Exploring the Role of Social Networks in Consumer Travel Planning

Desklib provides solved assignments and past papers to help students succeed.

RESEARCH PROJECT
1

2

3

TASK 1
1.1 AND 1.4
TITLE: IMPACT OF SOCIAL MEDIA AND NETWORK ON THE HOLIDAY OR TOUR
METHOD THROUGH CONSUMERS IN THE TOUR INDUSTRY”
INTRODUCTION
Internet and social media have become the most necessary part of our lives. The Internet has
also the significant and main role to transform the way by which the individual works,
communicates and does business. The social network era is now becoming a new period where
information technology and communication have the potential to change society and develop
the standard of living of the common people. Also, Web 2.0 is also the introduction of the new
media that have a high effect on the individual that is associated with the user content. Web
2.0, social network and internet have all now become the act of sharing experience and it has
an effect on the decision making of the consumers that affects the behavior of the consumers.
Social networks have the ability to provide the platform to tour and travel consumers to
compare the facilities and services, checking to review, comparing and sharing opinions and
thoughts etc. It also pushes to have the consumers connect with the organization and also it
has an effect on the planning of the consumers so that they can plan for their travel holiday.
This research project will underpin the role of internet, social network on the consumer
planning process in the tour industry (Chung, and Koo, 2015).
RESEARCH PROBLEM
This research will reflect the assessment of the social media role like Facebook in the consumer
planning process of social media.
4

RESEARCH QUESTIONS
Below are the listed research questions:
How the consumer decision is affected by the use of social media to decide the trip?
What is the social network role in traveller decision making?
What are the factors and aspect that affects the consumers planning trip and satisfaction of
consumer?
KNOWLEDGE AND SKILLS
The main focus will be on the assessment of the factors that play a role in affecting the process
of consumer planning and decision-making in the tour and travel industry.
AIMS
The research’s aim is to analyze study and explore the impact of the use of social and network
in the consumer’s decision-making in the tour and travel industry.
OBJECTIVES
Below are the objectives that will help to meet the research aims:
 To evaluate and identify the effect of social network and media in the travel industry
 To assess the social media role in the decision making process
 To identify the social media concepts and its uses in the tour and travel sector
5

1.2 RESEARCH RATIONALE
The media and the online technology play a vital role to uplift and update tourism industry. It is
very vital to the companies to have the knowledge and understanding of the effect and role of
social media on the travel and tourism industry. The social network also plays a vital role to gain
useful and important information for the tour and travel consumers. A social network is also
utilized for the decision-making process and for selection of the destination and comparing with
all other facilities and features. Social network helps to complete the first stage of the
consumer decision making and planning which involves the information search and it will be
associated with the destination search and related information and it can attained using social
media (Chung, and Koo, 2015).
This research project focuses for assessment the functions of social network in the decision
making the process for tourist planning and using the findings to understand its implications in
the travel and tour sector.
6

1.3 LITERATURE REVIEW
Social network
Chung, and Koo, (2015), the social network is the application type that has web 2.0 base
reflecting interactive website and user-friendly content. This enables to build the relationship
with the others. Social media has recently been increasing and important and have the wide
range of the internet based applications that are built on the technological and ideological
fundamentals and that allow the access to the exchange and creation of user-friendly and
generated content. Social media are the channels that are internet based that also provides
access to opportunistically self-present and interact with both narrow and brand audiences
having content that is user-generated. Web 2.0 is being formed from the different social
network platforms such as media, customer ratings, syndication of content, wikis, tagging, web
forums etc. It also allows people to share, create and exchange ideas, information and videos in
virtual networks and communities. Social media technologies take different forms including
business networks, blogs, enterprise, forums, photo, micro blogs, social networks etc (Chung,
and Koo, 2015).
The social network and tour and travel
Hernández-Méndez (2015) has argued that the purchasing choice of the tourism industry is a
very complex procedure that includes major risk and higher planning. Social media is a vital tool
that analyses the behavior of tourist (Hernández-Méndez, 2015).
The tourist must know by the means of the trustworthy sources of how the experiences will be
liked for reducing the uncertainty. A social media is becoming gradually mobile and customers
are also affected by the other customers with their opinions. Social media is bias-free and low
cost so it provides an advantage for marketing communications. Social media is also
increasingly used by the consumer to check the review and communicate with friends and
taking important data and information. Moreover, the consumers are also seeking the
recommendations and advice about the experiences of travelling from families, friends and
relatives. The advice is also beneficial for making decisions that have a main effect on consumer
decision making (Hernández-Méndez, 2015).
DECISION MAKING PROCESS OF CONSUMERS WITH SOCIAL MEDIA IN PLANNING A HOLIDAY
7

According to Schegg and Stangl, (2017), customer decision making also includes different stages
which start from the identification of need followed by the information or details research,
identification of the choices, procurement activity and post purchasing. The consumers go for
information research after the identification of the needs. Social network is being used for the
search of the information. After the collection of the information, the evaluation of the
different alternative is also done like best tour operator, best facilities, affordable pricing,
weather, facilities and service etc. are being done. The decision to purchase is also being made
after the best alternative selection. Perrin (2015) argued that Consumers are the main part and
vital for the tourism industry. They make the judgments and opinions for the process of
planning and also made the right kind of choices and selection for the area or destination of
tourism. The planning of tour makes the decision for the trip include the consumers, decision
making etc. Using social network the consumers of the travel and tourism industry select the
trip destination, accommodation, holiday trip duration etc. Social media assist to gather the
information and data it is more efficient tool. There are different phases that are followed by
the individual and person on making the decision to buy. The social media affects the decision
of buying as it helps to gather the wider range of different information that compares the
advantages of the tour packages for increasing the value of the media in the industry (Duggan,
2016).
8

1.4 METHODS OF COLLECTION AND DATA ANALYSIS
The main focus of this research is the social network and its uses in decision making by
travellers. The aspects related to the different concepts and models of travelling are used for
the decision making and the decision is affected by the social networks. Thus this research
project will undertake qualitative and quantitative research methods. Primary research will be
conducted for conducting qualitative research and literature review will be conducted via
quantitative method. The primary data will be collected with the aid of the online survey and
questionnaire (Park and Nicolau, 2015). There will be a set of the different questions that will
be categorized into the whole questionnaire. The respondents and target audience for this
survey will be the UKCBC students and this will be sent to them via an online link and it will be
saved in the Google drive. The secondary research that is quantitative research will be
conducted via academics, online articles, research papers, magazines etc. This will help to
gather the key material that will be studied and a summary will be provided. The random
sampling method will be used for the same. For the secondary data, there will be the selection
of the fifty journals including papers, books, articles, magazines etc. The analysis will be done
along with the random sampling method. For the analysis part, meta-analysis will be done (Park
and Nicolau, 2015). The survey for the questionnaire will be framed and structured and will be
organized and for this ten questions will be framed. The questions of the survey will focus on on
social network impact on the process of decision making. The respondents will also be college
students with the help of graphs (Perrin 2015).
The data collected from both research will be assessed through the application of the different
techniques and tools that will help to gather the results and findings.
9

ETHICAL CONSIDERATION
Ethical consideration is the important part of the research project. These are the basic norms,
ethics and behavior that must be considered and taken care while carrying out the research
project.
The consent of the respondents will be gained to participate in the research project and they
will also be informed about the all purpose of the research project. The students that have filled
the survey with their own wish will be asked for their consent. The personal information and
data will not be disclosed to anyone. There will be full security provided to all with respect to
the secondary information (Flick, 2015).
LIMITS OF PRIMARY RESEARCH
There is the possibility of showing biasness by the end of the participant because sometimes
the respondents mark the incorrect answer due to hurry. . This research may be proved
expensive and it may require exceeded time as compared to normal. The staffing needs may
also be high for this research project completion.
10

RESEARCH DESIGN
11

1.5 ACTION PLAN
GANTT CHART
STRATEGY
The strategy for this project will take care of the time bound to complete the research project.
This will also include the time management of time in an effective manner that will help to
improve the stress of the last minute.
12