Noor Hazarina Hashim

A Review of Hospitality Website Design Frameworks

An effective website is vital for a hotel to strengthen its customer relationships and harvest online sales. Yet despite the proliferation of hotel website studies, research seems to have under-emphasised a fundamental first step, the development of valid and reliable constructs and features for evaluating websites. Based on a literature review, expert judgement and in-depth interviews, this study proposes a framework for evaluating hotel websites. The results are five dimensions of website quality — information and process, value added, relationships, trust, and design and usability — reflected by 74 websites features. The paper closes with a proposed process for developing a website evaluation framework and future research opportunities.

Take Me Back: Validating the Wayback Machine

Although fields such as e-commerce, information systems, and computer-mediated communication CMC acknowledge the importance of validity, validating research tools or measures in these domains seems the exception rather than the rule. This article extends the concept of validation to one of an emerging genre of web-based tools that provide new measures, the Wayback Machine WM. Drawing in part on social science tests of validity, the study progresses from testing for and demonstrating the weakest form of validity, face validity, to the more demanding tests for content, predictive, and convergent validity. Finally, the study tests and shows nomological validity, using the diffusion of innovations theory. In line with prior diffusion research, the results of tests for predictive and nomological validity showed significant relationships with organizational characteristics and two WM measures: website age and number of updates. The results help validate these measures and demonstrate the utility of the WM for studying evolving website use.

The Practice of Shariah-Compliant Hotel in Malaysia

Abstract — Over the past one decade, there has been an increasing focus on Islamic products and services research such as Halal food and Islamic banking. Halal revolution has created increasing awareness among Muslim to consume Halal product or Shariah-compliant services. In responding to this development, hotels created innovative services for Muslim guests called Shariah-compliant hotel (SCH). However, there is lack of research on the characteristics, and implementation of SCH has been carried out in the hotel industry. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to understand the practice of SCH in Malaysia. Diffusion of innovation (DOI) theory is utilised to investigate the issues of adoption and implementation of SCH. The preliminary study uses in-depth, open-ended interviews through purposive sampling. Interviews were recorded, transcribed, and evaluated based on thematic analysis to understand the practice. The study found three issues in implementing SCH, such as the uncertainties of government regulation, difficulties to meet Halal standard, and absence of SCH standard. Along with this, two Malaysian Standards (MS1900:2005 &MS1500:2004) have been identified and strongly suggested to be used as a tool in the SCH practice.

Leapfrogging and internet implementation by tourism organizations.

Drawing upon the Diffusion of Innovations (DOI) and technological ideologies, this article develops three areas for research of successful Internet implementation. The first research area is to operationalize and validate measures of successful Internet implementation. The second area calls for investigating how five factors—bandwagon effects, leapfrog effects, cloud computing, open communities, and system legacy—relate to successful Internet implementation. Finally, this article proposes combining technology ideologies and adopter categories to examine (un)successful Internet implementation. Diffusion of Innovations covers many aspects of innovation adoption and implementation, but implementation stage research remains sparse and perhaps no diffusion research has incorporated moral values towards technology. The article concludes with the contributions of this agenda for researching successful Internet implementation.

Take Me Back: Validating the Wayback Machine as a Measure of Website Evolution

Drawing on Diffusion of Innovations theory, this study of 175 Malaysian hotel websites validates the Wayback Machine (WM) — a web-based tool that archives websites — as a means to study website evolution. The results support validating the Wayback Machine for studying website evolution, and extend hospitality diffusion research to Malaysia. In line with prior research, there were significant positive relationships between hotel size, category and affiliation with two variables provided by the WM — website age and number of updates. Larger, higher-rated and affiliated hotels launched their websites earlier and updated their sites more often than smaller, lower-rated and independent hotels.

A Theoretical Framework of Factors Relating to Internet Adoption Stages by Malaysian Hotels

Drawing upon the Stage Model, Miles and Snow business strategy typology and Diffusion of Innovations (DOI), this paper proposes a theoretical framework for relationships among Malaysian hotels’ business strategies, organisational characteristics and stages of Internet adoption. As innovations diffuse based on situational and environmental characteristics, existing research may not generalise to hospitality organisations. Further, Internet tourism research is at an embryonic stage in developing countries such as Malaysia. In addition to existing business strategy and organisational characteristics, this framework includes domain name age as a temporal measure of Internet adoption. Practically, the stages suggest pragmatic Internet use for hoteliers. Academically, this paper adds to the paucity of research on Internet tourism in developing countries, and proposes extending Miles and Snow’s typology to hotels, the online environment and DOI research.

Evolving Internet Use by Malaysian Hotels

This study used the diffusion of innovations (DOI) and Miles and Snow’s business strategy to investigate evolving Internet use by Malaysian hotels. Unlike previous studies, this paper included email and a new temporal measure, website age. The study proposed that Malaysian hotels’ Internet use evolved in six-stages from no adoption to advanced website. Against expectations, one stage emerged suggesting no evolving Internet use, reflecting a bandwagon effect. This counterintuitive finding adds to the growing study of evolving Internet use. In line with DOI and Miles and Snow, large, high rated, affiliated, and Prospectors hotels led in evolving Internet use.

Gender Differences in Instagram Hashtag Use

ABSTRACT This article draws on two theories—uses and gratification and the James–Lange theory of emotion—to investigate gender differences in Instagram hashtag use. The study content analyzes 1,382 Instagram posts with the hashtag #Malaysianfood and categorizes them as informative/emotional and positive/negative. The results show that compared to male users, female users tend to use emotional and positive hashtag descriptions. This study also finds a positive relationship between the number of hashtags used and both the number of followers and likes. Finally, the results suggest a high satisfaction with Malaysian foods based on the number of positive and negative hashtags. Academically, this study adds to the limited Instagram and hashtag literature, expands the online gender behavior literature to hashtags, and introduces hashtag sentiment to measure user satisfaction. Companies should consider gender preferences in Instagram, and other social media, hashtag use to attract and keep target customers.

The Role of Information Quality, Visual Appeal and Information Facilitation in Restaurant Selection Intention

The emergence of smartphones, with their multiple functions and applications, are changing behaviour in many ways, particularly among the Gen Y. Instagram, a photo-based application, allows smartphones users to share picture, write comments and include #hashtags in their posts. Drawing upon Consumer Socialization Theory (CST), this paper proposes a framework to understand how this new electronic word of mouth platform affects young consumers restaurant selection. In addition, this paper investigates the mediating role of perceived diagnosticity on restaurant selection intention. Academically, this paper adds to the paucity of research on photo-based social media, particularly in developing countries, and extends the application of CST to online consumer behaviour research. Moreover, this paper offers ideas for restaurant operators to develop effective social media marketing strategies.

Modelling and comparing Malaysian hotel website diffusion.

This study draws upon diffusion modelling, a coupled Bass Rogers model, to examine hospitality website adoption within Malaysia and across countries. The results suggest 38% of Malaysian hotels may never adopt a traditional website. Rather, these hotels may start with new online channels, such as social networking and communities, leapfrogging over those that adopted websites. Across countries, the results highlight the role of innovation and imitation in adopting websites. Malaysian and international chains hotels showed similar adoption related to innovation and imitation. For Swiss hotels, the influence of imitation was much stronger than for Malaysian and international chain hotels.