Award Date

1-1-2005

Degree Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Department

Hotel Administration

First Committee Member

Pearl Brewer

Number of Pages

190

Abstract

Online travel intermediaries such as Expedia, Travelocity and Orbitz have controlled the lion's share of the transactions over the Internet in terms of travel search and purchase by offering low prices, increased consumer choice, and enhanced shopping efficiency. Travel suppliers have been fighting harder than ever to keep up with the online travel intermediaries in terms of technology infrastructure and added-value content to re-capture the customers whose loyalty they spent so much time and money cultivating in the first place; The purpose of this research was to identify the antecedents of customer e-loyalty and examine the effects of these loyalty drivers on consumers' loyalty to online travel intermediaries. An integrated structural model was introduced that showed the relationships between e-loyalty, perceived e-quality, perceived e-value, and consumer attitudes toward shopping online. Data collection was conducted via a self-reported online survey sent as an email attachment to a randomized sample of customers of an independent online travel intermediary. Respondents were asked discuss their attitudes and behaviors in regards to shopping online for travel. As hypothesized, perceived value, perceived quality, and consumer attitudes toward shopping online had significant and positive effects on e-loyalty. An examination of the effects on e-loyalty among the three components revealed that perceived e-quality had the strongest effect on consumer's attitudinal and behavioral e-loyalty; This study was the first effort to comprehensively examine and test the determinants of loyalty in an online travel context. This research expanded the body of knowledge in services marketing and hospitality information technology as well as provided a new model of service e-loyalty. This study also extended the use of the e-SERVQUAL instrument to the travel market and developed a multidimensional instrument to measure service quality, value, and attitude towards shopping online; Findings from the study provided insights for online travel intermediaries in identifying important e-loyalty drivers, understanding consumer needs, and improving their online performance. Customer e-loyalty is a good indicator of company profit and therefore understanding the drivers and dimensions is important to online travel intermediaries. Strategies may be developed to improve customer e-loyalty by addressing the gaps among the quality, value, and consumer attitudes toward shopping online attributes. Managers can use the framework and model to improve e-service performance, retain customers, and improve profitability.

Keywords

Consumer; Consumer Loyalty; E-business; Examination; Intermediaries; Loyalty; Online; Travel; Travel Intermediaries

Controlled Subject

Marketing

File Format

pdf

File Size

4014.08 KB

Degree Grantor

University of Nevada, Las Vegas

Language

English

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