Evaluating social media's communication effectiveness on travel product promotion: Facebook for college students in Hong Kong

Purpose This study aims to evaluate social media's communication effectiveness on travel product promotion among college students in Hong Kong. As traveling has become a popular activity, promoting travel products via social network sites (SNSs) has become common. Thus, identifying factors that affect shopping decisions is vital to tourism businesses. While the number of people using social communication tools has increased quickly, social media marketing provides a new strategy for the local travel business to sell and promote their products online. Design/methodology/approach This study adopts the attention, interest, desire and action (AIDA) marketing communication model to explore the influence of Facebook on the marketing of travel products among youngsters. Because Facebook is the most widely used social media platform in Hong Kong, it was selected for this study. An online survey was conducted via Google Form to collect responses from students of different local universities. Findings The findings indicate that our respondents consider purchasing travel products according to brand, discount and customer comments. They generally perceived Facebook advertising as a platform that could deliver various updated travel promotions and discounts, which can be adequately explained based on the AIDA model. However, respondents were unwilling to recommend the travel company to their friends on Facebook, even if they were satisfied with the travel products after purchase. Also, Facebook promotion could positively influence, draw the attention and make travel desire of the customer, but no positive influence to arouse their interest. Originality/value Although there are many studies on the travel industry's marketing and social media, scant studies have investigated the influence of social media on the promotion of travel products with the AIDA model. In particular, it is crucial to explore what factors can affect young people's decision-making, their perception of social media advertising and how marketers can make good use of this channel.