Increasing Purchase Intention and Word-Of-Mouth through Hotel Brand Awareness

Abstract

Purpose – Mobile applications (apps) have been widely used in many industries as a method for companies to communicate with customers. The hotel industry is one of the top sectors that utilizes mobile apps. The majority of luxury hotels are updating themselves being a part of this new wave. The aim of this study was to investigate the impact of hotel brand awareness from hotel-branded mobile application towards WOM and purchase intention by the travelers based on the theory of consumption values. Design – A survey was administrated to 453 foreign travelers in Bangkok who used hotel-branded mobile apps in order to evaluate the accuracy and effectiveness of the conceptual model. Methodology – Structural equation modeling (SEM) was used for model estimation. Findings – The results revealed that hotel brand awareness acted as a mediator in the relationship between the attributes of mobile applications and travellers' consumer behaviour such as purchase intention and word of mouth. In order to raise brand awareness in mobile apps, it is essential to create value through the mobile apps, have proficient virtual interactivity, and reasonable rewards. Originality of the research – Only limited amount of the previous research is available attempting to identify insights into how the value proposition attributes of mobile apps could be better designed to deliver enhanced brand awareness.

Keywords

• word-of-mouth
• purchased intention
• brand awareness
• hotel-branded mobile application