An Investigation of Hoteliers' Attitudes toward the Use of Social Media as a Branding Tool

Abstract

This study investigates how hoteliers view social media as a branding strategy and elucidates the motivational factors that determine the adoption of social media as a branding tool. It was based on a survey of 491 hotels from the USA, the UK, and Egypt that ranged from one-star to five-star hotels. Data on hotels’ locations, grades, numbers of rooms, positions of respondents, usages and perceptions of social media, types of social media used by hoteliers, and perceptions were collected. A major finding of this paper is that higher grade hotels have a higher probability of using social media. Furthermore, the study reveals that hotels in the USA and the UK use social media more often compared with those in Egypt.