Puzzling out characteristics of ewom inducing vietnamese millennials’ possibility of booking hotels via online travel agency sites

Puzzling out Characteristics of Ewom Inducing Vietnamese Millennials’
Possibility of Booking Hotels via Online Travel Agency Sites
Vuong Thao Nguyen
Tran Tien Khoa
Nguyen Van Phuong
International University, Vietnam National University HCMC, Vietnam
Abstract
This paper aims to puzzle out factors contributing to the proposed set of hypothesized relationships
inducing perceived electronic worth-of-mouth (eWOM) credibility and purchase intention of Vietnamese
Millennials when seeking for hotel reviews on Online Travel Agencies’ (OTAs) site. The study uses a
quantitative approach throughout surveying 365 correspondents in social network sites from February to
April of 2018. The findings illustrated that booking intention of Vietnamese Millennials was affected mostly
by source trustworthiness. Some notable peculiarities in research findings due to the potential differences in
nature of OTAs’ site have contributed to the debate of existing eWOM literature. Specifically, the current
findings not only enrich understanding of factors inducing perceived eWOM credibility but also benefit
marketers by providing preliminary recommendations in approaching Vietnamese Millennial eWOM
receivers, also known as the most potential consumers, on OTAs’ platform via credible eWOM initiatives.
Keywords: electronic worth-of-mouth; eWOM; online travel agency; eWOM credibility; Vietnam
hospitality industry; Vietnamese Millennials
JEL codes: D91, M, Z3, Z32
1. Introduction
Undoubtedly, the rise of internet and internet applications have enabled people to easily share information,
experiences, and thoughts, regardless of either location and time constraints (Allsop, Bassett, & Hoskins, 2007).
Due to the dramatic increase in the amount of consumer-generated media (CGM) platforms, there are shifts
from traditional word-of-mouth (WOM) communication to a myriad of electronic communities and virtual
networks (Lee, Park, & Han, 2008; Ye, Law, Gu, & Chen, 2011). Notably, one of which is the transferring into
electronic word-of-mouth (eWOM) communication. The fact that consumers tend to favor online users’
recommendations recently to make purchase decisions instead of advertising and professional advice drops a
hint that eWOM could be considered as a powerful marketing force (Park, Lee, & Han, 2007; Lee et al., 2008).
According to Litvin, Goldsmith, and Pana (2008), the influence of eWOM on hospitality industry seems to be
more significant than any other sectors. Hospitality industry provides experienced goods (e.g., lodging

services and dining), whose quality is usually unknown before actual consumption (Xie, Zhang, & Zhang,
2014). Thereupon, consumers now prefer to seek numerous reviews from various information platforms
before making a hotel reservation. According to a global survey of PhocusWright among 12,000 leisure
travelers, over 80% of them read at least 6-12 reviews on TripAdvisors.com before making a purchase decision
(Tnooz, 2014). The result of an investigation conducted by eMarketer (2013) also attracted our notice.

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eMarketer revealed that internet reviews and Online Travel Agency (OTA) sites are travelers’ first two choices,
followed by Facebook when they search for traveling information. As ranked in top two, OTA sites serve as
information centers where people can either search for information, maintain connections, develop
relationships or make travel decisions conveniently and cost-effectively (Stepchenkova, Mills, & Jiang, 2007).
Thanks to less biased reviews of higher credibility, OTA sites are very popular (e.g., Booking.com, Agoda.com)
(Kim, & Hardin, 2010; Litvin et al., 2008).
For this study, Vietnam was chosen as the specific setting for our empirical study. Recently, the dramatic
increase in the number of Vietnamese internet users has reshaped the interaction channels between consumers
and product images, which increases the chances for online social interactions. According to Internet Live Stats
(2016), the total internet users in Vietnam accounted for 52% of Vietnam Population. Notably, Vietnamese
consumers are willing to spend 25 hours per week on average browsing online social networks and interacting
with other online users (eMarketer, 2016). Besides, Vietnam is well known for its diverse tourism potentials.
According to Vietnam National Administration of Tourism (2016), there was a dramatic increase in a number
of 3-5 stars tourist accommodation in the 2013-2015 period, specifically from 598 to 747. These evidence give a
hint of enormous opportunities regarding hospitality industry in Vietnam, including new OTA sites targeting
Vietnamese online users.
With regard to the official statistic of Vietnam General Statistics Office (2002) in “Population Population
structure by sex. Age group and sex ratio (males/100 females)” in the 2001-2002 period, Vietnamese
Millennials comprise about approximately 40 percent of the country’s population of Vietnamese Millennials
account for about 40 percent of the country’s population. Another worth noting study of Zemke, Raines, and
Filipczak (2000) early stated that this generation will be shaped into the current high-tech, neo-optimistic time

and will represent the most technological adepts. Kersten (2002) also found the first characteristic springs to
mind when mentioned about Millennials is their comfort with technology. Existing literature also hinted that
Millennials would xf society into a new world of personal information by sharing and disclosing via social
media and mobile technology (Bilgihan, Okumus, & Cobanoglu, 2013). Notably, Bolton et al. (2013) claimed
that the Millennials’ behavior could indicate future consumer behavior since they are about to become
potential consumers of service products in the hospitality industry. Four years later, in 2017, Nielsen reported
on its official website that the Millennials had traveled more frequently than any other generation, including
Baby Boomers, and they will likely travel more due to the increase in incomes and financial standings. Above
all, the crux of the matter is that their preferences are sufficiently raveled for researchers to predict as they are
much more different from other previous generations. However, this difficulty has motivated us to further
extend existing literature by studying about this generation. It is noticeable that Millennials generation in this
study are any individuals born from 1981 to 2000 (Zemke et al., 2000).
As a side note, Wathen and Burkell (2002) concluded that receivers tend to adopt any senders’ eWOM
having higher credibility. Sources of eWOM credibility later appear to attract more and more attention of not
only academic researchers (e.g., Awad, & Ragowsky, 2008; Cheung, Luo, Sia, & Chen, 2009; Lin, & Fang, 2006)
but also practical marketers’. The fact that eWOM has long gained credibility in consumers’ perception (Leung,
Law, Hoof, & Buhalis, 2013) and becoming a significant product reputation signals affecting consumers’
purchase decisions when seeking for hotels motivates us to study about the eWOM credibility. There are also
several prior studies focusing on eWOM in the hotel industry in recent years. Many of them measured the
impact of eWOM credibility on purchase intention as mediated by various mediation such as trust (Wu, 2013),
perceived value, perceived risk (Liang, Choi, & Joppe, 2017) or response ratio (Xie, Zhang, Zhang, Singh, &
Lee, 2016). But few of them measured the direct impact of eWOM credibility on purchase intention. Another
study worth noting of Tsao and Hsieh (2015) noticed a shift in recently focused research topics toward eWOM
quality. eWOM with high quality is considered to enhance perceived eWOM credibility and purchase
intention (Jensen, Averbeck, Zhang, & Wright, 2013; Jiménez, & Mendoza, 2013; Zhao, Lu, Wang, Chau, &
Zhang, 2012). At current, this matter has not been investigated toward product offerings, especially in

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Vietnam. Besides, this research is aimed to contribute to the controversial topic on factors inducing eWOM
credibility, especially in OTA environment. While the study of Shamhuyenhanzva, Malon, Tonder, Lombard
and Hemsworth (2016) pointed out the partial mediation through source trustworthiness of interestingness,
homophily, and authority on eWOM credibility; much of the existing literature would rather use expertise
than authority to measure eWOM credibility (Lis, 2013; Tsao, & Hsieh, 2015).
In sum, adapted from three main empirical studies (Tsao, & Hsieh, 2015; Lis, 2013; Shamhuyenhanzva et
al., 2016), this study aims to (1) examine what factors significantly induce perceived eWOM credibility of
reviews on OTA sites; (2) investigate the direct impact level of perceived eWOM credibility on purchase
intention; (3) identify the mediation effects.
2. Literature Review
2.1. E-WOM Credibility
Source credibility refers to the expected ability of the information source to generate factual, accurate and
credible information (Cheung et al., 2009; Dou, Walden, Lee, & Lee, 2012). The more credible online review is
perceived, the greater chance that reviews’ seekers will make purchase decisions (Nabi, & Hendriks, 2003).
According to Tsao and Hsieh (2015), perceived eWOM credibility is an antecedent to purchase intention. Their
finding is also supported by the work of Jiménez and Mendoza (2013). Regarding the context of this study, if
the Millennial online users perceived hotel reviews on OTA sites as credible, they might use it to make a
reservation. Concerning Tsao and Hsieh (2015), this study solely used positive phrasing for all of eWOM
content to ensure eWOM content’s valence. Therefore,
Hypothesis 1. Perceived credibility of positive eWOM significantly induces purchase intention.
Source of eWOM credibility
Besides, many classical studies share a general agreement that source expertise and source trustworthiness
are two major determinants of information credibility (Applbaum and Anatol, 1972; Ohanian, 1990; Lis, 2013;
Tsao and Hsieh, 2015).
Source Expertise
Ohanian (1990) shows that source expertise is referred as the perceived ability of each to possess either
knowledge, skills or experience to answer whether it provides accurate information or not. In the context of
services, prior studies demonstrated that information provided by an expert source is more persuasive, more
authentic and has a greater impact on receivers’ attitude (Bansal, & Voyer, 2000; Wangenheim, & Bayón, 2004).
Receiver tends to display a high expectation of highly qualified information from the sender with high

expertise (e.g., knowledge and competence), so the receiver has little cause to question the correctness of
review content (McCracken, 1989). Base on the above argument, we propose the second hypothesis:
Hypothesis 2. The higher source expertise is perceived, the more likelihood that eWOM is perceived
credible.
Source Trustworthiness
Source trustworthiness, on the other hand, refers to the extent to which an individual's statement is
believed as authentic (Pornpitakpan, 2004). The information shown in a trustworthy source is considered to
be more influential, more credible and less doubtful than information of an origin considered less trustworthy
(Huang and Chen, 2006). In sum, we predict Millennials will perceive positive eWOM as credible if the review
is perceived to come from a high expertise sender and high trustworthy source. Thus, hypothesis 3 is
proposed:
Hypothesis 3. The higher source trustworthy is perceived, the more likelihood that eWOM is perceived
credible.
Homophily

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According to Miller and Hoppe (1973), homophily is supposed to affect source credibility significantly.
With reference to Rogers (1983), homophily is defined as the similarities degree among individuals in term of
certain traits. It is further stated that individuals’ similarity could lead to a greater level of interpersonal
attraction, trust, understanding, interaction and sharing mutual concern compared to dissimilarity (Laumann,
1966). If a source closely resembles the sender, the source appears more attractive to him (McGuire, 1985).
Previously, demographic characteristics (e.g., gender, age, and race) have drawn much attention of researchers
(Saiki, & Delong, 2006; Turban, Doughrety, & Lee, 2002) while similarities regarding attitudes, core values and
personality were paid no heed. However, in the context of eWOM, it is more arduous to measure source
credibility by demographic attributes due to the nature of reviewer anonymity (Cheng, & Zhou, 2010). Thus
we adopted the highlight of the study of Brown, Broderick, and Lee (2007) to measure source credibility by
shared interest and shared mindset. Based on prior studies, we suggest hypothesis 4:
Hypothesis 4. The higher the perceived homophily among senders and receivers, the higher eWOM

credibility is perceived.
In advance, the mediating effect of source trustworthiness was examined in the path from homophily to
perceived eWOM credibility. As such,
Hypothesis 5. The path from homophily to perceived eWOM credibility through source trustworthiness is
positive and significant.
2.2. E-WOM quality
DeLone and McLean (1992) declared that information quality significantly contributes to the success of an
information system. Besides, Jiménez and Mendoza (2013) stated that product’s quality in the mind of
receivers could be enhanced by enhancing the quality of eWOM, ergo indirectly enhancing purchase intention.
Notably, Awad and Ragowsky (2008) revealed that consumers care about the correctness and usefulness of
online reviews, and eWOM seekers are more likely to trust a content with good quality. Evidence reveals a
positive direct effect of eWOM quality on perceived eWOM credibility toward credence good (Tsao, & Hsieh,
2015). Therefore, it can be assumed in this study that high-quality eWOM on OTA sites increase not only the
perceived eWOM credibility but also the possibility that Millennial eWOM receivers make a reservation.
Hence, the next two hypotheses are proposed:
Hypothesis 6. The higher the quality of eWOM, the more likelihood that eWOM is perceived to be credible.
Hypothesis 7. The higher the quality of eWOM, the more likelihood that eWOM receiver makes a
reservation.
Concerning Tsao and Hsieh (2015), this study solely assumed high quality for all of the eWOM content to
ensure eWOM content’s valence. In advance, for this study, we took into consideration the mediation through
perceived eWOM on the eWOM quality – purchase intention path. Therefore,
Hypothesis 8. The path from eWOM quality to purchase intention through perceived eWOM credibility is
positive and significant.
3. Methodology
Due to the context of the study, we conducted quantitative research to maximize the number of data
collected to the reliability and validity of research hypotheses and research model. After collected, the data
would be analyzed and interpreted thoroughly.
Sample Profile and Data Collection
Google Forms, a free service for data collection provided by Google, was used to conduct the selfadministered online survey. Considering the purpose of this study is to investigate eWOM characteristics’

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impact on purchase intentions in a specific group (i.e., OTA users), an online survey is one of the common
methods. Besides, to assure the comprehensibility of the questions, the questionnaire was pre-tested on 50
respondents. Since there is no concern reported in these pilot tests, this questionnaire construction was
considered to be definitive. The final questionnaire link was posted on several traveling groups in popular
social network sites (e.g., Facebook) and several universities in Ho Chi Minh city where Vietnamese
Millennials are easy to reach.
Development of Measures
This research targeted only Vietnamese Millennials who used OTA sites to book a hotel, so the first section
included two questions regarding the year of birth and OTA usage to sort unqualified respondents out.
Potential respondents qualified if they are Millennial consumers who have made a hotel reservation from any
OTA sites at least once. The second section focused on identifying respondents’ profile, traveling patterns and
hotel booking references. The final section was used to measure respondents’ perception toward seven factors
and their relationships proposed in the literature review above.
The measurement scale of this study adopted items from different prior research and modified questions
to fit the identity of eWOM on OTA sites. We adopted five items from Ohanian (1990) to measure expertise
while using four items recommended by Whitehead (1968) to best measure source trustworthiness. For
homophily, we modified four items from the work of Shamhuyenhanzva (2016). To measure perceived eWOM
credibility, three items extracted from the study of Cheung et al. (2009) were used. We adopted 5 measurement
items from the study of Park et al. (2007) to measure eWOM quality. Lastly, for purchase intention, the final
dependable construct, we extracted four items from the scale proposed by Dodds, Monroe and Grewal (1991).
All of the indicators were positively expressed on a 5-point Likert Scale, ranging from 1 (strongly disagree) to
5 (strongly agree). The questionnaire was designed in either Vietnamese or English to ensure the
understanding of Vietnamese Millennials.
4. Results
Within three months, from February to April 2018, a total of 365 qualified responses out of 451 respondents
were collected through online surveys, which accounts for more than 80%, meets the sample size requirement
of Schumacker and Lomax (2010) (i.e., 250-500 subjects). The rest are considered as invalid either because the

respondents reported themselves to have not used OTA sites before or because they are not Vietnamese
Millennials.
As shown in Table 1, 100% respondents are Vietnamese, 83.8% of which are in 18-23 age group, and the
rest age from 24 to 37. Most respondents reported themselves to having bachelor’s degree (79.5%).
Interestingly, the next answers generally help identify a common pattern of traveling and common online
usage. To be more specific, approximately 79% of respondents spent more than 4 hours a day on suffering the
Internet for leisure, which indicates that Vietnamese Millennials tend to highly bond with technology and the
Internet. Secondly, Vietnamese Millennials tend to prefer seeking for information and reviews to

posting their experience as 61% of respondents reported themselves not to leave any reviews on
OTA sites. In general, 98% respondents traveled at least once during last year, 49% of which
reported themselves to travel more than 3 trips. Next, when further assess travel plans within the
next 12 months, only 4% respondents reported having not make up their mind yet while 66% of respondents
have already planned to travel within 3 months. Hence, these results emphasize the role of Vietnamese

Millennials as the most potential consumers in tourism and hospitality industry. Lastly, with

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regard to the percentage of favorite OTA usage, it is worth pointing out that domestic OTA sites
(i.e., Ivivu,vn; Mytour.vn; Vntrip.vn) are far less preferred to global OTA sites.
Reliability test
To test internal consistency reliability of the measurement model,we used cronbach’s alpha criteria with
reference to Anderson and Gerbing (1988). EXP1 and QUAL4 violate the rule of Field (2005) as their
“Cronbach's alpha if item deleted” values are higher than the overall Cronbach's alpha, thus they were
removed from the measurement model [See Table 2]. The result of reliability test after removing inappropriate
items well supported the internal consistency reliability of measurement model.
Preliminary analyses of empirical data
The Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin (KMO) Measure of Sampling Adequacy and Bartlett's Test of Sphericity were

conducted to assess sampling adequacy and examine whether factor analysis applies to the measurement. A
total of 23 items contributes to the KMO values of 0.891 at a significant level of 0.000, which exceeds the
meritorious threshold of 0.80 (Kaiser, 1974), therefore appeared to be applicable for further analysis.
Common bias method
As both dependent and independent variables were taken from the same respondent doing selfadministered survey might result in the inflated relationship between variable, also known as common
method bias (Podsakoff, & Organ, 1986; Conway, & Lance, 2010). To detect the potential of common method
bias, we conducted Harman’s single-factor test (Podsakoff, & Organ, 1986) with an approach of unrotated
maximum likelihood analysis extracting all variables into one factor. The single factor only covers 29.23% of
the whole variance, which is less than 50%. Thus the probability that a substantial common method bias occurs
is low.
Measurement model evaluation
At the initial stage, we measured the validity and reliability of measurement model both with Exploratory
Factor Analysis and Confirmatory Factor Analysis approach.
Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA)
As the measurement items were adopted and modified from prior studies, an EFA approach of maximum
likelihood analysis with eigenvalues greater than 1 through Promax rotation for 20 measured items was
conducted. Concerning Fabrigar, Wegener, MacCallum, and Strahan (1999), maximum likelihood best suits
data relatively normally distributed. The result of pattern matrix categorized 23 items into six distinct
components [see Table 3]. None of the factors loaded under the value of 0.5 meets the requirement of Hair,
Anderson, Tatham and Black (1998). Besides, there is no items having a value of loading value minus crossing
value greater than 0.3. Therefore, it is unnecessary to delete any items. Then, we used the determinant of the
matrix as a criterion to test for multicollinearity. As the determinant value of 23-item matrix is 0.000021, greater
than the threshold of 0.00001 recommended by Field (2005), multicollinearity is not a problem for these data.
Furthermore, the data highly met the requirement of Anderson and Gerbing (1988) that total variance
explained was 57.29%, higher than recommended of 50%.
Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA)
Next, we conducted CFA by AMOS software version 20 to firstly examine the consistency within measured
constructs using model fit indices and further assess measurement model’s validity.
Model fit. The results demonstrated that the measurement model fits the data well at p=0.000: the ratio of
chi-square test size and number of degrees of freedom [χ2/d.f.] = 1.42, root mean square error of

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approximation [RMSEA] = 0.03, standardized root mean square residual [SRMR] = 0.02, normed fit index
[NFI] = 0.92, goodness of fit index [GFI] = 0.93, and comparative fit index [CFI] = 0.98 (Carmines, & McIver,
1981). The measures of overall fit meet conventional standards. Hence, the measurement model met the
requirement of absolute fit, incremental fit, and parsimonious fit.
The validity of measurement model. All 23 items loaded significantly into proper constructs at p < 0.001 and
their value of Standardized Regression Weights are all greater than 0.5, which indicates the convergent validity
exists (Bagozzi and Yi, 1988; Hair, Bush, & Ortinau, 2006). With reference to Fornell and Larcker (1981), the
square root of each AVE in each variable [written in bold in the matrix diagonal of Table 4] is greater in all
cases than the other correlation values among the latent variables [written in off-diagonal elements in their
corresponding row and column]. Therefore, the discriminant validity of the measurement scale is also verified.
Besides, for all constructs, the composite reliability exceeds the threshold value of 0.7 (Bagozzi and Yi, 1988).
Following Bagozzi and Yi (1988), we verified convergent validity for a reflective measurement model by
evaluating the average variance extracted (AVE) of each latent variable instead of using items’ loadings and
cross-loadings. All of the AVE values [shown in Table 4] are greater than the acceptable threshold of 0.5, so
convergent validity is confirmed.
With reference to Fornell and Larcker (1981), the square root of each AVE in each variable, written in bold
in the matrix diagonal of Table 4, is greater in all cases than the off-diagonal elements in their corresponding
row and column, supporting the discriminant validity. Besides, Sweeney and Soutar (2001) suggested that the
discriminant validity is also assured if correlations between pairs of variables are significantly below one. As
the square root of AVE [shown in Table 4] is verified for all pairs, so the discriminant validity is also confirmed.
Therefore, the validity and reliability of measurement scale is confirmed.
Structural model evaluation
For this study, Structural Equation Modelling (SEM) was applied in-depth to examine the hypothesized
causal relationship between latent constructs as well as their significance level (Hair et al., 1998). Before
conducting SEM, we first assess the structural model’s overall model fit indices to estimate the strength of
relationships among scale items and latent constructs.

Model fit
The overall result is significant and shows good fit indices: [Chi-square] = 457.582; [χ2/d.f.] = 1.182 (< 3);
[GFI] = 0.906 (>0.9); [TLI] = 0.927 (>0.9); [CFI] = 0.936 (>0.9), and [RMSEA] = 0.024 (<0.08). As a result, the final
research model of SEM fit with data.
Hypotheses testing
Next, we used SEM to examine 8 proposed hypotheses. According to the Standardized Regression Weights
statistics [shown in Table 5], p-values of remaining paths namely CRED->PI, TRUST->CRED, HOM->CRED,
QUA->PI are all less than 0.05. Especially, with regard to CRED->PI, TRUST->CRED, and QUA->PI, all of the
p-values are highly significant at a confidence level of 99.9%. Furthermore, all estimate weights are positive;
hence these relationships are proved to be positive by the data. H1, H3, H4, H7 are therefore supported. The
statistics in Table 5 also reveal that regarding the strength of relationships on CRED, TRUST shows the
strongest positive effect (0.556) highly significant under the confidence level of 99.9%.
In the contrary, p-values of two paths, namely EXP->CRED and QUA->CRED, are greater than 0.05, which
indicates the significance under the confidence level of 95%. Consequently, H2, H6 are not supported by data.
Mediation

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Last but not least, for the initial purpose of this study, we examined each of two indirect paths proposed
above. One of which is from HOM to CRED through TRUST. Another is from QUA to PI as mediated by
CRED. Based on the results in table 6 [see Table 6], the path from HOM to CRED through TRUST (i.e.,
parameter AxB) is positive and significant at p < 0.01. Meanwhile, the indirect effect of QUA on PI as mediated
by CRED (i.e., parameter DxE) is positive but not significant (p = 0.519). As a result, H5 is supported while H8
is disregarded.
To summarize, the results of hypotheses testing and the final research model are shown in Figure 1.
5. Conclusions
It is noticeable that travel pattern of 365 respondents indicates a potential market toward hospitality
products in Vietnam. That Vietnamese Millennials comprise of approximately 40% of the total population
contributes to the potential of tourism and hospitality industry in the not too distance future. Most of the

respondents traveled a lot during the last year, 1-5 trips most commonly. The trend of traveling is predicted
to continuously raising due to the low fare of flights and accommodations. Seven-tenths of respondents
already made a plan to travel within 3 months. Besides, four fifth of respondents spent more than 4 hours a
day to wandering the Internet for leisure purpose, hence it is more likely to trigger them to travel or seek for
information through OTA sites.
With the main objectives are relationship prediction and explanation of target constructs, we examine five
distinct variables namely expertise, trustworthiness, homophily, perceived eWOM credibility and purchase
intention. The measurement model had a very good fit, and all of Cronbach’s alpha values are highly good.
The results revealed sets of the relationship between proposed variables related to eWOM that have not been
investigated in the context of OTA site in Vietnam before. To be more specific, the path estimation from
perceived eWOM credibility to purchase intention is positive and significant, which is consistent with our
prediction and findings of Tsao and Hsied (2015), perceived eWOM credibility is a strong antecedent to
purchase intention, in which the impact level is 40.2%. Therefore, it can be concluded that Vietnamese
Millennial online users make a reservation if they consider the positive reviews on OTA about that hotel is
credible; on the contrary, if reviews are regarded as fake or manipulated by marketers, the final purchase
decision is unlikely to be made. Furthermore, these Vietnamese Millennial respondents share similarities with
another target sample of Tsao and Hsieh’s study (2015).
With regard to factors inducing perceived eWOM credibility, we examined four distinct direct paths from
source trustworthiness, source expertise, homophily and eWOM quality. In summary, the proposed

theoretical framework has confirmed that the path estimation from homophily and source
trustworthiness to perceived eWOM credibility are positive and significant, once again consistent with the
finding of Shamhuyenhanzva et al. (2016). In specific, the study revealed among the four antecedents of
perceived eWOM credibility; source trustworthiness shows the strongest effect regarding standardized
regression weights estimated, in which the impact level reached to more than 50%. This finding is
supported by either Lis (2013) or Shamhuyenhanzva et al. (2016), which indicates once the reviewers are
perceived to be right, trustworthy, honest and just, there is more likelihood that receivers will follow the
recommendation.
On the contrary to the work of Lis (2013) and Tsao and Hsieh (2015), we found no significant effect of source
expertise on perceived eWOM credibility as well as eWOM with high quality on perceived eWOM credibility.

According to Lis, the disclosure of user’s identity hinders the generation of homophily due to the anonymity
environment on OTA sites. However, the difference could have been explained by the assumption that OTA
environment creates a strong tie between individuals sharing same interests or concerns in traveling and
booking hotels. Meanwhile, although reviews are perceived to be accurate, complete, reliable and useful,

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eWOM seekers might question the objective of the reviewer. In other words, eWOM seekers still question the
posting purpose of reviewers.
As a further investigation, we explore two indirect effects, one of which is on perceived eWOM credibility
of homophily. The result shows a significant positive effect. Besides, we found a positive significant direct
effect from homophily to perceived eWOM credibility; thus source trustworthiness partially mediates the
effect of homophily on perceived eWOM credibility. This finding again matchs with the work of
Shamhuyenhanzva et al. (2016). With regard to the second indirect effect, neither direct effect from eWOM
quality on purchase intention nor the mediation through perceived eWOM credibility was found to be
significant. Hence, the mediation through perceived eWOM credibility on purchase intention of eWOM
quality is unnecessary.
The significance of the study and practical implication
The research findings have contributed to the extension of existing eWOM literature, particularly in
Vietnam industry. The findings provide and support empirical evidence on the usability of source
trustworthiness, homophily on the perception of eWOM credibility and the significant direct positive impact
of perceived eWOM credibility on purchase intention not only toward credence goods but also toward
experienced products in the hospitality sector. Notably, the peculiarity in the effect of source expertise and
eWOM with high quality, with reference to the finding of Lis (2013) and Tsao and Hsieh (2015), has contributed
to the debate of existing eWOM literature.
With regard to the practical implications, we propose some initial recommendations that practical
marketers may find them useful in enhancing purchase intention and attracting potential consumers via
credible eWOM initiatives. Firstly, marketers of OTA sites must bear in mind that remaining credibility within
any online environment is a must. The results also suggest the three main factors including OTA’s

trustworthiness can homophily can significantly induce potential consumers’ perception of reviews
credibility. Therefore, several recommendations such as keeping track of either negative or positive hotels’
reviews while ensuring the feeling of belongingness among eWOM seekers can be adopted. Manipulating fake
reviews with high-quality content under the perception of an expert can enrich the positiveness of review
content but cannot induce perceived eWOM credibility. Instead, marketers had better act as moderators and
enabled potential consumers to leave and exchange their views with others freely. By designing and executing
marketing strategies together with providing good services, marketers probably can trigger real consumers to
leave positive reviews.
Limitations and Future Research
Several limitations should be acknowledged in this study. Firstly, the results might have been influenced
by common method bias. Even though Harman’s single-factor test was conducted to test for this bias, potential
bias from the researchers in developing the questionnaire still exists. Thus, we applied pretest on 50
respondents to reduce it as much as possible. Secondly, the trend of traveling via OTA sites is still in the
primitive stage and just started to become more popular in Vietnam. Besides, with the enormous limitation of
non-probability sampling is that inferences cannot be drawn about the larger population based on a nonprobability sample. Therefore, the results should be interpreted as only explaining the majority of Vietnamese
Millennials using OTA sites rather than all Vietnamese Millennial travelers. Thirdly, the Cronbach’s alpha of
expertise and homophily (respectively 0.680, 0.605) is somewhat lower than the suggested value of 0.70.
Finally, this study only examined the effect of positive eWOM with high quality, the relationship among
proposed variables should be assumed with neither reviews with low quality nor negative reviews.
Due to four limitations above, we recommend future researchers to employ a 2x2 factorial design of eWOM
quality (high vs. low) and perceived eWOM credibility (positive vs. negative) to provide more insights about

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OTA environment. Researchers can also further consider the effect of either fare or OTA’s booking policies
(e.g., deposit and payment method) on purchase intention. Comparing OTA sites’ experience of the
Millennials with other generations’ (e.g., generation Z, generation X) might also come up with an interesting
conclusion.
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Acknowledgement
It is acknowledged that this work is not supported by any funding organizations.

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Tables and Figures
Table 1. Socio-demographic profile of the respondents.
Category

%

Nationality

Category

%

Less than 1 hour

4.4

Category
Travel plans
months
Not yet

1-3 hours

17.0

Within 1 month

29.9

Time spent online for leisure (per day)

Vietnamese

100

Age

%
within
4.1

18-23

83.8

4-5 hours

47.1

Within 3 months

36.2

24-37

16.2

More than 5 hours

31.5

Within 6 months

23.8

Reviews-posting experience

Within 12 months

6.0

15.3

Yes

39.5

Favorite OTA site

2.2

No

60.5

Traveloka.com

36.4

79.5

Trips took during the past year (2017)

Booking.com

27.7

3.0

0

2.5

Agoda.com

16.2

1-2

48.5

TripAdvisors.com

12.6

3-5

42.5

Ivivu.vn

3.0

6-10

5.5

Mytour.vn

2.5

> 10

1.1

Airbnb.com

1.1

Vntrip.vn

0.5

Education
High school or
less
Associate

degree
Bachelor's
degree
Master's
degree

N=414

12

Table 2. The result of Reliability test (before removing inappropriate items)

Construct

Source
Trustworthiness
(TRUST)

Purchase
Intention
(PI)

Initial
Cron.
Alpha

Corrected
Items
Total
Correlation

Cron.
Alpha
Items
Deleted

0.726

0.783

0.708

0.792

Item

Instrument

TRUST1

The reviewer is right

TRUST2

The reviewer is trustworthy

TRUST3

The reviewer is honest

0.688

0.8

TRUST4

The reviewer is just

0.605

0.834

PI1

The probability that I would
consider booking hotel on OTA
site is high

0.598

0.846

PI2

There is a strong likelihood that I
will book hotels on OTA site

0.714

0.799

PI3

If I were to book a hotel, I would
consider booking on OTA

0.756

0.78

PI4

I would make a reservation on
OTA site next time

0.694

0.808

EXP1

The reviewer is an expert

0.427

0.812

EXP2

The reviewer is experienced

0.62

0.736

728

0.845

0.85

0.791

if


Source
Expertise
(EXP)

EXP3

The reviewer is knowledgeable

0.606

0.74

EXP4

The reviewer is skilled

0.607

0.74

EXP5

The reviewer is qualified

0.651

0.732

Perceived
eWOM
Credibility
(CRED)

CRED1

I think the review is factual

0.689

0.768

CRED2

I think the review is accurate

0.729

0.726

CRED3

I think the review is credible

0.655

0.801

HOM1

I
have
the
feeling
of
belongingness when browsing
through OTA site

0.634

0.744

HOM2

I think OTA site represent likeminded individuals with similar

interests to me

0.616

0.753

HOM3

I favor OTA site because a wide
range of people are represented

0.594

0.764

I prefer to read reviews written by
whom have the same ideas when
getting information on OTA site

0.62

0.751

The reviewer is an expert

0.596

0.654

QUAL2

The reviewer is experienced

0.609

0.642

QUAL3

The reviewer is knowledgeable

0.712

0.599

QUAL4

The reviewer is skilled

0.124

0.837

QUAL5

The reviewer is qualified

0.562

0.662

5

6

Homophily
(HOM)

HOM4
QUAL1
eWOM Quality
(QUAL)

0.831

0.802

0.733

Table 3. Pattern Matrix
Factor
1
TRUST1

0.864

TRUST2

0.782

TRUST3

0.771

TRUST4

0.564

2

PI3

0.873

PI2

0.802

PI4

0.762

PI1

0.606

3

QUAL3

0.859

QUAL2

0.741

QUAL1

0.739

QUAL5

0.642

4

EXP5

0.721

EXP2

0.719

EXP3

0.714

EXP4

0.68

HOM4

0.721

HOM2

0.711

729


HOM3

0.704

HOM1

0.687

CRED1

0.844

CRED2

0.781

CRED3

0.657

Table 4. Scales reliability and validity
CR

AVE

0.847

0.582

TRUST

TRUST

PI

QUA

EXP

HOM

CRED

0.344

0.391

0.370

0.408

0.637

PI

0.763
0.344

0.853

0.594

0.335

0.497

0.452

0.426

QUA

0.391

0.771
0.335

0.839

0.567

0.420

0.465

0.341

0.522

EXP

0.370

0.497

0.753
0.420

0.814
0.802

0.397

HOM

0.408

0.452

0.465

0.722
0.468

0.468

0.504

0.460

0.625

CRED

0.637

0.426

0.341

0.397

0.710
0.460

0.832

0.791

Bold figures in the diagonal are the square roots of AVE’s.

Table 5. Direct effects of the structural model
Hypothesis

Relationship

H1

CRED->PI

H2

EXP->CRED

H3

TRUST->CRED

H4

HOM->CRED

H6

QUA->CRED

H7

QUA->PI

Estimate

S.E.

C.R.

p-value

0.402
0.117
0.556
0.199
0.028
0.196

0.07
0.063
0.062
0.083
0.049
0.067

6.565
1.886
8.324
2.782
0.581

3.38

***
0.059
***
0.005**
0.561
***

Decision
Supported
Not supported
Supported
Supported
Not supported
Supported

***significant at p < 0.001; **significant at p < 0.01; *significant at p < 0.05

Table 6. Indirect effects of the structural model
Parameter

Relationship

Estimate

p-value

Decision

A

HOM->TRUST

0.457

***

Supported

B

TRUST->CRED

0.556

***

Supported

C
AxB

HOM->CRED

0.199

0.005**

Supported

HOM->TRUST->CRED
QUA->CRED

0.004
0.561

Supported

D

0.295
0.028

E

CRED->PI

0.402

***

Supported

F

QUA->PI

0.196

***

Supported

DxE

QUA->CRED->PI

0.013

0.519

Not supported

***significant at p < 0.001; **significant at p < 0.01; *significant at p < 0.05

730

Not supported


Note: Dotted line indicates relationship not significant at significance level of 0.05

Figure 1. Revised research model

731