Tourism Consumer Behaviour and Insight

This document explores the factors influencing consumer behavior in the tourism industry and the impact of digital technology. It discusses the stages of consumer decision making and the importance of mapping the path to purchase. It also examines the key differences in decision making between B2C and B2B in the hospitality industry.

TOURISM CONSUMER
BEHAVIOUR AND
INSIGHT

Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................3
LO 1.................................................................................................................................................3
P 1 different cultural, social, personal and psychological factors that influence the behavior of
consumers and their attitudes.......................................................................................................3
P 2 consumer trends are changing due to the impact of digital technology................................4
LO 2.................................................................................................................................................5
P 3 stages of the consumer decision making journey and map a path to the purchasing for a
given tourism service...................................................................................................................5
P 4 why it is important for marketers to map a path to purchase and understand consumer
decision making...........................................................................................................................6
LO 3.................................................................................................................................................7
P 5 key differences of the hospitality decision-making process in the context of B2C and B2B
.....................................................................................................................................................7
P 6 different approaches to market research and methods of research used for understanding
the decision making process........................................................................................................8
LO 4.................................................................................................................................................9
P 7 marketers can influence the different stages of tourism decision making process................9
CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................10
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................11

INTRODUCTION
The analysis of consumer behavior requires the consideration of various processes
internal and external to the individual. To understand behavior, it is necessary to examine the
complex interaction of many influencing elements. It concludes with an illustration of tourist
behavior modeling. Travelodge Hotels Limited is a private company operating in the hotels and
hospitality industry throughout the United Kingdom, Ireland and Spain. Known simply as
Travelodge, it is the UK's largest independent hotel brand with over 570 hotels across the UK.
This report includes issues such as different factors and behavior of consumers and the factors of
its influence. Impact of digital technology on business and changing trends in business, process
of consumer decision making and importance of map and journey path, methods of research,
tourism decision making process and difference between B2C and B2B (Sutton, 2016).
LO 1
P 1 different cultural, social, personal and psychological factors that influence the
behavior of consumers and their attitudes.
Personal factors-
These factors also relate with the factors that are psychological that is the reason why
they are also known as psychological or explicit variables on the basis of individual personality
according to the tourist. The personality of the tourist is judged on all the basis such as
characteristics, beliefs on the basis of factors that made the individual consumer different from
other people. Travelodge plans for promotion according to the personality traits of consumers.
Attitude of the individual helps the company to assess the response in a positive or negative
manner. Other than this perception of the individual, their age and the profession they are
influence their behavior a lot.
Social factors-
Travelodge needs to be careful about the culture people follows and their beliefs as they
are the ones which influence the behavior of consumers. Culture refers to the tradition that
people follows. It is basically a framework of rituals that is developed on the basis of lifestyle of
people. Tourism companies such as Travelodge needs to figure out the background and some

information of the company so that strategies can be made. For instance needs of a bachelor
person is different from that of needs and priorities of a married couple.
Psychological Factors-
These factors stand on four belief and they are motivation, perception, learning and
beliefs and attitude. It states if consumer is motivated then he or she will surely consider going
on a trip. If the perception of the customer is positive then they will agree to the trip and vice
versa. Learning is concerned will collecting the knowledge which will take time to convince
them.
P 2 consumer trends are changing due to the impact of digital technology
Consumers are more aware of their needs-
Due to the advancement and development in the sector of IT they have more options and
availability to gain knowledge about the information which covers all the tourist activities. This
is helping the tourist to gain more confidence about the places they want to explore. Still people
who are old relies on the agencies that deals in this sector and provide a package deal. There is a
change in the demand pattern of consumers now they do not want to go on a common place they
want to explore new places and they are ready to pay for that (Prajitmutita, Perényi and Prentice,
2016).
Sustainable holidays-
People wants to change their preference from most wanted places to new and uncommon
places as they want to remove the factors that affect the environment of tourism in a negative
manner. Many of the countries such as Europe is facing the issue of overcrowding in the season
which is changing the minds of many people to consider that place as a option. This is the reason
why Travelodge needs to provide their clients a decent package and have the facilities of hotels
across more places. The reason behind visiting small and underdeveloped places is that they fear
that they so not have to face the urban impact of the disease (Santamaria and Filis, 2019).
Consumers and technology-

The whole process of purchasing and booking the vacation has changes as now the
consumers just look for it online, book the hotels near the place and pay online. The whole
system of paying digitally is on the rise. Travelodge can easily comply their portal online or join
with other platform to enable their services for the users. Other than this they also have the scope
to promote places through social media platforms as now people have different types of fears
such as fear of missing out and joy of missing out. It is important for people nowadays to share
their experience online with their belongings and some of the people take trips because of that.
Company can take the advantage of this factor and influence people who follow up to this kind
of thought process (Altinay and Taheri, 2019). Technological aspects has both positive and
negative aspects on the business such as it can help the business to increase their reach and serve
more customers and the negative effect will be when package made by tourists is getting
negative feedback and comments online as this can affect the profits of the company.
Interest in local culture-
The behavior of people has changed now they want to visit places which are historical
and monumental in order to feel the experience of local people such as taste their food, try out
their dressing style, learn about the decorum and the history of the place and take the routes
which covers all of their traditional activities. Travelodge needs to keep in mind that the pace of
digital technology has changed the preferences of people and they need to make their strategies
according to that.
LO 2
P 3 stages of the consumer decision making journey and map a path to the purchasing for
a given tourism service
Consumer decision making process-
Need recognition-
This aspect is concerned with the determination of needs as they will start having the
feeling of missing out on something and in order to remove the issue they look they way for it.
For instance going to a place at a certain period of time such as holidays (Font, English and
Gkritzali, 2018).

Information search-
This stage is concerned with obtaining the information so that they can assess which
place matches the criteria according to their level of need. People check recommendations and
often believe the word of mouth. This is done so that decision taken by them does not go wrong
in any way. There are many ways from which consumers can gain information and companies
such as Travelodge can use these measures in order to promote their business with the help of
sources that are commercial, public, personal and experiential as this will help the company to
get some promising deals (Held, 2018).
Evaluation of alternatives-
This steps is concerned with evaluating all the alternatives selected to pursue the
decision. Consumers will prefer the best alternative according to them and it can be on the basis
of their budget, the suitability of the experience and the company they have for the trip.
Purchase decision-
After considering all the steps and evaluating all the steps consumers come to a decision
and final the selection. Their decision can either be on the basis of conclusion and logic,
campaigns of marketing event, emotional connections or experiences that are personal (Liu and
et.al., 2017).
Post purchase behavior-
This stage is the last stage of the process and it reveals the information that the decision
made by the user was viable or not. If the package provided by Travelodge match the expectation
of consumers then they will gain the benefit of word of mouth and their clients will turn sa
marketers for the brand and vice versa.
Other than this Travelodge also needs assess a journey map for their customers as it will
help them to analyze the experience of customers they have with the company. It will also help
to know that the experience shared will be continued into a long term relationship between them
or not.

P 4 why it is important for marketers to map a path to purchase and understand consumer
decision making
It is important for the marketers of Travelodge to map a path to purchase and on what
grounds decision are taken by consumers. This way company will be able to get the insights and
information about their pattern. With the help of this company can change their ways in order to
improve their experience for consumers and determine what they need so that it can be offered to
them at the time of negotiation of deal. Consumers wants to be connected with the brand they
feel that when they are going with the company for a second time company must have all the
information about them and offer deals to them according to that. There are many benefits of this
aspect such as helps the company level of interaction of customers, highlights the needs and
wants at stages that keeps on changing in the funnel of buying. Figuring out that the journey of
customer is in order or not. It also helps to get perspective from someone outside the company to
assess the process of sales. Other than this Travelodge will also be able to find out their mistakes
in providing them the quality experience and the ones they have met so that rectifying measures
can be taken for those in order to improve the quality of service. It highlights the priorities and
develop a system for it. The most important benefit of maping the journey of a customer is to put
the efforts on maintaining the balance between income and expenditure so that effectiveness and
efficiencies of work can be maximized (Jackson, 2019).
Map of journey will help the company to check the level of accuracy on the basis of
expectations of consumers and the promise made by the company. It is necessary that
management of the company optimizes the resources and improve the experience as this will
help Travelodge to build relations that are long term.
LO 3
P 5 key differences of the hospitality decision-making process in the context of B2C and
B2B
Relationship between customers-
B2B Build relationship on personal basis-
B2B helps the companies such as Travelodge to build relationships so that they can serve
in the market for a long period of time. It is necessary for the company dealing in B2B to build

relations with others in the sector. It provides an opportunity to the company to express their
ethical code of conduct. This will also help the company to build the ability which will help them
to assess the factors that will distinguish them from their competitors in the market and establish
the brand of the company. This factors also undertakes that this works on the power of reference
and reviews a lot and by maintaining the relationship the company can get more references and
positive reviews (Moutinho and Vargas-Sanchez, 2018).
B2C Build relationship on transactional basis-
The purpose of B2C is to boost the consumers on the website of the company or the
partner site of the company in order to make a sale. In order to serve this purpose company needs
to make sure that the website must provide the customer with best quality experience. It does not
invest the time in getting the details of the customers and investing more in that area which is the
reason why the relationship maintained through this aspect on transactional basis (Waqas-Awan,
Rosselló-Nadal and Santana-Gallego, 2020).
Branding-
B2B Focus on relationships
Branding is considered as an aspect of B2B but as compared to B2C it comes with the
help of building relationship. In order to gain the aspect of brand recognition it is up to the
company to use the right strategies for positioning the brand. Travelodge needs to position their
brand according to the audience they have targeted.
B2C Prioritize your message-
With the help of branding marketer of the company will be able to build customers that
are loyal, deliver them the message, assess the creditability and motivate them to make a trip.
This aspect is also considered as the priority of the B2C marketing as they believe that they will
be able to make the memory of the interaction between the two parties and ensure that they will
return to the company next time they have to plan a trip.

P 6 different approaches to market research and methods of research used for
understanding the decision making process
There are two ways in which Travelodge can conduct the research and it will be beneficial for
them as it will help them to assess the behavior of consumers and what influence them.
Primary research-
This research will help Travelodge to collect the information for the purpose and the sole
motive of company’s benefits. There are many types of methods to conduct this research that is
through surveys, directly observation on the aspects, by taking interview of people which is less
suitable in the case of travel companies and through focus groups. This research will help the
company to conduct the research in their own manner and by asking the questions in their own
way. The results obtained by this type of research mostly turns out to be valuable. But in the
downside it takes a lot of time, effort and other resources of the company (Gibson and O’Rawe,
2018).
Secondary research-
This type of research is conducted from the research which has already been done earlier
either for the same or some other purpose which can be useful for the company. There are many
ways to conduct this type of research such as going through the internet and collecting the
information, results which are already existing in the market, check the data which is in the
records of the company itself and go through it and information can be collected with the help of
agencies which belong to government, libraries and council etc. Travelodge needs to keep this in
mind that the accurate information they want may not be available through this aspect. This
aspect is less costly and consumes less time as compared to primary method of research.
Travelodge needs to consider this research at the time of initial operations of the market. It may
present data on a faster level but they need to interpret so that it can be figured out that the right
and relevant information is taken out. Travelodge needs to consider only those facts from the
information which works as many of the factors are outdated (Ingram, Caruana and McCabe,
2017).
Other than this there are two more methods that is qualitative and quantitative method of
research. Quantitative method helps the company to gather data on numerical basis such as

figures of sales, financial trends, questionnaires and survey of customer. With the help of this
method company can assess the demographics of the market and make strategies according to
that. Qualitative research helps Travelodge to collect the information such as views and interest
of people. This way company can promote their brand according to their interests and take a
grasp at the right opportunity. This will help the company to improve the level of service they
offer to their customers. Also in order to get information through this method they need to select
different approach which takes more time to interpret the data.
LO 4
P 7 marketers can influence the different stages of tourism decision making process
Tourist motives-
In order to target and influence the consumers, marketers of Travelodge needs to
understand the motive or will of the client as how serious are they and where do they want to go,
how many people want to go. If the motives of tourists are found to be strong such as they are
ready to pay more but they need quality service and experience so that they can match with the
level of their satisfaction (Alamanos, Kuznesof and Ritson, 2016).
Collection and analysis of information-
On the basis of demand made by the clients and according to their suitability and budget
company needs to find certain places and make a package that covers almost everything they
demanded for such as flights, hotels, visiting places. Also it is necessary that employees working
in the sector of tourism and travel industry can show some extra effort by looking for something
new and offering them to their clients. Company needs to do a background check on the
consumers from their activities on social platforms as this will help them to take right decision
for the consumers. These aspects are necessary as consumers today do a deep background check
on everything and if they do not find anything suitable they will start looking out for alternatives
(Gowreesunkar and Varvaressos, 2017).
Decision and evaluation-

This stage is concerned with taking the final decision. Consumers will evaluate every
factors after the presentation has been made by the company to offer them the package from their
side. They will look on all the areas that the company needs to match according to their level of
satisfaction. If the decisions are taken by the consumers it will only be taken if the sector of
travel and tourism has offered them the right amount of deal and according to their suitability.
This will also tell that if or not the consumer will do the business again with the company and
ask for their services (Nguyen, 2016).
CONCLUSION
From the above studies it has been summarized that Travelodge needs to understand the
behavior of consumers and what influences them and the factors that help them to make better
strategies for the company. Other than this they also need to conduct a research so that they can
figure out the right type of priorities and package for the consumers. The most suitable research
method for the company will be primary and quantitative method as this way they will be able to
find out that information which are relevant to their issues and all the demographic factors of the
target audience will be covered. This way they will be able to work with them for a long period
of time. Also in order to serve in the market for a long period of time they need to maintain the
relationship with their customers an save the record of their information so the next time they are
with the company to ask for their services company can present themselves according to the
approach and perspective of the consumers. This will create a right impression from the
company.

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