The relationship between sustainability and customer satisfaction in hospitality: An explorative investigation using eWOM as a data source

Abstract

Sustainability is a global megatrend and has gained increasing attention in the hospitality industry. To facilitate sustainable development, it is important to understand how sustainability relates to customer satisfaction. Previous studies do not consider specific sustainability measures in hospitality and neglect eWOM as an objective data source. This study investigates the extent to which sustainability aspects play a role in eWOM and how sustainability orientation in general as well as specific sustainability measures are linked to customer satisfaction. The results indicate that although only a few online reviews contain sustainability aspects, there is a relationship between sustainability orientation and customer satisfaction that is moderated by star classification. Furthermore, the results show that the relationship differs depending on the specific sustainability measure. Among the observed measures, "dissatisfiers" as well as "satisfiers", "criticals" and "neutrals" are found, supporting Cadotte and Turgeon's categorization of attributes in the context of sustainability.