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239638

How Do Social Media Influencers Affect Digital Natives 2.0 To Travel Inside Egypt? Integrating the Theory of Planned Behavior and Elaboration Likelihood Model

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Last updated: 22 Jan 2023

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Abstract

Understanding generational differences in tourist behaviors helps in predicting and realizing future tourism trends. The new tourism market will be dominated by Digital Natives who have high expectations for technology and a more customized travel experience. In this vein, positive online reviews, suggestions, and recommendations provided by social media influencers (SMIs) help improve tourists' perception of tourism services and destinations, strengthen brand image, drive tourists' behavioral change, and increase tourism services sales. This research is designed to investigate the influence of SMIs on travel behavioral intention among the Digital Natives 2.0, people born after 1990, in Egypt. Through integrating the Elaboration Likelihood Model of persuasion and Theory of Planned Behavior, the study investigates the influences of the central route, argument quality, and the peripheral route, attractiveness, and credibility, on the attitude towards tourism SMIs which further affects the behavioral intention of Digital Natives 2.0 to travel to destinations endorsed by SMIs. Besides, the influence of subjective norms and perceived behavior control on behavioral intention are examined. Data is collected from 391 respondents, and the PLS-SEM technique is utilized to test the study hypotheses. The results supported that argument quality, attractiveness, and credibility are fundamental factors shaping Digital Natives 2.0 attitude towards tourism SMIs. Significantly, these three factors together predict 77.4% of the variation in the attitude towards tourism SMIs. Moreover, the study's model predicts 45.3% of Digital Natives 2.0 behavioral intention to travel to destinations endorsed by SMIs in Egypt. This makes social media influencers highly relevant for this market segment's travel decision-making. This research suggests that Egypt's tourism public and private sectors cannot afford to ignore the SMIs as an effective marketing tool for influencing domestic tourists' behavioral intention, especially Digital Natives 2.0, who represent more than 30% of total social media users in Egypt. 

DOI

10.21608/ijthm.2022.239638

Keywords

Social media influencers, Domestic tourism, tourist behavior, Egypt

Authors

First Name

Ahmad

Last Name

Ragab

MiddleName

Muhammad

Affiliation

Faculty of Tourism and Hotels, Minia University, Egypt

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Volume

5

Article Issue

1

Related Issue

29738

Issue Date

2022-06-01

Receive Date

2022-01-25

Publish Date

2022-06-01

Page Start

75

Page End

105

Print ISSN

2535-2318

Online ISSN

2682-3632

Link

https://ijthm.journals.ekb.eg/article_239638.html

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https://ijthm.journals.ekb.eg/service?article_code=239638

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4

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Original Article

Type Code

824

Publication Type

Journal

Publication Title

International Journal of Tourism and Hospitality Management

Publication Link

https://ijthm.journals.ekb.eg/

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Article

Created At

22 Jan 2023