Therefore, this study aims to find out the influence of online reviews on office workers' intention to visit bars and restaurants at night in the Bangkok area. The main purpose of this study is to find the relationship between the key variables of online consumer review; consumer characteristics, eWOM, review sources, content quality, and awareness of office workers' intention to visit bars and restaurants at night in the Bangkok area. The finding is useful for restaurant businesses in Thailand, especially beverage and restaurant, to explore new channel marketing around their restaurant using online consumer review to attract potential customers. Online reviews on review websites or apps, both negative and positive, become one of the factors that influence consumers' intention to purchase or use any service in the form of electronic word of mouth.
Since this study focuses on pubs and restaurants, alcoholic beverages are another factor that attracts customers to visit the restaurant. One of the most common activities that office workers enjoy doing after work is hanging out with colleagues and friends in pubs and restaurants just to relax - drinking, talking or even getting drunk. This research provides pub and restaurant entrepreneurs in the Bangkok area with useful information that will allow them to be aware of the effects of online reviews, which could be the effective marketing tool to attract potential customers.
Accordingly, online marketers, food bloggers, restaurant review websites, and restaurant review apps will also be aware of the impacts of online reviews.
Research Problem
Research Objective
Research Questions
LITERATURE REVIEW
Consumer Behavior
The number of people dining out in Bangkok is constantly increasing, especially among office workers due to the fact that society has changed - people work outside and do not spare time to cook at home (Somanapun and Kongsawaskiat, 2015). Moreover, restaurant promotion, customer loyalty and trust are also the factors that influence them to eat out.
Impact of Online Consumer Review
Customers' online reviews have attracted more consumers to visit the restaurant's website, while reviews and ratings from editors have a negative impact on consumer decision making (Zhang, Ye, Law, & Li, 2010). Most of the restaurant online reviews are able to answer consumer questions like what to eat tonight, which restaurant to go to, where the restaurant is, when it is open or closed or even what food to order. Online reviews will allow consumers to get some idea of the experiences they expect from using such products and services.
Referring to the term "word of mouth", it is a type of communication that influences consumers' intention to buy and to make decisions about one product (Richinx, 1983). Currently word of mouth is turning into Electronic word of mouth on online reviews and website ratings. E word of mouth is a form of content created as online reviews and ratings (Chatterjee, 2001). Online reviews usually consist of two parts: 1) content about products and services and 2) recommendations (Park, Lee.
One in three of those shoppers said online reviews helped with their purchase decisions (Compete, Inc., 2006). Another research shows that more than 80% of people who shop online use online reviews from other consumers when making a purchase decision (Forrester, 2006). This research clearly shows that online consumer reviews play an important role in consumer decision making.
The result of online reviews created by real restaurant consumers is more reliable for future customers. In addition, word-of-mouth (online review), source credibility, and volume of online consumer reviews are important factors influencing consumer intention. Similar to the previous study by Xinyuan (Roy) Zhao et al. 2015), highlighted that the usefulness, expertise of reviewers, timeliness, scope, value, and comprehensiveness of online reviews have a major impact on travelers.
Conceptual Framework
The research focusing on sushi restaurants in Thailand, which belongs to another sector of the restaurant industry separated from the bar and restaurant sector, found that the relationship of five variables influencing purchase intention, E word of mouth, source credibility , source expertise, valence is. , and volume (Cheewaudomsap, 2015).
RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
- Population and Sample
- Research Tool
- Data Sources
- Data Analysis
The interview questions will cover 6 main points: 1) Participant lifestyles such as after work or weekend activities 2) Participants. online consumer review usage behaviors 3) Participants' attitudes toward beverages and restaurants 4) Online review factors that stimulate participants to make a decision 5) Types of online review information that influence their decision making and 6) Personal participant information and background. In your opinion, what makes online reviews different from reviews from friends or other sources. Are there any differences between online reviews and reviews from other sources that influence your intention to visit pubs and restaurants?
Content Quality What are the reasons why online reviews make you want to visit bars and restaurants. Awareness What are the reasons that make you believe in online bar and restaurant reviews. What do you think about bars and restaurants that have a lot of online review content or high content share number.
Do you think online bar and restaurant reviews influence your decision to visit bars and restaurants. The researcher may add more questions to get more details, including questions about participants' lifestyles, personal information, and backgrounds. This research will observe the data from many sources, such as websites or tools that the participants use to read online reviews about bars and restaurants, including overall interviews in person (Promma and Worapichet, 2015).
The interview topic will be adapted depending on the participants to get the participants to reveal their. The data will be collected and analyzed; if there is any data conflict or omission, the researcher will correct immediately. After that, it will be categorized and matched with the objectives of the study, compared and linked with the relationship between the subject along with the methods of literature reviews studied by the researcher to answer the proposed research questions.
FINDINGS AND DATA ANALYSIS
- Consumer Characteristics
- E-Word of Mouth
- Review Sources
- Content Quality
- Awareness
Yes, I have read the online reviews of WongNai and ChillPaiNai pubs and restaurants; and if I'm interested, I'll go to Google and find more information about the name of the restaurant.” (Participant 20). When reading online reviews of pubs and restaurants, most participants agree that these online reviews influence their decisions about visiting pubs and restaurants. What's even more interesting is that most of them visited pubs and restaurants purely because of online reviews.
Participants further agree that any online reviews that may persuade them to visit pubs and restaurants should be based on various factors such as review comments, pictures, promotion and other factors such as friends' opinions of such restaurants . The youngest participant relies more on eWom than Wom and intends to visit pubs and restaurants after reading online reviews. After interviewing the participants, he reveals that online reviews from different sources can influence their intention to visit differently.
Participants choose to believe word of mouth from friends more than online reviews from publishers or celebrities. They found that most online reviews from publishers or celebrities only show the good side of pubs. However, lately people have been spending more time on their mobile phones, tablets or computers at work, so it's easier for online reviews to be the first thing to come to mind when making a decision to visit pubs and restaurants.
Most of the participant said that they might first consider bars and restaurants that their friends recommend and then look for online reviews to help them make a decision. The reason online reviews make people want to visit bars and restaurants varies from beautiful pictures, rich information, impact topic, ratings, real customer reviews, quality of reviewers, to the language used by reviewers. From the interviews, it was found that most of the participant will trust online reviews that come from real customers, while they still like to read online reviews from publishers or ads that have nicer pictures.
They read online reviews from more than one source when they want to make a decision. Most of the respondents said that in their opinion online reviews influence their decision to visit bars and restaurants because online reviews provide enough information to help them compare, plan and make a decision.
CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATION
- Conclusion
- Recommendation
- Limitation
- Further Research
This study found that there is a lot of detail in online reviews that consumers expect. The following things are what online reviews should include as part of the content to make them more interesting and useful. Online reviews that have nice and clear pictures will be able to attract consumers' attention more than those that don't have any nice pictures.
Since online reviews of bars and restaurants are intangible, photos should tell as much as possible about the restaurants such as atmosphere, decoration and style, food and drinks, and the restaurant's surroundings. Compared to the number of online reviews (volume), which reviewers wrote from their experiences, the more online reviews means the more real customer experiences. After analyzing research finding, online reviews were found to influence office workers' intention to visit bars and restaurants at night in Bangkok area.
On the other hand, customers can be the ones who create eWom, such as online reviews, by posting their photos, checking into pubs and restaurants, or recommending to their friends. People like to read online reviews of publishers because the content is well written and the featured photos are beautiful with complete information. However, when they are looking for more information to help them make a decision, they look to online reviews from real consumers.
Therefore, pub and restaurant business owners should start by hiring publishers to first write online reviews for them to promote and advertise their places. As online reviews influence consumers' intention to visit pubs and restaurants, pub and restaurant business owners or marketing companies can use online reviews as. Since eWom, ratings and positive comments influence consumers' intention to visit such places, pub and restaurant business owners should find a way to encourage their customers to get involved, such as checking in, posting photos on social media or writing short online reviews.
