| Author: | Ouyang, Zhe |
| Title: | The effects of corporate social responsibility on brand awareness and brand image : a comparison of international and domestic hotel brands in China |
| Advisors: | Xiao, Qu (SHTM) |
| Degree: | M.Sc. |
| Year: | 2014 |
| Subject: | Branding (Marketing) Hotels -- China. Social responsibility of business. Hong Kong Polytechnic University -- Dissertations |
| Department: | School of Hotel and Tourism Management |
| Pages: | x, 100 leaves ; 30 cm |
| Language: | English |
| Abstract: | China's hospitality industry has developed rapidly over the past decades (CNTA, 2012), and attracted numerous researchers' attention. Meanwhile, the increasingly demands for domestic hotels to build their own brands and compete with international hotel firms gave rise to the initial thoughts of this study. The research on CSR in general has a vast amount in both academia and professions linking it to different aspects of a business such as financial performance, strategy and reputation. However, the research into CSR and brand awareness, as well as brand image is limited, particularly conducting in hotel industry. Therefore, acknowledging the limited amount of research in this topics area, this study intended to investigate the relationship between CSR and brand awareness, as well as brand image, while examining the significant components to represent CSR for hotels in China. This study was a quantitative approach which adopted Turker's (2009) CSR scale and brand awareness and brand image scale developed by Hsu et al, (2012) to evaluate consumers' perceptions for international and domestic hotels in China. Using the volunteer panel online-survey, more than 300 qualifying questionnaires were collected. During the data analysis process, multivariate methods were employed which consisted of descriptive analysis, independent t-test, two-way ANOVA, factor analysis and multiple regressions. The differences between international and domestic hotels regarding CSR acts, brand awareness and brand image was significant according to general consumers. Two CSR components ("workforce and marketplace"; "environment and community") were extracted to represent CSR. Moreover, activities related to workforce and marketplace dimension were more representative for CSR compared to environment and community, for both groups of hotels. This study concluded that CSR acts relating to workforce and marketplace have much larger effects on building brand awareness compared to environment and community for hotels. While, CSR practices on environment and community were identified to be more effective than workforce and marketplace related in enhancing brand image for both groups of hotel. The results suggested CSR could provide an opportunity for hotels to develop consumer and brand relationship. As for hotels, which have already carried out CSR acts should communicate it effectively in order to receive the benefits. Due to the limitation of the collected data, whether the differences will hold under other circumstances is unknown. CSR initiatives were more influential in building brand awareness and enhancing brand image for domestic hotels than international hotels according to this study. Hence, participating in CSR could be an effective approach for domestic hotels to build their brand-consumer relationships. |
| Rights: | All rights reserved |
| Access: | restricted access |
Files in This Item:
| File | Description | Size | Format | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| b28195449.pdf | For All Users (off-campus access for PolyU Staff & Students only) | 1.59 MB | Adobe PDF | View/Open |
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