The electronic word of mouth as a context variable in the hotel management decision-making process

Abstract

The tourism literature claims more research regarding the electronic word-of-mouth (eWOM) impacts management, as well as the application of multidisciplinary theories, specifically in hotels. In order to fill this gap, and taking advantage of the Behavioural Reasoned Theory (BRT), this research proposes and validates a model of the decision-making process of hotel managers about accepting and implementing of eWOM as a management tool. The aim is to explain this decision-making process by stages, considering eWOM characteristics as a context variable and the hotel performance as dependent variable moreover the intentions of future behaviour. A survey addressed to hotel decision-makers in Spain is used as the source of information. Applying Structural Equations Models, the results confirm the eWOM context variable as essential to obtain a better hotel performance through the motives of decision-makers, as well as these improvements do not influence the future behaviour. Therefore, the hotels must implement the eWOM management, supported by a strategic plan and trained staff.