The Effect of Social Media Marketing on Customer Relationships

Romina Cheraghalizadeh

Doctoral thesis

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Abstract:

Customer behavior is crucial to a company's sustainability, and social media platforms are necessary for acquiring and retaining customers. Despite the relevance of these antecedents, limited studies in the hotel industry literature have looked at the effects of social media marketing on hotel outcomes. The current study uses the "Social Exchange Theory" the "Uses and Gratifications Theory" and "Theory of Communication" to understand the impact of social media marketing on hotel customer behavior. Therefore, the main objective of this study is to empirically evaluate whether there is a positive effect of social media in the formation of relationships with hotel customers in the Czech Republic (CZ). While most hospitality marketing research has focused the relationship between various marketing actions and different dimensions of research examining customer relationships as a multi-dimensional construct, this study used six variables proposed by Hyun and Perdue (2017) to examine customer relationships. Engagement, motivation, commitment, cross-buying, word of mouth, and defection are the six factors. Data for this study was obtained in two ways: from hotel customers and hotel managers. First, four and five-star hotel clients were triggered by application of questionnaire for data collection. To test the hypothesized relationship correlation and regression tests were conducted in this research. Moreover, data of this study also collected data from hoteliers point of view of four and five-star hotels in the Czech Republic. For this, the methods used to collect the data was interview. The findings of this study revealed the significance of social media marketing in improving customer relationships in the hotels. The results have significant theoretical and managerial implications for the hotel business.

Abstract:

Customer behavior is crucial to a company's sustainability, and social media platforms are necessary for acquiring and retaining customers. Despite the relevance of these antecedents, limited studies in the hotel industry literature have looked at the effects of social media marketing on hotel outcomes. The current study uses the "Social Exchange Theory" the "Uses and Gratifications Theory" and "Theory of Communication" to understand the impact of social media marketing on hotel customer behavior. Therefore, the main objective of this study is to empirically evaluate whether there is a positive effect of social media in the formation of relationships with hotel customers in the Czech Republic (CZ). While most hospitality marketing research has focused the relationship between various marketing actions and different dimensions of research examining customer relationships as a multi-dimensional construct, this study used six variables proposed by Hyun and Perdue (2017) to examine customer relationships. Engagement, motivation, commitment, cross-buying, word of mouth, and defection are the six factors. Data for this study was obtained in two ways: from hotel customers and hotel managers. First, four and five-star hotel clients were triggered by application of questionnaire for data collection. To test the hypothesized relationship correlation and regression tests were conducted in this research. Moreover, data of this study also collected data from hoteliers point of view of four and five-star hotels in the Czech Republic. For this, the methods used to collect the data was interview. The findings of this study revealed the significance of social media marketing in improving customer relationships in the hotels. The results have significant theoretical and managerial implications for the hotel business.

Keywords

Commitment, Cross-buying, Defection, Engagement, Motivation, Social media marketing, Word of mouth

Language used: English

Date on which the thesis was submitted / produced: 16. 9. 2022

Thesis defence

• Supervisor: doc. PhDr. Ing. Jaroslava Dědková, Ph.D.

Technical University of Liberec

Faculty of Economics

Doctoral programme / field:
Economics and Management / Business Economics and Management