The Impact of Digital Marketing Strategies on Hotel Performance

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to examine the impact of digital marketing strategies on hotel performance. This research is applied in terms of both descriptive and inferential purposes, and hypotheses were tested using the partial least squares (PLS) method. The statistical population of this study consisted of 125 managers and administrative staff of hotels in the West of Iran. The main instrument for gathering data in this study was a standard questionnaire. Face validity was confirmed by 4 experts, and its reliability was obtained by Cronbach's alpha test, which showed a score above 0.7. The results indicated good validity of the reagents, as all had higher factor loadings for their structures. The findings also show that email marketing has a positive and significant effect on performance dimensions, including financial perspective, learning and growth perspective, customer perspective, and internal processes perspective. Additionally, content marketing has a significant and positive impact on performance in terms of financial and customer perspectives. This suggests that content marketing has improved financial conditions and customer engagement, but has not impacted learning. Finally, the study did not confirm the impact of viral marketing on performance. Through a systematic review of current practices in hotel literature, critical methodological issues in selecting and using PLS were identified. These guidelines aim to enhance future PLS studies and provide recommendations for utilising recent methodological advancements.