E-Tourism

Table of Contents
Introduction............................................................................................................................................ 1
Literature review ................................................................................................................................... 1
Case study ............................................................................................................................................ 7
The social media: findings and discussion ..................................................................................... 15
Mobile technology .............................................................................................................................. 17
Conclusion and recommendations .................................................................................................. 18
References .......................................................................................................................................... 19
Introduction
Social media is the most influential medium of communication in recent years. The
development of social media has been playing a crucial role on the hospitality
industry in United Kingdom as well as in the world. In this assignment the
developments of social media on hospitality industry will be discussed. This
assignment will mostly focus on the literature review and the case study. To do the
report, a London based small restaurant named Riding House Café has been
selected and the use of social media by the restaurant to carry on its regular
business functions in the hospitality sector.

Literature review
ICT and Website in Tourism and Hospitality Sector

Online reservation systems are one of the greatest implications of ICT on tourism
and hospitality sector. Major firms like Expedia, Thomas Cook, and medium and
small sized tourism and hospitality firms’ focus on ICT and Mazoor (2010) focused
on the importance on owning an official website. Malten Hall Country House Hotel
focused on the importance of website, and its design and evaluation for small
hospitality companies is another issue as the website makes the first impression.
Special offers, wide range of freebies can be offered on the website. The
compatibility of the website for various users and screen sizes also determine the
duration of visit in the website.

Internet and small hospitality companies: In tourism and hospitality sector

communication practices, facilitation of sales, marketing practices, etc. are affected
by the internet. Triphal Indian Cuisine stresses on the development of online based
businesses with the help of internet. The firm thus stressed on the use of internet
related technologies have contributed to the introduction of Electronic Point of Sale
(EPOS) and Payment Management System (PMS). Internet also contributed to the
reduction of operating cost, convenience for customers, and speed transaction.

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Development of the global distribution system (GDS) and computer reservation
system (CRS) has helped the tourism and hospitality sector to boom. Involvement of
multinational players like the hotel chains and airline companies has also facilitated
the development. ICT has facilitated the site development, marketing, operations,
customer services, and monitoring of the industry.

Tourism distribution channels: Tuten and Solomon (2013) claimed that tourism
distribution channels are the traditional and the sophisticated means of providing
tourism services to the respective users. One of the most traditional and common
distribution channels is following here:

Figure: Traditional tourism distribution channels

Source: Buhalis, 2003.

Different travel agents work as the intermediary to have an uninterrupted tourism.

This traditional distribution channel shows that the most common means of
networking and conveying information are the telephone, fax, and mail.

But with the advancement of the modern technology, according to Moutinho (2011),
the means of communication have changed. People use telephone as well as social
media for communication. The most common mean of communication and channel
of communication are through personalized website developed by the tourism firm.

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New technologies and tourism and hospitality industry: With the blessings of
immense development in technology, the tourism industry is also reaping the
benefits of the development. The centralized reservation system (CRS), time and
attendance software, automated phone services, etc. are the most common
technologies being used in the tourism and hospitality industry, Mihalic and Buhalic
(2013) focused.

The industry has been benefiting a lot from the recent development of those
technologies. The benefits that are being reap by the industry are saving times,
labour, controlling the quality, enhancing customer satisfaction, ensuring health and
safety, ensuring security, etc. The invention of new technology has made it easier for
the firms in the hospitality industry to reduce their marketing cost and by this way;
they have been able to concentrate more on enhancing the quality of the services.
As a result, the overall impact has been seen in the whole hospitality industry.

Social networking and hospitality sector: Social media websites are the most
used means of communication in recent years. Facebook, Twitter, Skype, LinkedIn,
Yelp, Bing, and other social media are determining the success of the tourism and
hospitality industry. Social networking is helping the tourism and hospitality industry
in many ways. These ways are following here:

Advertisement via friends: It is a most common means of advertisement. If the

services of a particular restaurant or hotel are satisfactory to a customer, it will act as
the word of mouth. Many firms have accounts in social media sites. The advertising
costs of the firm reduce significantly, Mihalic and Buhalic (2013) stressed on the
issue that if the advertisements can be done with friends. Word of mouth plays the
most crucial role in the tourism and hospitality industry. If the firms in the hospitality
management have been able to promote their brand value over the social networking
sites, then they will be able to draw mass attention of the customers.

Promotions: Different promotional services of firms are conveyed with the help of
social media channels. Pie Crust restaurant of London stress on the issue of social
media for their promotions. These promotions and special deals cost nothing for the
firm. Customer loyalty has been created with these free promotional activities. Social
networking sites are the most inexpensive means of promoting business strategies
to attract the mass customers. Again lots of promotional activities can be run through

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the social networking sites and they are the best way to introduce the new services
or products and through these social networking sites, the firms can get instant
review from the potential customers and customize the offerings according to the
reviews from the potential customers.

Customer service: To upgrade and personalize the customer service, firms

belonging to the hospitality industry are using the social media channels. By
rewarding the customers for linking to the social media channels, hotels and
restaurants are reaping the benefits of free advertising. Allora Restaurant of
London focused to providing lower cost foods and thus greater customer service.
Social networking sites enable the firms in the hospitality industry to provide 24/7
customer service and satisfy all the queries of the customers regarding the services
and products. With the help of the information technology, the firms in the hospitality
industry can promote their services and products to satisfy customers’ need.

Customer reviews: Customer review is the most significant contribution of social

media. Now people visit to those hotels which have higher grade given by the
customers visited there. Customer reviews are considered as the most important tool
to apologize, explain, and steps taken to address the problems. La Trompette
Restaurant, a medium sized restaurant in London from France, often focused to get
the customer reviews on the service provided. Thus social media helps to get rid of
problems running in the firms in the hospitality industry (Valacich and Schneider,
2013). The customer review options offered by the social networking sites help the
firms in the hospitality industry to understand what the customers think about their
services and products and then they can redesign their services and products
accordingly.

Social networking and search engine optimization for hospitality firms: Search
engine optimization is the process of affecting the visibility of a particular website to
the people. Social media directly affects the business’s search engine optimization
efforts and at the same time search engine influences the presence in the social
media. Search engines have begun to incorporate the social signals; likes from
Facebook, retweets from Twitter, etc.

Though search engine optimization is highly focused on content, website

architecture, and linking, in recent year social media has turned the focus on the

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identity, relationships, and content. Social media helps in amplifying the content
marketing efforts. Social media also have a larger and indirect impact on the overall
performance of search marketing efforts as social data is used to inform content
marketing strategies.

Valacich and Schneider (2013) stressed on the issue that keyword strategy is
another contribution of social media to the search engine optimization by which the
conversations in social media are accumulated to inform keyword strategy. Social
media helps determining what the customers want and where the preferences of the
customers belong.

Different social media and their application in the hospitality industry: There
are a lot of social networking sites that are used by firms belonging to the tourism
and hospitality industry. Most used sites are Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google
Plus +, Instagram, Vine, etc. The application of these social networking sites is
following here:

Facebook: Facebook is the most popular site for sharing the ideas, emotions,
feelings, etc. Facebook offers opening of pages for firms which can be liked by the
followers. The followers will get the notifications if the admins of the page change the
status, picture, etc. Mihalic and Buhalic (2013) states this is most common and most
popular means of communication and advertising for firms in the hospitality industry.
Almost all firms, from small to large, have Facebook pages which are frequently
updated. As it takes very little amount of cash outflow to make promotion and
customer service over the facebook pages, now a days, it has become one of the
most popular means of social networking sites. The facility to upload pictures and
videos in the facebook pages help the firms in the hospitality industry to promote
their services and products to the potential customers. Again they can get instant
reviews from the customers about the services and products that the firms are going
to introduce in the market. On the basis of the likes and comments, the authority can
restructure their business strategy accordingly.

Twitter: Twitter is another social networking site which is popular for micro
messages. This site also allows pictures to upload. “Retweeting” helps to spread out
the message to a large number of people. Firms belonging to the hospitality industry
use twitter to deliver their offers to the customers and followers. They also upload

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photos of their menus and recipes. Twitter is the most used social networking sites in
the information and communication technology. With the help of the twitter, it is
easier to create buzz in the social networking area.

Vine and YouTube: Vine is a popular site for watching videos so as the YouTube.
The two social sites are open to all and the users of those sites can watch the videos
without any cost. Firms belonging to the hospitality industry use these sites to upload
the videos of their activities and the services they are offering to the customers. The
video upload facilities of the above two social networking sites, help the firms to
upload their products and services that they are going to introduce in the market and
from the comments of the videos and reviews of the followers, the authority can
redesign their services and strategy.

Instagram: Instagram is a very popular site for sharing the photos. Hospitality
industry and the firms in the industry use the social site to make the customers
aware about the services and the products being offered to them in the form of
photos. This most popular site for sharing pictures in the social networking sites
helps the firms to promote their products and services internationally and create a
buzz in the social networking sites.

Mobile technology as a catalyst of social media in hospitality industry: Mobile

technology is the key player for the recent development of the social media.
Smartphones, 3G and 4G networks help to flourish these social networking sites. So,
in an indirect way, mobile technology helps to flourish he hospitality industry
(Valacich and Schneider, 2013). As all most all the social networking sites can be
used through the smart phones and with the fastest internet facilities provided by the
network service providers, the firms are now concentrating more on using marketing
campaign over these social networking sites. Again it is very cost effective to use
social networking sites through cell phones and this feature of the mobile technology
has been picked by the firms in the hospitality industry and this has become a trend
in the industry.

The future of distribution is following here with the help of a graph. This graph shows
that internet is the key reason why service based firms are leading in recent years.
Social media has come out first in the competition. Reviews from people are
seriously accepted by a potential customer who wants to visit the restaurant or hotel.

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Direct promotional activities adopted by firm and the mobile technology will also
determine the future of service based industries.

Source: Mazoor (2010)

Case study
Riding House Café is a London based small restaurant which offers foods for nearly
50 people at a time. This firm has the experience of operating the business for
almost 10 years. Riding House Café is though a small restaurant in the hub of
business, the firm is very active on social media like Facebook and Twitter.

Case study methodology

In analysing the extent of social media use, qualitative data methodology will be
used. Qualitative data methodology focus of facts not figures. The rationales behind
the use of qualitative data methodology are the ease of data collection, non-
availability of numeric data, and time constraints. This methodology of data analysis
is mostly effective in conducting the exploratory research. Here, exploratory research
is conducted.To analyse the developments of social media on hospitality, the case of
Riding House Café will be discussed and related.

Riding House Café has their own personalized website which has many contents.
The website of the firm gives ins and out about all the menus that are being offered

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by the hospitality firm. For example: The menus that are being offered are
categorized under different heads. These are breakfasts, lunch and dinner, Saturday
brunch, Sunday brunch, desserts, cocktails, and wine. The personalized website of
Riding House Café also paves the way to get reservations and the ways to be
reserved.

Figure: Website of Riding House Café http://www.ridinghousecafe.co.uk/

Source: Ridinghousecafe, 2014.

Again, their website is very user friendly as anyone having little knowledge about the
information technology can use their website easily to get their desired information
from the official website of the restaurant. The most important part of their website is
that it contains detail information about each and every service that they offer to their
most valuable customers in running their day to day business functions. As the
website uses English language for the communication purposes, English being a
lingua franca, most of the customers can get their desired information easily from the
website. With the share options embedded in the website, anyone can share the
attractive part of the website to the most popular social networking sites like
facebook, twitter and even the users can email the contents to others. Reservation
option of the website helps the customers to reserve their desired table over the
website. Here the authority gives opportunity to reserve tables through online for
maximum of 6 dinners and also if any customer does not find desired table then

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there is opportunity to contact with the authorities over the telephone to get the right
table. Again for bookings exceeding 7 there is option to contact with the Events team
through official email and telephone. All the options included in the website helps the
Riding House Café to interact with their both existing and potential customers.
Riding House Café is very active in social media especially in Facebook and
Twitter. In Facebook the hospitality firm has a rating of 4.3 by the visitors. The firm
has 2.7k likes in Facebook. The number of visits at the restaurants who posted this
on the Facebook is around 25k. These figures indicate the firm is highly involved in
Facebook. The people visiting Facebook will give the review on the foods and
services and thus will ensure the involvement of the people in the industry.

Figure: Facebook page of Riding House Café

Source: Facebook (2014)

The Riding House Café uses the facebook as one of the most useful means to
make social networking with the existing and potential customers. If the official
facebook of the Riding House Café are seen then it can be said that they post on
regular basis in their facebook page to make inform the potential customers about

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the various types of foods that they offer along with all the facilities that they offer to
their most valuable customers. Again they use facebook page as a way to build
customer loyalty and make a social branding of their restaurant. They often post food
items with pictures which helps the customers to compare the items provided by the
Riding House Café with the other similar types of competitors running business in
the industry. Again anyone can get immediate reply from the authority on their
queries by making posts in their facebook page and this helps the Riding House
Café to remain connected with the customers all the time and make a long time
relationship.

Riding House Café is also highly active in Twitter. The firm has an enriched page in
Twitter which has some followers. The firm has been tweeting since the opening of
the page at the social networking site. At present they have made 2,534 tweets,
uploaded 252 photos/videos, following 542 and have around 6,000 followers over the
twitter. A snapshot of the page on Twitter is following here:

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 Figure: Profile of Riding House Café on Twitter

Source: Twitter (2014)

By using Twitter, they can easily inform their existing and potential customers about
they are offering to enhance the value of the customers. Again they get connected
with the customers by retweeting to the enquiries of the followers about any service
that they offer.

Instagram is a popular site for uploading photos and videos. Riding House Café is
also active in this popular social networking site. In this social networking site Riding

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House Café periodically posts and the firm has almost 12k followers on the site. A
snapshot of the activities on Instagram of Riding House Café is provided here:

Figure: Profile of Riding House Café on Instagram

Source: Instagram (2014)

Vine is a popular site of video sharing. In this social networking site Riding House
Café is also active. Riding House Café has uploaded 6 videos on the site. The firm
is doing their marketing with the help of this social networking site. It is easier to
judge any food item from the video instead of still picture as the real condition of the
food can be got from the video and by using Vine; the Riding House Café has given
opportunity to its existing and potential customers to compare their food items with
those of the competitors. A snapshot of the site is given here:

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 Figure: Vine account of Riding House Café

Source: Vine (2014)

Third party sites

Third party sites are parties that give reviews to the visitors according to some
criteria. For the case of Riding House Café, the review of third party site is not
either good or bad. The restaurant got average grade.

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Figure: Third party reviews of The Riding House Café

Source: Tripadvisor (2014) http://www.tripadvisor.com/Restaurant_Review-g186338-

d2087849-Reviews-The_Riding_House_Cafe-London_England.html

Figure: Third party reviews

Source: Google (2014)

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The firm is ranked at 2642 position as ranked by third party site, TripAdvisor. So,
according to the third party sites, the visitors are not so much motivated to visit the
restaurant.

Rating based on evaluation

In evaluating the aspects of e-tourism the following rating can be given based on a
scale of 10.

Particular aspects Rating out of 10

Use of internet 8
Use of social media 7
Mobile technology 5
As the firm is focusing on the use of internet as a means of communication and
distribution, the performance can be considered as good. That is why a rating of 8
out of 10 is a good one.

The extent of social media use for communication and distribution as well as
branding is good but not that much excellent. Hence, a rating of 7 out of 10 is
preferred here.

The firm has no dedicated mobile application and they currently have to plan to
develop a featured application. So, the performance can be said poor.

The social media: findings and discussion

Social media has had significant impact on the tourism industry so as the hospitality
industry. For the selected firm in the hospitality industry, the study shows that
besides social media, internet, mobile technology, direct approach of the firm, and
many other factors lead to the development of the industry so as the firm.

From the above case study of the Riding House Café it can be said that the
restaurant is using all the social networking sites to derive maximum utility from
those sites and also they use these as a mean of building customer loyalty and
brand value in the hospitality sector. From the case study of the Riding House Café,
it can be said that the authority is giving maximum attention to develop their official
website to maintain contact with the existing and potential customers. Their official

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website contains all the necessary information that the prospective customers will
need to satisfy all their queries about the services of the restaurant. The customers
can find the menu, the food items, the price list, the schedule and also make online
reservation by using the website.

Again with the use of the facebook, the Riding House Café authority is also making
close contact with the prospective and existing customers and satisfying all their
needs related to the firm. The number of likes and visitors by the facebook users
make it clear that the Riding House Café has been successfully using the facebook
in building their brand value. But in comparing with other similar types of the
competitors in the sector, the number of likes of the facebook page is lower and here
the authority of the Riding House Café should give maximum concentration. As it is
a quickest way to reach maximum customers and also a cost effective one, they
should conduct most of the marketing strategies over the facebook page and make
close contact with the customers. The authority should make more communication
over the facebook page and they should also keep in touch with the customers 24/7
through the facebook page. Here they can make more posts regarding what they are
offering in the value creation process of the customers. Exclusive offers along with
the photos and videos may attract the potential customers and they also become
able to know more about the restaurants. Facebook users from all over the world can
be able to know about the Riding House Café through the activities of the
restaurants from their facebook page and as a result, the restaurant will be able to
enhance their international brand value.

Again along with the activity of the facebook page, the Riding House Café is also
carrying its social networking activities through twitter and in comparison to
facebook, they are quite successful to maintain their social networking in twitter as
they have more followers in the twitter than the likes of facebook. In a regular basis,
the authority is posting about what is going on in their restaurant along with all the
offers that they have designed to enhance the value of the customers. They are
retweeting to the posts of their followers and this helps the authority to make close
contact with the followers over the twitter.

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Mobile technology
Riding House Café has not developed any mobile app yet and the firm has not
considered developing a app. The dedicated app is expected to be developed later
and it will bring all the ins and outs of the firm.

Mobile technology focuses on the use of modern technology in calling, data

transmission and data analysis. In terms of the selected hospitality industry is has
found that mobile technology has have significant use on the firm. It has discussed
that smartphones, 3G, and 4G networks are contributing a significant growth in the
hospitality industry.

Now it has become very popular to use mobile apps to make communication with the
valuable customers of any firm operating its business in any industry. All the social
networking sites can easily be used by using mobile technology as with the invention
of smartphones and superfast internet facilities have paved the way to make a robust
social networking with the prospective customers.

As the Riding House Café is conducting its social networking through various types
of social networking sites like facebook, twitter, vine, instagram etc. and as all these
social networking sites can be accessed through cell phones, the authority can make
a robust campaign by using these social networking sites.

Overall comment

Riding House Café is utilizing the rapid development of ICT sector. They are using
the social media as means of their marketing. Tourism distribution channel is used
by Riding House Café. The firm is exploiting the benefits of social media. This is a
great similarity that has found in doing the project. At the same time it has found that
the extent of use of all the social media is not so much high. They are active in
facebook and twitter but not that too much active in other social networking sites. It
has found that the use of internet is high in the case of Riding House Café. Another
similarity that has found in doing the report is use of direct distribution followed by
the firm.

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Conclusion and recommendations
Social media is the most emerging phenomenon in developing industries of all types.
Being a service based industry, tourism and hospitality industry is highly affected by
the emergence of the social media. Social media helps tourism and hospitality
industry to make their promotions through words of mouth and free advertising on
internet. Without incurring significant costs in the marketing and promotional efforts,
firms belonging to the tourism and hospitality industry are using the social media as
an effective and efficient tool to run the promotion of the business. Mobile industry
and technology is helping in this regard a lot. Due to the introduction of the
sophisticated phones and 4G networks people now have easy access to the internet.
In this regard mobile technology is playing an indirect role. The following
recommendations can be made from the above analysis:

Social media collectively and indirectly is affecting the business especially the
tourism and hospitality industry.

Organizational success is now being determined by the engagement of the firms in

social media. Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, etc. are now widely used as means of
networking and communication.

Service industry is highly influenced by the involvement of the firms in the social
networking sites. Word of mouth, free advertising on social networking sites, free
review on the networking sites, etc. are the major benefits of use of the social
networking sites.

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References
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Management. Prentice Hall.
2. Bowen, A., A. Lockwood, and P. Phillips 2003. Identifying Core Capabilities in
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British Academy of Management Conference Proceedings, edited by S.
Parkinson and J. Shutt. Leeds, UK: Leeds Metropolitan University
3. Buhalis, D. and Egger, R. 2008. eTourism Case Studies: Management &
Marketing Issues in eTourism. Heinemann Oxford.
4. Facebook. 2014. The Riding House Cafe. Available at: <
https://www.facebook.com/RidingHouseCafe> Last Accessed Date: 22
September, 2014.
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Publishing
6. Moutinho, L. 2011. Strategic management in tourism. CABI
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No.1 pp. 33-56
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<http://www.tripadvisor.com/Restaurant_Review-g186338-d2087849-
Reviews-The_Riding_House_Cafe-London_England.html> Last Accessed
Date: 8th November, 2014
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https://twitter.com/RidingHouseCafe> Last Accessed Date: 26 September,
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13. Vine. 2014. The Riding House Cafe. Available at:
<https://vine.co/venues/4da49dccc6e96ea82a06015e> Last Accessed Date:
22 September, 2014.

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