O impacto das críticas online na reputação das marcas hoteleiras

Beatriz Louro Miguéns Margarido (Student)

Student thesis: Master's Thesis

Abstract

The behaviour of consumers has been changing throughout the years, especially in the tourism industry, where reviews online – such as Booking or TripAdvisor just to name a few -, have been growing, in particular in the early stages of hotels brand´s reputation. Having all this in consideration, this investigation had the goal to verify the impact of online reviews in the reputation of hotel brands, using the Portuguese consumers opinion as a starting point. Based on the quantitative methodology carried out through the implementation of a survey, it was possible to verify based on a sample ( n=320) that the online reviews of others consumers about a specific product or service continue to be more and more important to decide in the tourism industry and that the feedback given by users of the digital platforms strongly impacts the choice of the surveyed consumers, a premise that aligns with the contributions of Park et al. (2007), Elwalda e Lu (2016), Schuckert et al. (2015), Tsiakali (2018), Baneriee et al. (2017) e Rasoolimanesh et al. (2019). On the other side, it was possible to consolidate the idea that a reputation of a hotel brand is a decisive factor for a Booking accommodation, ensuring alignment with the thoughts of Fombrum (1996), Forudi et al. (2017), Brown et al. (2006), Ogut e Onur Tas (2012), Gândara (2008), Chnag e Liu (2009) e Mayer (2015). To sum up, the data collected allowed to conclude that online reviews have a strong influence in the decisions of Portuguese consumers in their choice of hotel brands, as well as their impact on their reputation.