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The purpose of this paper is to know which hotels mostly rely on Booking.com, investigating the level of presence on Booking.com around the world by country, hotel size, hotel category and managerial form. Neither the company nor the hotels provide this information, so the authors use the number of reviews as an indicator of estimated sales.

Data from 33,996 hotels worldwide are downloaded from Booking.com using a Web browser automatically controlled, developed in Python, that simulated a user navigation (clicks and selections). The comparison between independent hotels and hotels belonging to a chain is performed by a Student’s t distribution test and the comparison of hotel categories and hotel size is analyzed by a one-way ANOVA test.

The results show that three factors clearly influence the usage level of Booking.com: independent vs chain hotels, small vs large hotels and low vs high category hotels worldwide. The authors also observe that hotels from Europe are the ones that rely more on Booking.com.

The originality of this research is to identify the factors that make hotels to have a greater (lesser) dependence on Booking.com within each destination and geographical area. Moreover, the use of big data from hotels worldwide allows the authors to know the level of use of Booking.com in dozens of countries, especially those with the highest tourist activity. This work expands the capabilities of big data in the hospitality industry research, and with a simple ratio, this study counteracts the lack of public data on hotel sales through Booking.com. This new approach could be extended to the analysis of other online travel agencies (OTAs), which use similar review systems.

In September 2019, Booking.com changed from the smiley-based scoring system (2.5–10) to the purely 10-point evaluation system (1–10). The smiley-based service evaluation is based on the multi-dimensional (M-D) system, whereas the purely 10-point service evaluation is based on the single-dimensional (S-D) system. This paper aims to focus on how a change in review posting policies impacts service evaluations regarding review generation and distribution.

The authors exploit the natural experiment using Booking.com when the site changed its scoring system from a multidimensional smiley-based service evaluation system to an S-D scoring system. The authors collected online reviews posted on two travel agencies (Booking.com and Priceline.com) between September 2019 and October 2020. A quasi-experimental approach, Difference-in-Differences, was used to isolate the impacts of the new scoring system from the impacts of the change in the service evaluation environment, i.e. COVID-19.

The change in the scoring system considerably alters review distributions by decreasing the portion of positive reviews but increasing the portion of highly positive reviews. Using the theory of emotion work (Hochschild, 1979, 2001), DID is also the reason that the former M-D smiley-based system could have underrated, highly positive reviews of services. Using the information transfer theory (Belkin, 1984), the authors reason the asymmetric transfer of information when users consume reviews from the older (M-D) system but are required to generate reviews on a newer (S-D) system.

The findings would provide online review platform management with a deeper understanding of the consequences of changes in service evaluations when the scoring system is changed.

Though the change in the scoring system would affect how customers evaluate the services of hotels, the causal impacts of switching to the new S-D scoring system have not yet been thoroughly covered by prior hospitality and service evaluation literature, which this research aspires to do.

Studies show that internet has become a major force propelling growth in tourism sector in many countries. An appropriate diffusion of the information and communication technology (ICT) services can facilitate visibility of hotels and lodges on search sites and third-party booking websites and thus influence demand. It also helps leverage the use of social media for promotion and customer acquisition purposes. Recently, Myanmar, with impressive historical world heritage sites, is witnessing a tourist boom; more hotels are opening up and achieving competitive advantage by offering free internet connectivity to guests and locating their premises in the vicinity of an ICT infrastructure. The purpose of this paper is to investigate ICT readiness to support the lodging industry in Myanmar by focusing on one sub-index of the Network Readiness Index (NRI, a term heavily used by World Economic Forum). The paper focuses on the “Network Use” component of NRI, pertaining to the effect of the “quality of the Internet connection” available to lodges, and its association with the following dimensions: customer service: the availability of ICT services to guests, such as internet connectivity and availability of ATM in the vicinity; digital marketing: the use of social media, keeping records of guests and analyzing aggregate data to extract business insights; and business-to-business online booking: the use of online booking via major third-party intermediary websites like Expedia, Booking.com and Agoda.com.

Surveys were conducted in three major touristic cities in Myanmar: Bagan, Mandalay and the capital city, Nay Pyi Taw. A total of 101 valid questionnaires were used. Survey questions were centered around the following themes: internet connection problems, digital marketing activities, and online booking directly or via third party digital intermediary. The data are presented and interpreted by descriptive statistics and regression analysis.

Though, Myanmar is new to internet and commercial use of ICT, the awareness of the importance of leveraging social media and online booking for business development is surprisingly high in the lodging sector. On average, about 80 percent of surveyed hotels are present on the WWW through a dedicated hotel website. However, most websites lack an online booking capability. As a result, and due to a global trend, online booking through third-party intermediaries has become the dominant option for hotel booking arrangements in Myanmar. Agoda, founded in Bangkok in 2002, was found to be the number one choice for online booking intermediary in Myanmar, followed by Booking.com. Analysis of the logistic regression revealed that it was highly likely that areas around ATMs have better internet connectivity. As expected, it was also found that it is very unlikely that hotels reporting a problem in internet connectivity will be able to provide internet service to their guests. Despite the presence of problems in internet connectivity in Mandalay and Bagan cities, located away from the capital; most hotels in these cities resort to leveraging social media for promotion and customer/guest development. The analysis also revealed that cities located away from the capital are more aggressive in leverage online third-booking intermediaries.

While researchers were hoping for a higher participation rate in the survey, especially in the city of Mandalay, data collection was challenging, a number of hotels/lodges denied participation. This may have some implications on the generalization of results. However, over 70 and 45 percent of hotels/lodges in the capital city and the ancient city of Bagan, respectively, had participated in the survey.

Tourism has a great potential for growth in Myanmar. This research recommends ways to achieve and sustain competitive advantage for the lodging sector, which is vital for tourism.

Though a considerable research exists on tourism and the recent advances of the ICT sector in Myanmar, the country’s readiness for the actual usage of the internet for the development of tourism has not been specifically addressed. This paper explores this with compelling research findings useful for policy makers as well as players in the tourism sector.

The primary purpose of this study was to examine the underlying consumer values that drive hotel booking mobile app users to engage more with the app and use the app continuously for hotel booking purposes.

By conducting confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) and structural equation modeling (SEM) on the data collected through the Qualtrics online survey platform from 506 respondents in the United States, the proposed measurements and structural models were tested.

The findings for both Generation Xers and Millennials revealed that hedonic and social values influenced mobile app engagement, which strongly influenced mobile app loyalty. Thus, to enhance customer engagement and indirectly influence mobile app loyalty, the app value delivery should appeal to social and hedonic values. Although the utilitarian values for using apps had a potential direct impact on mobile app loyalty, the mediation analysis showed that mobile app engagement, when connecting consumption values to mobile app loyalty, served as a full mediator for Generation Xers and a partial mediator for Millennials.

This study provides insights into how hotels and online travel agent (OTA) marketing managers may consider augmenting user engagement with hotel booking mobile apps. This study suggests that hoteliers and OTAs should further develop their user experience efforts to enhance the utilitarian features of their mobile app to increase revenue from repeat purchases. Additionally, this study provides implications for enhancing the hedonic and social features of hotel booking mobile apps to appeal to Millennials and Gen Xers.

This study developed and assessed an integrated model to investigate the relationships between consumption values, engagement and loyalty in hotel booking mobile apps. Furthermore, it examined generational cohorts' role in the relationships between these constructs.

The purpose of this study is to propose a definition and model of social sustainability within the ambit of systems theory and to test it on hospitality e-distributors. The study suggests that social sustainability arises through the congruence among the interrelated components of social innovation, societal demand and social stakeholders in a transformation model and it can be assessed to whether and how this congruence addresses to the equity principles.

The study provides a case analysis on two selected hospitality e-distributors – Booking.com and Airbnb. The data obtained from a video-based content on managerial interviews were triangulated with the data of corporate disclosures and expert views derived from a focus group study.

The study reveals that both companies affect the intra-generational, procedural and geographical equity principles across physical and virtual communities so long as they take the advantage of their strategic positions. While Booking.com transforms its own industry, Airbnb disrupts the entire system by blurring the boundaries between market and non-market as well as touristic and non-touristic areas.

The study contributes to the practitioners by showing how to configure and assess the social sustainability of their organizations at the different contexts.

The study provides a holistic perspective on social sustainability by linking the concept with social innovation, societal demand and social stakeholders and highlighting its contribution to equity principles.

Despite the proliferation of studies, the authors have very little understanding on the social pillar of sustainability. The current study fills the gap by addressing these conceptualization and measurement challenges in the literature.

The purpose of this study is to investigate multichannel integration of hotels and online travel agencies (OTAs) and to compare consumer behavior between China and Indonesia in the context of online to offline (O2O) commerce. We examine how the services, brand and market share of OTAs influence behavioral intentions in both online and offline channels. SERVQUAL, theory of reasoned action and the halo effect are integrated to develop the research model.

To investigate Chinese and Indonesian customers' experiences and behavioral intention of OTAs and hotels, the customers who booked hotels using OTAs were invited to participate in the questionnaire survey. This study collected 336 and 305 data from China and Indonesia, respectively. A partial least squares structural equation modeling technique was used to test and compare the research hypotheses and model between China and Indonesia.

The results compare the similarities and differences of cross-country customer experiences and behavioral intentions of OTAs and hotels. The effect of website service quality on online satisfaction, the effect of online satisfaction on offline confirmation and the effects of offline confirmation and booking intention on patronage intention are significant and positive in both countries. Website service quality is positively associated with booking intention for Indonesia but not for China. The relationship between perceived size and booking intention is significant for China but not for Indonesia. The findings provide insights into the development of O2O commerce for global markets and multichannel strategies between OTAs and hotels.

With the development of O2O commerce, increasingly more hoteliers are opening up online and offline sales channels by cooperating with OTAs. Although several cross-country studies have investigated consumer behavior or behavioral intentions, behavioral settings are based on online or offline channels rather than the integration of both channels. Although some research has studied the integration or competition of OTAs and hotels, none of these studies have investigated the issues from the perspective of country comparison. This study provides the understanding of how customers in different countries and with different backgrounds react to the same e-commerce development, especially the cooperation of OTA and hotels.

The purpose of this study is to provide an insight on how hospitality companies engage with the sustainable development goals (SDGs) and whether their corporate social responsibilities declaration and actions could achieve the targets of the SDGs by 2030 as they relate to their respective companies.

This study provides a case study analysis of three selected hospitality companies – Marriott International, Booking Holdings and The Soneva Group. The data for the study were obtained from secondary resources such as the companies’ publications and websites. It uses the module of sustainability challenges and the monitoring framework provided in the global sustainable development report 2019.

All the companies examined in this study are investing significant effort and resources to achieve the goals. They are focussing mainly on actions related to challenges that present high to medium levels of socio-political agreement and factual certainty. Though significant progress has been made towards achieving social and economic goals, there is still a large gap in relation to environmental goals. The efforts made solely by the hospitality companies to achieve the targets of Goal 13 are not enough, as hospitality companies cannot achieve these targets on their own. More actions and contributions from governmental and international agencies will be required.

This paper contributes to an understanding of the role that the SDGs play in the hospitality industry and how companies should engage and interact with the goals. Further research might be needed to analyse the financial implications of the SDGs in relation to the companies’ efforts and their respective investment contributions.

The study aims to investigate how hotel booking attributes (i.e. perceived privacy, perceived certification and perceived assurance) engender consumers’ untrust and consequent behavioral intentions (i.e. altruistic behavior and trusting intentions). It also unveils the role of hotel attributes performance as a moderator between hotel booking attributes and consumers’ untrust.

Data were collected through an online platform by engaging 454 Chinese respondents. SPSS 25.0 and AMOS 24.0 (structural equation modeling) were used for data analysis and interpretation.

Results demonstrate that hotel booking attributes positively substantiate consumers’ untrust which, in turn, develops altruistic behavior and negative trusting intentions. Moreover, hotel attribute experience significantly moderates the relationships between perceived privacy, perceived certification and consumers’ untrust. Notably, hotel attribute performance insignificantly influences the association between perceived assurance and untrust.

This study used the Chinese context and examined Chinese domestic travelers and the nonbranded hotel industry. Notwithstanding its limitations, the findings help hospitality and tourism firms, en bloc, to manage their review websites by explicitly disclosing policies regarding customers’ privacy and assurance, winning their trust through third-party certification and employing data scientists to develop algorithms to sieve fake information proactively.

This study develops an original conceptual framework by using the untrust model in this research. Our findings add to the research on consumer behavior, information processing, service management and trust and suggest practical implications for hospitality firms.

This paper aims to define and demonstrate the importance of crowdsourcing for the improvement of diverse functions of hotels, the advantages and disadvantages of this technique and, specifically, the relevance of crowdvoting for enhancing hotel sales, and diverse hotel performance dimensions.

A total of 45,103 opinions from Booking.com, a sample of 184 questionnaires addressed to hotel managers and partial least squares (PLS)-path modeling were combined to contrast the hypotheses.

The results empirically show the direct and positive impact of the opinions of the crowd on the amount of hotel sales that do not depend on physical intermediaries, and the impact that this has on the performance dimensions of hotels.

The paper shows the relevance of following strategies addressed at increasing the customers’ recommendations in the main social media or virtual travel agencies, as a mechanism to reduce tourism and hospitality organizations’ traditional weaknesses and increase their long-term performance.

The novelty of crowdsourcing, means that few works (although with an explosive increase and with high impact) have focused on this aspect in the literature, especially in the tourism and hospitality literature. The results of our research open new areas of research and contrast the relevance of crowdsourcing and specifically crowdvoting for the success of hotels. In addition, the methodology employed, by mixing the data from a social media, with a questionnaire addressed to managers, can open new ideas for future works.

The study aims to assess how corporate branding affects firm performance in the context of the Oman hotel industry, listed on the Muscat Stock Exchange (MSX).

This study approach was made by way of a mixed method. First, it examines qualitative and exploratory information collected from companies’ internet sites, audited annual reports (the financial year 2019) published in MSX, web searches and websites of companies and travel agencies from all the eight listed hotel companies in the MSX to examine the impact of corporate branding on firm performance proxied by return of assets (ROA) and return of equity (ROE) and secondly, it assesses the measurement and structural models by applying partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM).

The findings recommend that well-thought-out web marketing on corporate branding by hotel companies leads to firm performance. The findings indicate that corporate branding on travel agency websites and a company’s own website can help businesses become more profitable. In addition, there is a synergistic connection on corporate branding of the hotel industry, including the presentation of a novel hotel narrative, the conception of a cornerstone loyalty program, the demonstration of excellence in hospitality and service, information on timely amenities like Covid-19 safety measures and the use of technology and experiential elements through platforms like the company website or the website of the travel agent all essential to achieve firm financial performance. As per the importance–performance matrix map, websites of travel agents (agoda.com, booking.com and hotels.com) had the importance (agoda.com 0.616, booking.com 0.959 and hotels.com 1.036) to impact companies’ corporate branding and firm performance, whereas Google search shows a value of −1.954, which has no impact on companies’ corporate branding.

The study considered only one hotel/tourism industry to know the effect of corporate branding on firm performance. Further studies may be chosen on other industries needed to allow for generalization.

This study aims to provide insights into how the hotel industry can make use of corporate branding through the company website, Google sites and websites of companies’ travel agency by providing timely updated promotion, facilities, quality services and hygiene matters to enhance firm performance.

This study provides empirical evidence to find various factors of corporate branding of the hotel industry’s firm performance. In addition, the study offers valuable insight into the nonmonetary measures of achievements.