Kristina Kapanova, Barbara Guidi, Andrea Michienzi, Kevin Koidl
Online Social Networking platforms (OSNs) are part of the people's everyday life answering the deep-rooted need for communication among humans. During recent years, a new generation of social media based on blockchain became very popular, bringing the power of the technology to the service of social networks. Steemit is one such and employs the blockchain to implement a rewarding mechanism, adding a new, economic, layer to the social media service. The reward mechanism grants virtual tokens to the users capable of engaging other users on the platform, which can be either vested in the platform for increased influence or exchanged for fiat currency. The introduction of an economic layer on a social networking platform can seriously influence how people socialize. In this work, we tackle the problem of understanding how this new business model conditions the way people create contents. We performed term frequency and topic modelling analyses over the written contents published on the platforms between 2017 and 2019. This analysis lets us understand the most common topics of the contents that appear in the platform. While personal mundane information still appears, along with contents related to arts, food, travels, and sport, we also see emerging a very strong presence of contents about blockchain, cryptocurrency and, more specifically, on Steemit itself and its users.
In recent years, blockchain has substantially enhanced the credibility of e-commerce platforms for users. The prediction accuracy of the repeat purchase behaviour of e-commerce users directly affects the impact of precision marketing by merchants. The existing ensemble learning models have low prediction accuracy when the purchase behaviour sample is unbalanced and the information dimension of feature engineering is single. To overcome this problem, an ensemble learning prediction model based on multisource information fusion is proposed. Tests on the Tmall dataset showed that the accuracy and AUC values of the model reached 91.28% and 70.53%, respectively.
The blockchain technology has witnessed growing interest since cryptocurrencies became popular in 2016. Not only through payment issues, but the tourism sector is also likely to be affected by the blockchain in terms of front- and back-stage processes. As the blockchain could replace traditional intermediaries, the structure of the tourism sector in the future has been discussed widely in the news. This article aims to conceptually examine the implications of blockchain along the value system in the tourism industry in order to identify its potential benefits. To address this, the methodology follows a content analysis of 175 news articles on the topic of blockchain and tourism, which are analysed through a qualitative news analysis and the method of GABEKÂŽ. The results imply blockchain applications along with the whole tourism value system, while it became apparent that traveling is streamlined through the transformation of time-intensive back-stage processes and thus offers extra value for travellers. Through its novelty in the academic discourse, the paper makes obstacles and regulations a subject of discussion, too.
Open access
Digital Marketing and Social Media
Consumer Retail Behavior Studies
Consumer Behavior in Brand Consumption and Identification
Francesco Bolici, Chiara Acciarini, Lucia Marchegiani, Luca Pirolo
Purpose Technological innovations provide huge opportunities to expand and revolutionize the scope of products and services offered. This is particularly true for tourism, which is undergoing significant changes due to the development of new technologies. The level of technology diffusion depends on several factors like the exchange of information among peers, and the attitude and shared perception among the contributors. The aim of the study is to explore the diffusion of technology in tourism with a specific focus on the social media discourse around new technologies. Thus, the paper investigates the level of interest in these new technologies analysing the information exchange occurring between individuals on Twitter in order to explore the influence of reciprocal networking. Design/methodology/approach To capture the attitudes expressed in the industry, the study analyses the ongoing discourse on Twitter as a proxy for the participants âinterest in new technologies. Through a social network analysis of the tweets and retweets conducted over a period of nine months, the research maps the level of information exchange about the diffusion of new technologies. Moreover, the sentiment analysis provides an interesting overview of the individualsâ attitudes towards the awareness or the adoption of new technologies. Findings Our analysis has provided several insights: (1) the information network on blockchain in tourism consists of participants who change very quickly over time ( high turnover of accounts ); (2) some contributors have an extremely important role in influencing the flow of information in the system ( information centralization ), they can have a generalist (discussing several topics) or a specialist (focusing on a specific topic) behaviour and this strategic choice influences their network's structure; (3) these central nodes also have an impact on the definition of positive and negative sentiment towards a topic ( sentiment influencer ). Research limitations/implications The paper contributes to the literature on technology diffusion, by focusing on one of the preconditions of diffusion that is the shared positive attitude towards technological innovation. More specifically, we adopt a network-based approach, which is useful to explain the level of information exchange and the public discourse that can impact the shared perception and attitude towards technological innovation. The study also highlights the role of knowledge brokers in influencing this public discourse. Future studies can deepen the association between positive perception, higher levels of information exchange and increasing usage of specific technologies. Our results also suggest further exploring the opportunity to combine social media data and other sources of information to shed more light on the technological innovation diffusion processes. Practical implications This paper shows how practitioners can benefit from the analysis of information exchange about new technologies in tourism adopting a network perspective with the aim of understanding the level of influence among contributors. Moreover, the increasing interest in blockchain technology and the potential combination between social media data and other sources of information can offer promising insights. Social implications The present study explores the level of technology diffusion through the analysis of information exchange on social media (Twitter). Furthermore, the dynamics of individual user behaviour offers a better understanding about media effects. Originality/value While previous research is focused on the users' perception towards the development of new technologies in tourism, the aim of this study is to investigate the dynamics behind the level of diffusion of information and awareness about these new technologies, which still represents an unexplored area of research.
Open access
Digital Marketing and Social Media
Technology Adoption and User Behaviour
Consumer Behavior in Brand Consumption and Identification
Denni Arli, Patrick van Esch, Marat Bakpayev, Andrea Laurence
Purpose In this study, we focus on consumer perceptions of cryptocurrencies. We hypothesize that knowledge of cryptocurrencies, trust in government, and the speed of transactions are the main factors contributing to consumers' trust in cryptocurrencies. Design/methodology/approach 451 MTurk workers, a convenient sample incentivized with a small monetary payment, participated in a cross-sectional online study with cryptocurrencies serving as the focal product category. Findings We obtained support for our hypothesized notion that knowledge of cryptocurrencies, trust in government, and the speed of transactions are the main factors contributing to consumers' trust in cryptocurrencies. Our research makes several important theoretical contributions. First, we demonstrate that consumers who understand and know how cryptocurrencies work are more likely to trust and invest in the currency. Next, we demonstrate that consumers are more likely to trust cryptocurrencies and their peer-to-peer transactions if, preferably, they take place via a central issuer and are regulated by their respective governments. Originality/value This study is the first known paper to focus on cryptocurrencies from the consumers' perspective. Next, we identify key antecedents of trust towards cryptocurrencies. Second, we reveal the role of government concerning cryptocurrencies. Finally, FinTech firms and banks (should they choose to enter the cryptocurrency market) need not spend time and money on marketing, advertising, and promotions in order to try to allay consumers' anxiety when it comes to their uptake in the different digital currencies. Rather, this would allow the FinTech firms and banks to allocate resources to focus their attention on marketing, advertising and promoting the factors (i.e. knowledge, trust in government, and speed of transaction) that drive intent to invest in cryptocurrencies.
Contemporary tourism has undergone many changes in the last decade, mainly due to expansion of the new technology. The use of new technology has had more positive than negative impacts on tourism intermediation, but none of them triggered a radical change. Blockchain technology has been one of the most discussed topics especially after 2016 due to its all opportunities, but also threats. Even though it is still somewhat unfamiliar, it is a form of technology which has a great potential to cause a revolution in traditional business activities, as it is predicted by futurists. For now, this phenomenon has only been recognized by bigger tourism intermediaries, technology-oriented companies. Such fast changes require even faster adaptations of all tourism intermediaries and this is challenging because most of stakeholders are not familiar with the use and the impact of blockchain. Therefore, in this paper the authors will try to provide answers by presenting a SWOT analysis of blockchain technology implications on activities undertaken by all participants in tourism intermediation. It implies to conclusion that everyone will face various challenges in its implementation which have to be considered seriously. The use and the general understanding of blockchain technology is still in an initial stage, so it is crucial that tourism research takes a proactive role in the exploration of this field of study. Furthermore, as trends are dynamic and evolve rapidly, the topic becomes particularly challenging for scientists in bridging practice into theory. Therefore, this theory-based paper on an overall assumption contributes to a better understanding of this phenomenon and raises the awareness for further research
Blockchain has become one of the core technologies in Industry 4.0. To help decision-makers establish action plans based on blockchain, it is an urgent task to analyze trends in blockchain technology. However, most of existing studies on blockchain trend analysis are based on effort demanding full-text investigation or traditional bibliometric methods whose study scope is limited to a frequency-based statistical analysis. Therefore, in this paper, we propose a new topic modeling method called Word2vec-based Latent Semantic Analysis (W2V-LSA), which is based on Word2vec and Spherical k-means clustering to better capture and represent the context of a corpus. We then used W2V-LSA to perform an annual trend analysis of blockchain research by country and time for 231 abstracts of blockchain-related papers published over the past five years. The performance of the proposed algorithm was compared to Probabilistic LSA, one of the common topic modeling techniques. The experimental results confirmed the usefulness of W2V-LSA in terms of the accuracy and diversity of topics by quantitative and qualitative evaluation. The proposed method can be a competitive alternative for better topic modeling to provide direction for future research in technology trend analysis and it is applicable to various expert systems related to text mining.
Globalization and high technological applications that shape modern life, it creates unique needs in the financial world and payment methods and leads to changes in the ways in which money is used. While the change has spread the use of virtual and crypto money, it offers signs that it will gain more place in life in the future. This makes the knowledge of young people, who grow up in the technology-dominated world and will be one of the main determinants of the use and management of money in the future, important for predicting the future use of money. The main purpose of the research is to determine the knowledge of tourism education individuals about Bitcoin money type and their use of this money. In addition, the research aims to determine the views of the participants about how the Crypto currency use will be shaped in the future. In this context, data collected 214 participants from Anadolu University Faculty of Tourism and were evaluated with descriptive analysis and difference analysis. The results show that although the participants know Bitcoin, they do not have a deep knowledge of the money and its usage areas and that they provide the opinion that the crypto money will be used in the most purchase and trade transactions in the future. In this context, suggestions were given to the researchers who will deal with crypto money in the context of tourism sector in the future and to entrepreneurs who tend to use the crypto money in their enterprises
Abderahman Rejeb, John G. Keogh, Horst Treiblmaier
The proliferation of sophisticated e-commerce platforms coupled with mobile applications has ignited growth in business-to-consumer (B2C) commerce, reshaped organizational structures and revamped value creation processes. Simultaneouslyâ new technologies have altered the dynamics of brand marketingâ enabling a broader reach and more personalized targeting aimed at increasing brand trust and enhancing customer loyalty. Todayâ the Internet allows marketers to penetrate existing markets, create new online marketplaces and to generate new demand. This dynamic market engagement uses new technologies to target consumers more effectively. In this conceptual paper, we discuss how blockchain technology can potentially impact a firmâs marketing activities. More specifically, we illustrate how blockchain technology can empower the consumer-centric paradigm and foster disintermediationâ combat click fraud, reinforce trust and transparency, enable privacy protection, empower security and enable creative loyalty programs. We present six propositions that will guide future blockchain-related research in the area of marketing.
Aleksandar Erceg, Jovanka Damoska Sekuloska, Ivan KeliÄ
As one of the most interactive economic activities, tourism has improved significantly since the Internet allowed customers (travelers) to look for and create their trips without the need to go to a travel agency. Through the development of Internet marketing, tourists are able to receive information in real-time and view them on the screens of their devices (computers, laptops, mobile phones or tablets), and consequently they can create their own content and share it with others. Due to this development, we are witnessing a new phenomenon, so-called app capitalism, in which companies like Uber and Airbnb make money on services and goods they do not own and finding new business models in the tourism sector which enable customer-to-customer models. To be able to respond to these changes, the tourism industry needs to bring together knowledge, money, and technology for the purpose of creating new business models. The development of technology in all social spheres, including tourism, has provided a strong tool for consumers in terms of both acquiring and disclosing information to others. One of the rapidly growing technologies which is also one of the cutting-edge technologies entering tourism is blockchain. Blockchain technology captured worldwide attention in 2017 and its implementation has been revolutionizing various industries (e.g., retail, healthcare, tourism). The aim of this paper is to analyze the potential of the tourism industry in terms of blockchain implementation. Blockchain technology provides significant benefits to the tourism industry since its implementation can help increase competitive advantage, improve customer satisfaction and enhance performance. In this paper, the authors present the current situation in the Republic of Croatia and the Republic of Macedonia regarding the use of blockchain technology in the tourism industry. The main findings of this paper comprise the detection of key areas regarding why blockchain technology is not implemented in the tourist industry, and what processes should be handled. By presenting a case study of the implementation of blockchain technology in tourism, the authors analyze the potential of using blockchain technology in the tourism industry and discuss topics for further research.
Federico Caviggioli, Lucio Lamberti, Paolo Landoni, Paolo Meola
Purpose Evidence from previous literature indicates that adopting a new innovative technology has a positive impact on a companyâs business performance. Much less work has been carried out into examining whether a technology adoption has impact on corporate reputation. This paper aims to examine the latter topic in a context where social media is the channel used to share news about the introduction of a new technology. The empirical setting of the study consists of five retail companies located in the USA that decided to include Bitcoin as a payment platform. Design/methodology/approach Twitter data were used to measure how sharing news about the adoption of new technology could affect the reputation of the companies selected, keeping a clear distinction between the volume of data relating to social media responses and the sentiment expressed in the tweets. A panel vector autoregression model was used to incorporate series of data relating to news items, volume and sentiment. Findings The results show that the news about the adoption of a new technology has a positive impact on both the volume of tech-related tweets and the sentiment expressed in the tweets themselves, although the patterns of these two effects are different. The resulting impact decreases after a few days, both in volume and in sentiment. Research limitations/implications The analysis has limitations that future research could address by extending and diversifying the examined companies and the social media used as data sources. The research suggests that managers in medium-sized companies can leverage on the introduction of new technologies that have a direct impact on their customers and gain reputational benefits in terms of immediate visibility. Originality/value The research introduces an additional dimension of analysis to the current stream of corporate reputation. Although the literature has already covered the dynamics of response to events on Twitter, by focusing on the adoption of the new Bitcoin technology, the paper provides novel insights.
Open access
Digital Marketing and Social Media
Corporate Identity and Reputation
Consumer Behavior in Brand Consumption and Identification
This paper investigates the factors influencing the intention to adopt cryptocurrency payments among small to medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in tourism and hospitality through the lens of the technology acceptance model (TAM). This paper uses an original sample of 101 SMEs employing a total of 15,831 people in Taiwan. Structural equation modeling is used to examine the joint effect of both internal and external factors influencing the intention to use cryptocurrency payments. Results show that (1) strategic orientation, owner/managers personal characteristics (self-efficacy and innovativeness) and social influence have a strong effect on the intention to adopt new technology; (2) perceived usefulness mediates the effects of strategic orientation and social influence; and (3) perceived ease of use mediates the effect of self-efficacy on the intention to adopt cryptocurrency payments. The present study is one of few empirical inquiries about cryptocurrency payment adoption among SMEs. This study extends the theoretical foundations of the TAM into the specific characteristics of SMEs. Limitations of the study are sample size and a single survey design. However, findings of this research on the cryptocurrency payment adoption offer practical implications for tourism stakeholders towards supporting SMEs competitiveness. The originality of this study is based on the fact that cryptocurrency payment is a new technology, and on the potential of cryptocurrency payments to disrupt the traditional way of operating tourism and hospitality SMEs. Hence the importance to consider major factors influencing SMEsâ intentions to adopt this technology.
An online review system is an important part of almost every e-commerce platform, especially a tourism e-commerce. However, various problems exist in the current online review systems. The review content is stored in a centralized database of each individual platform. Each platform differs in review management methods. In some cases, the review score of the same product disagrees across different platforms. Moreover, a centralized system has low transparency because it is difficult to trace individual actions within the system. As a result, some users are skeptical of the reliability of online reviews in centralized systems. This work proposes a global travel review framework based-on the blockchain technology. The incorporation of blockchain helps improve an online review system. The best practices for online review management from popular platforms, and the guidelines from trusted sources are used to develop the new system. The use of blockchain improves an online review system through its unique features of high transparency, security, and reliability. Additionally, the proposed framework relies on a community-driven environment. The accessibility level of users is controlled by using the smart contract. There is no single authoritative owner of the system. All participants in the system can exert controls on the system equally. This work illustrates the details of a blockchain-based global travel review framework. The advantages and disadvantages of such a system are discussed. The proposed framework can be easily integrated with any existing platforms since it can be accessed publicly.
The popularity and emergence of digital currency can be attributed to social media as it has a large user base for online discussion. The crypto market is highly dependent on socially constructed opinions as investors rely on online sources to acquire related information. A headline is considered as a summary of an article in a single sentence as it is the first that can gain a readerâs attention. The objective of this paper is to analyze the trend of cryptocurrency headlines in terms of positive and negative sentiment. The dataset is obtained from the Kaggle webpage containing news headlines from five online platforms. The paper will be using a lexicon-based sentiment approach to identify the binary sentiment. Support Vector Machine algorithm will be used to evaluate and optimize the sentiment results. This paper contributes to the gap in the literature by providing an empirical analysis of overview changes of the cryptocurrencies with multiple news platforms and longer periods. The findings of the paper resulting in negative sentiment for the trend of headlines, but it showed a different view in terms of positive polarity. Furthermore, the TD-IDF model outperformed the sentiment model in SVM modeling. Keywords: Cryptocurrency, Sentiment analysis, Lexicon sentiment, Natural Language Processing (NLP), Support Vector Machine (SVM).
Blockchain technology has evolved as a promising means to transform data\nmanagement models in many domains including healthcare, agricultural research,\ntourism domains etc. In the research community, a usable blockchain-based\nsystem can allow users to create a proof of ownership and provenance of the\nresearch work, share research data without losing control and ownership of it,\nprovide incentives for sharing and give users full transparency and control\nover who access their data, when and for what purpose. The initial adoption of\nsuch blockchain-based systems is necessary for continued use of the services,\nbut their user acceptance behavioral model has not been well investigated in\nthe literature. In this paper, we take the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) as\na foundation and extend the external constructs to uncover how the perceived\nease of use, perceived usability, quality of the system and perceived enjoyment\ninfluence the intention to use the blockchain-based system. We based our study\non user evaluation of a prototype of a blockchain-based research data sharing\nframework using a TAM validated questionnaire. Our results show that, overall,\nall the individual constructs of the behavior model significantly influence the\nintention to use the system while their collective effect is found to be\ninsignificant. The quality of the system and the perceived enjoyment have\nstronger influence on the perceived usefulness. However, the effect of\nperceived ease of use on the perceived usefulness is not supported. Finally, we\ndiscuss the implications of our findings.\n
Cryptocurrencies have embraced Twitter as a major channel of communication. Employing social network analysis and sentiment analysis, this study investigates the Twitter-mediated communication behaviors among cryptocurrencies. This study determines whether a significant association exists between cryptocurrencies' Twitter networks and their credit scores. Data were drawn from the Twitter pages of several top cryptocurrencies. The results indicate that reply-mention networks had the densest structure, that the following-follower network structure was correlated with the reply-mention structure, and that the reply-mention and co-tweet networks were positively correlated. The results also indicate that cryptocurrencies' active networking strategies affected their credit scores and more importantly, that cryptocurrencies frequently linked with fellow currencies tended to have high credit scores.
From a consumersâ perspective, Blockchain Technology (BCT) holds the potential to decrease transaction costs, improve privacy and redesign social interactions, which potentially leads to enhanced consumer power in transactional relationships. Nevertheless, only a few consumers use Blockchain-based applications consciously. By combining earlier research about BCT acceptance with different conceptualisations in the technology acceptance field (i.e. the Technology Acceptance Model and Rogersâ Diffusion Theory), a Blockchain-specific model to explain the usage intention has been developed and validated by conducting an online survey among 157 German consumers. While most of them have recognised the technologyâs existence and confirmed its general relevance, many consumers do not know how to access and profit from BCT. Integrating the results of a Structural Equation Model and Pairwise Comparisons between typical attributes of Blockchain-based applications, specific beliefs about BCT usage are found to have a remarkable impact on consumersâ acceptance. Based on the results, strategies to promote the acceptance of BCT among consumers are discussed from a marketerâs, developerâs and researcherâs point of view.
Smart technologies are shifting how tourism and hospitality businesses capture, analyse and distribute data from the individual usersâ online activity. This contribution critically reviews the latest developments on big data analytics and programmatic advertising. Moreover, the research also sheds light on the use of blockchainâs distributed ledger technology as it can be used to facilitate secure, verified transactions among marketplace stakeholders. The findings suggest that tourism service providers are increasingly utilising tracking, geolocation technologies as well as programmatic advertising tools to target and re-target individuals online. However, individuals and organisations are becoming increasingly aware of data protection issues, and they often block marketers from tracking them, and serving them ads. In conclusion, this research implies that data-driven technologies facilitate the businessesâ customer-centric marketing.
Open access
Digital Marketing and Social Media
Consumer Retail Behavior Studies
Consumer Behavior in Brand Consumption and Identification
Purpose The purpose of this conceptual paper is to delve into the implications of blockchain technology adoption for brands and consumers. Drawing on the existing branding literature and real-life applications of blockchain, the challenges, risks and opportunities from blockchain adoption for four important areas of the branding literature are canvassed (i.e. brand positioning and corporate brand image, consumerâbrand relationships, online brand communication and consumersâ trust in the brand). Also, a future-oriented discussion is provided that highlights some important avenues for researchers in the field. Design/methodology/approach This conceptual paper sheds light on the potential implications of blockchain technology for brandâconsumer relationships. To do so, an analytical review of the blockchain literature is conducted, the nature of blockchain technology is presented and its unique features and functions for brandâconsumer interactions are discussed. Findings This paper ignites an exploratory discussion around how blockchain applications and platforms can affect consumerâbrand relationships, drawing on a number of real-life examples of blockchain adoption. This discussion sheds light on how blockchain features can impact on various areas of interest for strategic brand management, such as the adoption of digital currencies, brand storytelling, use of blockchain-enabled loyalty programmes, role of intermediaries in online advertising, counterfeit consumption, brand transparency and trust for brands in online marketplaces, amongst others. Originality/value This is one of the first conceptual efforts in the branding literature that draws on the scarce existing knowledge around blockchain adoption and discusses the potential implications of blockchain technology for brands and consumers whilst also providing directions for future research.
Juneman Abraham, Dian Utami Sutiksno, Nuning Kurniasih, Ari Warokka
Previous studies showed that a number of factors play roles in influencing Bitcoin penetration and acceptance, both at country and individual level, such as trust, perceived risk, security threat, perceived benefit, perceived ease of use, as well as macro-technological and socioeconomic factors. This present study aimed at finding theoretical models at the macro- and microlevels that are able to explain the penetration and acceptance. Study 1 examined hypotheses on the predictive relationship between national cultural orientation and Bitcoin penetration involving 60 countries. Study 2, using a construal level perspective, tested the predictive strength of psychological distances against Bitcoin acceptance, involving 565 Indonesians ( M age = 28.88 years, SD age = 12.482 years). The results showed that national culture of individualism, uncertainty avoidance, and long-term orientation are able to predict the penetration. Spatial/physical distance, social distance, and hypothetical distance are able to predict the acceptance. This research is pivotal in obtaining the fundamental factors of community vulnerability in accepting and endorsing new e-money, i.e. Bitcoin. Monetary policy is expected to consider cultural and psychological factors in intervening against economicâtechnological disruptive innovations developing among societies.
Purva Grover, Arpan Kumar Kar, Marijn Janssen, P. Vigneswara Ilavarasan
Although blockchain has attracted a great deal of attention from academia and industry there is a lack of studies on acceptance drivers. This study explores blockchain acceptance by mining the collective intelligence of users on Twitter. It maps blockchain user acceptance drivers to technology acceptance constructs. The analysis shows that users are attracted by security, privacy, transparency, trust and traceability aspects provided by blockchain. On Twitter more discussions on blockchain benefits than on drawbacks. Initial coin offering (ICO) is extensively discussed. The study provides guidelines for managers and concludes by presenting the limitations of the study along with future research directions.