How millennials perceive leisure luxury hotels in a sharing economy?

The introduction of both the experience and sharing economies can potentially be seen to be the start of a new type of luxury accommodation, but is that really true? The generation best adapted to such changes, who are also the generation to shape the future is the millennials. However, the research literature does not seem to understand millennials’ expectations of what tangible and intangible variables are to be found in luxury accommodation. This conceptual paper will attempt to fill this gap, taking a critical look at the future of the leisure luxury accommodation industry.Keywords: experience economy, leisure travel, luxury hotels, millennials, sharing econom

An Exploratory Research to Formulate the Web-Customer Satisfaction in terms of Digital Business Model

Internet has provided a freeway to organizations from traditional business model to e-commerce to market, advertize, and commerce around the globe. The increasing Internet penetration rates have transformed the e-commerce business model to digital business model, also called eBusiness. It is found that web-customers and their behavioral patterns often differ from customers with traditional purchasing behavior. In the present Internet generation, organizations may need to go beyond website performance in order to build their overall customer satisfaction. In the hospitality and tourism industry, organizations need to create value and build relationships with its customers that go beyond e-commerce. Considering the recent developments in this digital business model, the objective of this study is to conduct an exploratory research that depicts the variables that may have significant influence on the web-customer satisfaction. This study aims to conduct an exploratory research through literature search for formulating the model for web-customer satisfaction

Does Embedding Social Media Channels in Hotel Websites Influence Travelers' Satisfaction and Purchase Intentions?

In the Internet world today, social media channels have emerged as a top share of Internet usage, and more travelers have started using them to make their hotel plans and purchases. Because of the recommendations of researchers and practitioners, hotel organizations have already embraced social media and have embedded their links on their host websites. Still, research is lacking concerning how embedded social media channels influence traveler satisfaction and their purchase intentions in the hotel industry. The main purpose of this study was to examine the differences between travelers that use social media channels and those who don't use them. In addition, this study examined how social media channels influences gratification factors, traveler satisfaction, and purchase intentions. A post-test only experimental design was conducted by using two, almost-identical hotel websites, which were created just for this study. A total of 378 responses were analyzed using multivariate analysis of variance and path analysis of structural equation modeling.The results of this study revealed that embedded social media channels on the hotel website moderately increased travelers' perceived social interaction. Regarding the effects of experimental modifications of the website, the results indicated that the two outcome variables--traveler satisfaction and purchase intentions--were not directly influenced, although there was a marginal indirect influence of embedded social media channels on travelers' satisfaction, through perceived social interaction. There was no significant difference in perceived informativeness and perceived enjoyment for travelers who used website with embedded social media channels, compared to the website that didn't have them. The perceived enjoyment of the hotel website statistically predicted an increase in traveler satisfaction and purchase intentions. The perceived informativeness of the hotel website strongly influenced traveler satisfaction. Traveler satisfaction was identified as a strong mediator between gratification factors and purchase intentions. Meanwhile, the perceived informativeness, enjoyment, and social interaction of the host website play a major role in travelers' satisfaction during their initial visit to the host website.School of Hotel and Restaurant Administratio

To Investigate the Usage of Social Networking Sites as a Career Enhancement Tool among Generation Y: An Empirical Research

Social Networking Sites (SNSs) have turned out to be the major platform for communications by becoming the “most trafficked” websites. SNSs provide user-friendly personalized services with various functionalities and networking applications to control the way information is shared. These SNSs have embedded integrated platform that facilitates users to integrate their profiles with social networks and obtain access to users in that network. This facility enabled business organizations to employ SNSs for finding the right potential employees in this user market. While studies have conducted in the past on how these SNSs are changing the consumer behavior, little is known on whether users utilize them to enhance their careers. The purpose of this research is to investigate the usage of Social Networking Sites as a career enhancement tool (CET) among Generation Y. This paper will also analyze the attitudes and intentions of Generation Y in using SNSs as a CET

Asset and Inventory Management in the Hotel Industry using RFID technology: An Experimental Study with Economic Analysis

The ability to provide a cost-effective solution to improve hotel organizations efficiency through inventory management has made RFID technology one of today’s most potential deployment technologies. Hotel organizations are invariably competing in assuring the service quality and are facing many challenges in terms of inventory management that directly impacts the overall customer satisfaction. The purpose of this study is to conduct an experimental research to investigate if RFID technologies can offer efficient and effective solution to manage asset and inventory in the hotel organizations. An experimental research was conducted by implementing RFID tags on assets and inventories and tracking those using receivers in a boutique hotel. A framework to install identification tags, touch points and RFID system was suggested. This study also examined the costs, maintenance and ROI (Return on Investment) of using RFID system for two years by doing an Economic Analysis and comparing with the traditional barcode systems