Exploring destination advocacy behavior in a virtual travel community

The use of social media to engage in travel-related discourse plays an increasingly important role in destination choice as users turn to virtual communities where exchanges between visitors and residents thrive. There is growing recognition of the local resident as destination advocate, yet researc...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inJournal of travel & tourism marketing Vol. 38; no. 5; pp. 431 - 443
Main Authors Lever, Michael W., Elliot, Statia, Joppe, Marion
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Binghamton Routledge 13.06.2021
Taylor & Francis LLC
Subjects
Advocacy
Destination advocacy
netnography
social identification
social identity theory
Social networks
visit intention
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Summary:The use of social media to engage in travel-related discourse plays an increasingly important role in destination choice as users turn to virtual communities where exchanges between visitors and residents thrive. There is growing recognition of the local resident as destination advocate, yet research of online advocacy behavior is limited. This study analyzes 1,226 messages exchanged among members of a Facebook travel community using netnography, supplemented by several in-depth interviews, to reveal behaviors including sentiment expression, advocate-focused and visitor-focused. The findings extend our understanding of destination advocacy, building on social identity theory to identify unique patterns of co-created social participation.
ISSN:1054-8408
1540-7306
DOI:10.1080/10548408.2021.1940421