of comparing the interval numbers, which can obtain the same results with the above two methods. The fuzzy VIKOR method, a popular multi-criteria decision-making method, focusses on ranking and selecting from a set of alternatives in a fuzzy environment. For the fuzzy value, the paper also proposes the extension of the VIKOR method to perform an evaluation and get the compromise alternatives.

According to the huge customers’ requirement, how to improve their social fair degree has become the focus in public service resources allocation, where the social fair degree may be a comprehensive concept which includes the fair degree compared with all the other allocation alternatives and the fair degree compared with the other small group under the same allocation alternative. In the paper, the author defines the above two types of fair degree and then depicts the comprehensive fair degree as their integration, which will be interval numbers.

The COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in significant changes in tourists’ attitudes and behaviors mostly as a result of confinement-related problems. Although various studies have been conducted to analyze customers’ perceptions of service quality and satisfaction using a drop-off/pick-up method, the influence of COVID-19 on customers’ perceptions of service quality and satisfaction has not been examined using online reviews. It is critical to evaluate satisfaction aspects from user-generated content to ascertain their preferences for hotel services during the pandemic. This research aims to explore the viewpoint shared online by hotel tourists, as well as identify which service practice is associated with higher and lower satisfaction during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The purpose of this study is to investigate the needs of potential end-users of a database dedicated to Swedish lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, and intersex (LGBTQI) literature (e.g. prose, poetry, drama, graphic novels/comics, and illustrated books), in order to inform the development of a database, search interface functionalities, and an LGBTQI thesaurus for fiction.

A web questionnaire was distributed in autumn 2021 to potential end-users. The questions covered people's reasons for reading LGBTQI fiction, ways of finding LGBTQI fiction, experience of searching for LGBTQI fiction, usual search elements applied, latest search for LGBTQI fiction, desired subjects to search for, and ideal search functionalities.

The 101 completed questionnaires showed that most respondents found relevant literature through social media or friends and that most obtained copies of literature from a library. Regarding desirable search functionalities, most respondents would like to see suggestions for related terms to support broader search results (i.e. higher recall). Many also wanted search support that would enable retrieving more specific results based on narrower terms when too many results are retrieved (i.e. higher precision). Over half would also appreciate the option to browse by hierarchically arranged subjects.

This study is the first to show how readers of LGBTQI fiction in Sweden search for and obtain relevant literature. The authors have identified end-user needs that can inform the development of a new database and a thesaurus dedicated to LGBTQI fiction.

Over the past two decades, online booking has become a predominant distribution channel of tourism products. As online sales have become more important, understanding booking conversion behavior remains a critical topic in the tourism industry. The purpose of this study is to model airline search and booking activities of anonymous visitors.

This study proposes a stochastic approach to explicitly model dynamics of airline customers’ search, revisit and booking activities. A Markov chain model simultaneously captures transition probabilities and the timing of search, revisit and booking decisions. The suggested model is demonstrated on clickstream data from an airline booking website.

Empirical results show that low prices (captured as discount rates) lead to not only booking propensities but also overall stickiness to a website, increasing search and revisit probabilities. From the decision timing of search and revisit activities, the author observes customers’ learning effect on browsing time and heterogeneous intentions of website visits.

This study presents both theoretical and managerial implications of online search and booking behavior for airline and tourism marketing. The dynamic Markov chain model provides a systematic framework to predict online search, revisit and booking conversion and the time of the online activities.

The purpose of this paper is to shed light on the remarkable trend of multisided platforms (MSPs) in the travel industry with the help of which travel agencies (TAs) and global distribution systems (GDSs) can reinforce their intermediary roles. Orthodox TAs face the threats of disintermediation because of the ever faster-changing developments in information and communication technologies, such as the emergence of metasearch engines, online travel agencies, direct bookings on airline websites and the widespread of mobile applications for travel related bookings. GDSs face similar threats of disintermediation from low-cost carriers and legacy carriers, as these carriers promote and encourage direct bookings via their official websites or via the new distribution capability.

This is a casestudy-oriented research, and the case selected is a MSP based in Turkey. The data are gathered using semi-structured interviews conducted from 15 international representatives of this MSP in different countries. Interviews were conducted either physically at the MSP’s headquarters in Antalya, Turkey, or virtually using Zoom application from January to October 2019.

The paper portrays the significance of MSPs in terms of their contributions toward the reintermediation of the two important intermediaries, namely, TAs and GDSs in the travel industry supply chain. Both of them are prone to the dangers of disintermediation because of the developments in technology, networking and communication channels; the worldwide accessibility of the stakeholders to the internet; and the direct reach of suppliers to consumers. The deteriorating role of TAs and GDSs is reignited by the successful launch, deployment and adoption of MSPs in the ecosystem of the travel industry.

This paper offers an insight into the prevailing trend of MSPs in business to business (B2B) trading from the perspective of two main intermediaries, TAs and GDSs, in the supply chain of the travel industry. The paper in a novel way compiles the data from the interviews to shed light on the adoption of MSPs by intermediaries in their business models to reintermediate themselves because the sole reliance of intermediaries on orthodox business models is pushing them on to the verge of disintermediation.

The main purpose of this study is to investigate what affects a customer's decision to use the hotel smartphone applications when he/she makes a room reservation.

A total of 266 usable data was collected through an online survey. The research model was tested using confirmatory factor analyses and structural equation modeling.

This study revealed that perceived usefulness, perceived credibility, perceived equipment risk, and perceived change risk affected customers' intention to book a hotel room using hotel smartphone apps. Perceived ease of use did not have a significant effect on behavioral intention.

This study extended TAM and the existing literature of mobile technology in the lodging industry. This article explored both existing variables and new variables in studying customers' intention to use hotel smartphone apps when booking a hotel room.

This paper examines the process optimization method of the online sales model of information product demand concerning the spillover effect. It illustrates the spillover effect (SE) of online product demand compared with traditional market demand. Also, optimized the SE for the ethical and ordinary consumer.

This article primarily focused on two types of models for online marketing: one is wholesales, and another is the agency. Firstly, the wholesale and agency models without SE and the wholesale and agency models with SE are constructed, respectively, to realize the SE in different sales models. Secondly, online channel participants' optimal price, demand and profit under variant conditions are compared and analyzed. Finally, efficient supply chain theory is optimized for the decision-making of online marketing consumers using an equation-based comparative analysis method.

The study found that when SEs are not considered, stronger piracy regulation makes online channel participants more beneficial. When the positive SE is strong, it is detrimental to manufacturers. When SEs are not considered, online channel participants only reach Pareto in agency mode. Pareto optimality can be achieved in wholesale and agency modes when SEs are considered.

The research has practical implications for an effective supply chain model for online marketing. This is the first algorithm-based comparative study concerning theoretical spillover effect analysis in supply chain management.

Many countries today, especially in Europe, provide publicly funded public services in quasi-markets. As these markets commercialize, agencies of various types are providing technologies that support citizens’ choice of services. Citizens’ use of technologies for service provision is studied as e-government under labels of channel management, e-service uptake or adoption. In contrast, by using actor–network theory (ANT), the purpose of this paper is to focus on the marketing devices that are used to enroll citizens to choose technologies in a context with large penetration of quasi-market arrangements.

Based on a Swedish case study, this paper uses qualitative data from 11 occurrences of technologies to support citizens’ choice (“market devices”) in education, healthcare and public pension in an analysis of the means taken (“marketing devices”) to increase their use. The study formulates a tentative typology of these devices.

The marketing devices are intended to attract citizens’ attention to the possibility of choice (e.g. catalogs, postcards and commercials), invite interaction (e.g. various social media platforms), improve the technological support in line with user needs (e.g. user participation in development), increase visibility of technological support (e.g. search optimization) or directly connect citizens to technological support (e.g. via links).

The paper contributes to e-government research through a typology of means taken to increase citizens’ technology use based on selected concepts from ANT, and to a discussion of technologies and humans.

The purpose of this paper is to identify key aspects of business model development for sustainable apparel consumption, as actors show an increasing interest in product‒service systems. This purpose should be seen from a retailers’ perspective so as to develop sustainable solutions for long-term survival in the apparel industry when meeting consumer preferences for fashion as well as an increasing interest in consuming less. Further, this is from a perspective in an economy where sharing and circularity are potential drivers for changing consumer patterns.

The study is based on the apparel retailer Houdini Sportswear and its business model development from a traditional model of selling sportswear to a more future-oriented model where sustainability is more salient. The data for analysis were collected through interviews with employees within the studied company. The interviews have been guided by overarching themes covering relevant areas of interest for this study.

Overall, the paper shows how sustainability can be included in strategic development, from product idea, product development, production and sales/rental to repair, reuse and finally recycling. The paper also highlights potential obstacles in a developed business model with increased sustainability, including technological platforms, distribution networks for collecting and returning products and consumer consumption preferences. There are a few intertwined factors to be considered on different societal levels to achieve long-term success.

This study contributes an increased understanding of how more sustainable solutions can be included when developing business models. While the manufacture, distribution and consumption of clothes have an impact on the environment, some retailers and producers want to reduce this environmental impact. One alternative is to change the way clothes are consumed, to include more sharing and circularity.