Journal of Tourism & Hospitality
Open Access

Effect of Social Media in Tourism (Case in Cambodia)

Bora Ly^1* and Romny Ly^{2 *}Correspondence: Bora Ly, Paññāsāstra University of Cambodia, Cambodia, Tel: + 012757247, Email:

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Introduction

The social media environment has changed a lot in the last decade. The intensification of social networks has exaggerated changes globally. From the media to major corporate and individual users, everyone uses social media for some reason. Most deliberations go on blogs and social media. Significant companies are employing social networks in which discussions can affect a brand’s status that is why brands must stay awake on social media. Thus, social media is good and evil; however, it affects both.

Social media have become a preferred method to reach and interact with the masses that reach the exponential level. Individuals, companies, and celebrities have used their influence in increasing social networks as an advertising tool. An effective social media platform can serve as a robust outreach tool to disseminate information to those who need to consume it. Building a large follower base to engage and amplify a message is something one must do better. It is imperative, as it provides valuable information and insight into the services offered to users.

In Cambodia, as of January 2019, there are internet users accounted for 12.5 million (76%), active social media 8.4 million (51%), and mobile social media users account for 8.1 million (49%) among the nations of Cambodian population which accounted for 16.36 million [1].

The relationship between social media and the tourism industry is radically shifting the way travelers and tourists search, deliver, and justify information related to tourism have highlighted the role of social networking in promoting the leisure business. Research studies indicate that WhatsApp and Facebook as active social media platforms which have the highest numbers of users. The previous research argued in their study that the traveler’s perception about the usage of social media among travelers and the study enumerates the clusters based on demographic and other travel-related characteristics.

It is an essential feature for tourism to create compelling content in social media in both pre and post tripping time [2]. According to UNWTO highlighted, in the last 60 years, the travel sector has continued to enlarge and spread which makes it one of the most significant and higher growth segments in the world regardless of the financial ruin, and social networks are one of the most rapid growth sectors [3,4]. Hence, the critical objective of the article is to determine if social networks affect tourism, discover the benefits tourists perceive when using social networks while traveling, and determine if there are opportunities for strategic creation of value for the holidaymaker. The study will explore the question, “Does social networking website influence Tourism?” This article further examines the following queries to explore how tourism can utilize social media:

• The functionalities of social media which travelers reflect more significant.

• The benefits observed by utilizing social media when traveling.

• The way travelers observed the social media site when planning/taking tours.

To response to the constructed question, the value creation model of social media in tourism is employed based on the previous scholars Bechmann & Lomborg, Morville, Webb which utilized in tourism and Parra-López reworking on framework of Wang and Fesenmaier’s to define the benefits perceived by using social media when traveling [5-8].

The study aims to determine if there are any functionalities or benefits observed by utilization of social media in tourism significantly and to identify whether one of the social networking features in the tourism business or the apparent benefits of using social media is essential to voyager to see if it affects travelers’ incentives and arrangements. In this way, three hypotheses were performed on the model and literature to investigate the hypothesis.

Literature Review

Various scholars differentiate social media categories for blogs, content communities, content collectors, forums, and social networks (Gretzel and Yoo), and microblogging and photo sharing websites [9,10]. Vacation decision-makers are the higher impact information source when making travel decisions on these social media [11]. According to Kaplan and Haenlein mention that these platforms can be clustered into diverse realms such as networking, sharing, and gaming [12].

Web 2.0

As O'Reilly defined the evolution of Web 2.0 as the second era of simple and engaging web benefits that run a social and participatory virtual step for the association to communicate with collaboration, networks and partners [13]. Web 2.0 is the term used to depict an assortment of sites and applications that enable anybody to make and share online data or material they have made. A vital component of the innovation is that it allows individuals to create, collaborate, share, and communicate.

Web 2.0 contrasts from different kinds of sites as it does not require any website architecture or distributing abilities to take an interest, making it simple for individuals to create and distribute or convey their work to the world. For a long time, electronic communication frameworks (e.g., forums) are currently used for internet-based networks (e.g., wikis, blogs) and social networks (e.g., Facebook, Twitter) [14,15].

Social media

Social media is an online channel where a broad and narrow audience can gain insight into user-generated content and interact with others, allowing users to interact with themselves in real-time or permanently [16]. According to Mayfield notions that social media characterizes an online platform of sharing various forms including participation-social networking pushes the boundaries between social media and individuals through urging users to comment and provide feedback to enamored people, opennessthe service is open to feedback and contribution by comment and encouraging people to share information [17]. There is no barrier to accessing the current content, conversation-traditional media is about broadcasting, but social media is mostly considered as a mutual dialogue, community-it permits the public to create and communicate effectively with their common interest, and connectedness-most sorts of online networking flourish with their connectedness, utilizing connections to other sites and communities.

Social media is online, interactive, creating, modifying, sharing, and discussing internet content using platforms such as social networking, content sharing websites, and blogs [18]. Social networking has become an effort to attract users to online life [19]. Instead of using social networks for research, users join the company's comments and feedbacks [20]. Hence, the new social media business typically is characterized by consumer relationships and interactions. At this point, content and technology relate to a broad range of brands and how businesses affect consumers. As social media encourages participants and openness, it not only affects the users, but users also influence brand information [19]. As explained by Li, there are five typical dynamic members in the social network ecosystem, such as creators- uploading and publishing all forms of content, critics-criticizing and rating, collectors-storing, and sharing, joiners-connecting with other users, pages and groups, and spectators-reading the existing content [21].

Functional of social media-honey comb framework

Today, ordinary social media can damage products or brands because goats kill whales. Administrators still do not understand the opportunities and risks that social media brings. This understanding of the gap can be met using a social media framework. The Honey Comb Framework, firstly projected by Smith who merges and creates concepts from others Butterfield, Morville, Webb will be used [6,7,22,23].

These useful blocks or functionalities of social media express one facet or viewpoint of every one of the online networking backgrounds and its suggestion for organizations. With regard to Kietzmann et al. argued that these conversations, identities, presence, relationships, reputation, sharing, and group features are increasingly similar to social media builds that help to understand social media experiences and various dimensions/classifications. Identity

This functional block represents the scope to which the members will disclose their characters, such as age, sex, profession, location, etc. [18]. Users can easily share individual data about themselves on social media, so they do not have to worry about their discretion. They are concerned about their protection and the use of data from subsidiary companies. Users use several different methods for security.

Conversations

This functional wedge indicates how much a user communicates with others in social networking. Also, the focus useful blocks or topics of several social media platforms designed primarily to encourage communication between users. These conversations, which can be formal or informal, have a variety of purposes, and functional conversational blocks are essential for social networking [18].

Sharing

Share shows the size of distribution and content changes among social media users. General term means connecting in the form of exchange. These exchanges or shared objects are the reason people connect. Whether users share different kinds of social media by video, image, news, or shared content. If users share many social media platforms, they can be an essential way to connect and start a conversation [18]. A good example is a website that shares pictures and videos or shares music sites. Twitter and Facebook also share these features.

Presence

This feature shows the extent to which a user can know if someone exists and can be accessed. If users can find it online, they will know others in the real world [18]. Users post status updates and mark their location on specific social media platforms. Friends and followers can know what they are doing and where. Most social media platforms also automatically display users on the internet, including social networks and friendships. According to Kaplan and Haenlein argued that entities need to identify that the higher their social incidence, the more intense and powerful they are, and the presence of social networking is affected by the flexibility and intimacy of the subject [12].

Relationships

The dealings block indicates whether the user is associated with another user. The connection here means the connection between users, allowing them to talk, share, and follow as friends. The level in these relations may differ among platforms. They can make formal communication or the structure, for example, LinkedIn, in some cases. The focus here is on the professions and jobs in which users can work in a single organization or work in areas of ordinary or common interest. On many other platforms, relationships are not created or managed, like blogs. For YouTube and Twitter, links are not that important, so users can follow others and comment on all posts. As explained by Kietzmann et al. companies that want to connect with social media users need to recognize how to create and preserve contacts.

Reputation

Reputation commonly refers to both people and content that are related to trust and are frequently evaluated as well as implications for companies looking to engage in social networking. If consumers and companies value their reputation and the reputation of others, they need to choose a metric that will provide users with appropriate rating tools to choose from based on this information and target data such as followers or likes or collective intelligence [18].

Group

This feature block shows how users create communities and subcommunities on social media. Users can form groups on Facebook, Twitter, and Google Plus. Twitter permits users to build lists. The Facebook group can expose to everybody or free to request and approval. These groups are similar to offline clubs.

Tourism and information communication technologies (ICTs)

According to UNWTO predicts that international arrivals will increase by 3% annually by 2030. The WTTC says travel and tourism are part of the world’s largest economy, which accounted for 9% of global GDP with 30% of exports and 1 out of 11 jobs created globally. ICTs have been changing the travel industry universally. ICT-driven redesign gradually created new paradigm perspectives, revising business structures, and building out aspects and problems. ICTs engage consumers to recognize, choose, and buy the travel industry items and bolster the globalization of the business by providing instruments to creating, overseeing, and disseminating contributions around the world. ICT gradually plays a crucial part in the competitiveness of the travel firms and destinations as well as are turning into a critical determinant of organizational competitiveness. The improvements in ICTs' capabilities, in line with the reduction of the equipment and costs, improved the unwavering quality, similarity, and interconnectivity of various terminals and applications. ICTs give an incredible asset that can acquire favorable circumstances advancing and fortifying the travel industry's procedure and activities.

Social media in tourism

Social media is an influential part of tourist’s decision making together with travel administration and operation [24-27]. There are two significant tendencies shift bearing the travel system online. Firstly, Social media sites are popular in using for voyagers [28]. Also, the social networking site helps users integrate and share their experiences, reviews, and comments and use them as a source of information for visitors around the world. Because of extensive access online, users produce more influence in defining the production and transmission of data [27]. Secondly, searching has steadily bit turned into a dominant mode in travelers’ utilization of the internet because of the enormous measure of data accessible. Hereafter, search engines have turned into impressive entrance to travel-correlated communication Xiang and Gretzel, and play an essential aspect for the traveler and tourism industry [29]. With the rise of the internet, ICTs and social media are taking a new role in touring info exchange and change the form of tourismrelated. With the expansion of ICTs and the rise of the internet, the appearance of social sites as a new player of travel info exchange has transformed the form of the tourism sector.

Benefits of using social network in tourism

Because of the membership motivation typical actively participating in the tourism community and interests of members of the online tourism community Wang and Fesenmaier, the advantage of utilizing social media when planning a trip was formed and the use of social media intentionally when visitors were exposed to the benefits and the costs involved [4,30]. As mentioned by Wang et al. the trend of tourists to use social networks in their travel involvement is related to the benefits expected to use social network in this situation [31]. The advantage of technology using when preparing travel and trips are vigorous since the process of classification is complicated by the various characteristics of tourists, the utilization of social media has a positive outlook for tourists and is believed to have four main benefits including functional, hedonic, psychological and social benefits [4,8,31].

Functional benefits

Online networking participants figure out functional benefits when performing particular desires and actions online, for reasons such as searching info about travel, the association the types of benefits and social media usage is essential to defining travel planning and social media use in travel [4]. These advantages consist of the proficiency and comfort of web-based trip, where users can approach info without geographical or temporal boundaries along with the persistence of gathering useful information to streamline the decision-making process [8].

Hedonic benefits

Individuals also join the web-based travel for entertaining and pleasures such as entertainment, enjoyment, pursuit of fun, and other encouraging sentiments [8].

Psychological benefits

The internet-related travel community also makes a part of life, giving users the mental benefits they need such as a sense of affiliation to a particular community and a connection with community groups and this can be achieved to continuing dissemination of information in a collective setting [4].

Social benefits

The internet-related travel community is sociologically organized and offers social benefits such as engaging with visitors, exchanging ideas, building relationships with other travelers, exchanging information, and engaging with users in community trust [30,31]. Internet users grow from non-social information collection to social activity as their participation in online communities increases [32].

The consequence of social media for the travel sector

Company-created promotions allow customers to practice volunteerism, verbal feedback and social media communication through the impact of anticipated encouragement Casaló and Romero, the increase in user-generated content is progressively affecting the decision-making and behavior of travelers and tourists [33,34]. In the same way, the use of social network can identify the potential associated with tourist spots [35]. Then, the growing demand for openness and accountability, along with the increase of social site and user-generated content, create strong interactions.

As explained by Scott and Orlikowsky that the view provided by the ranking process in the case of social networking sites is augmented by the fact that it is a global website that extends both the reach of rank information and the rate of generation of rank information which available all and every day so users can continue to contribute [34]. They also claimed that previously rating websites such as the online travel community (e.g., Tripadvisor) became famous institutions such as the National Tourist Board or Travel Guides, controlling the evaluation and rating process of the tourism industry in line with international arbitration standards but presently Tripadvisor reviews reflect a traveler's personal opinions about the traveler's perceived and may show up a day after the stay. Again, Tripadvisor needs inspectors to evaluate the identical (rooms, services, amenities, and location), but the meaning of traveler ratings does not create value for a particular traveler [34].

In social media, the symbol of online authentication reconstructs and identifies responsible relationships in the travel and tourism industry. In some cases, this change in accountability and online travel reviews have had a significant impact on travel companies so that discussions can mean a difference in profit and loss for tourism and hospitality businesses [34]. In the same way, participating in social media and tourism is influencing how companies in the industry run marketing campaigns. The rapid change in consumer behavior on these platforms and the prominence of audiovisual content has given hotel chains and other players an excellent opportunity to target those who can be guests [36].

The resource-based view model (RBV)

Concerning Porter and Advantage argued that one of the main focus of strategic management is to identify the source of the company's sustainable competitive advantage [37]. Since the 1960s, research has been carried out using a framework (SWOT analysis) that deals with the company's internal and external analysis. The context suggests that companies develop a sustainable competitive advantage if they implement strategies to neutralize threats and respond to opportunities to develop their strengths and avoid weaknesses [38]. Despite the literature on internal analysis of strengths and weaknesses and external analysis of opportunities and threats, the author began to focus on examining the opportunities and threats of the company based on a competitive environment in the 1980s because of their high performance. An example of this type of analysis is Porter's five force models [38]. Additionally, Barney mentioned that the typical environmental problem of competitive advantage is that a company in a particular industry can hold genetic resources, and thinks that these resources are more mobile than their players, this means that funds are not sustainable competitive advantages.

The RBV model looks at the link of the company’s internal attributes and achievement and observes the impact of crucial rules in analyzing a sustainable competitive advantage in two phases. First, assuming that companies in a particular business can hold strategic genetic resources. Second, supposing that these resources are not extremely moveable throughout the company; the mixed supplies and company can last a long time.

Key concepts

Three significant notions of comprehending the resource-based view model are competitive advantage, resources, and sustainable competitive advantage. Firstly, a competitive advantage arises when companies implement value creation strategies that are not used by their rivals Finally, the benefit of sustainable competition occurs even when they are the only company in a particular industry that uses value-creating strategies and also when competitors cannot replicate profits. Secondly, as identified by Barney’s resources, including the assets, functions, organizations, properties, information, knowledge, etc. which managed by a company that allows the company to apprehend and conduct strategy. Furthermore, Porter demonstrated that resources are strengths that companies can use to develop and implement policies, and they can be tangible (e.g., machinery, technology) and intangible (e.g., intellectual and brand names) [39].

Another essential point, to understand which resources are heterogeneous, immovable, and potentially competitive, a VRIN analysis should be performed.

VRIN analysis

Not all resources in a business are equal and strategically related. Specific resources give the business a competitive advantage. As explained by Barney (2000), VRIN attributes can be discovered by focusing on four essential qualities includes Value, Rareness, Imitability, and Non-substitutable. These characteristics are an indicator of whether a particular support is diversified and stagnant. To illustrate valuable resource as claimed by Barney that the nature of a company can takes resources into account when exploiting industry opportunities and neutralizing threats. Besides, these resources are treated as valuable by allowing companies to develop and perform strategies that reinforce efficiency and effectiveness. Another essential point, firms with precious and rare resources will be strategic innovators by creating and implementing strategies that competitors can [38].

Also, to become a rare and valuable resource, it has to be imitated perfectly. That is, no other company can resemble, which is a substance of competitive advantage. As identified by Barney (2000), unique historical situations, causal ambiguities, and social complexity can imperfectly imitable resources.

Framework

The “Social Media in Tourism value creation framework” have been established for this study (Figure 1).

Figure 1: Framework of Social Media in Tourism Value Creation.

This conceptual framework is formed to link various notions and to better understanding of this article. This concept adopted in the honeycomb framework for social media functionalities Butterfield, Morville, Smith, Webb, may be useful for leisure industry and a revised version of the Wang and Fesenmaier, 2004b framework by Parra-López that defines the perceived benefits of tourists in utilizing social media for travel and trip planning. Therefore, the primary theme of this article is to determine what social media functions are performed in tourism and the utilization of social media in travel yield to the value creation of tourists or to influence tourists when taking and planning trips.

Alternatively, one variable to consider is the social media functionalities of the honeycomb framework may apply to tourism because they must create more value, which features are more critical and for tourists to effectively place themselves on social media and what sort should there be more on social media. Another possibility would be the benefits of using social media in planning a trip and traveling were examined one of the attributes to analyze. It is essential to understand what are the key benefits of travelers who use social media in tourism, so it is necessary to provide and connect vacationers. For example, by providing information on benefits to holiday travelers, tourism organizations can decide whether they should focus on providing information or focus on a sense of affiliation to the community.

Hypotheses formulation

It can be seen that various social media sites focus on varying features. Similarly, some concentrate on identity and others on sharing or relationships [18]. Currently, large social media sites do not focus on just one feature; they usually attention on 3-4 key features [22]. Specifically, Facebook's core functionality is relationship; however, there are quite a lot focusing on conversation, identity, presence, and reputation. YouTube exemplifies a media sharing site which key functionality is the sharing, but communication, group, and status are also significant.

In the same way for professional social networking site, LinkedIn core functionality is identical, and yet there is quite more concentrate on relationship and reputation. Thus, the first hypothesis is stated as follows:

H1: Tourists consider social media functionalities significant when taking and planning trips

Several scholars argue that the trend of holiday travelers to utilize social media when taking and planning trip is correlated to the considered benefit of using the website in such situations [31]. However, the advantages of employing technology in planning and traveling are vital; instead, the process of defining technology is complicated by the unique nature of travelers [4,8]. Thus, Wang and Fesenmaier believed that there are four benefits to having a positive outlook on employing social media such as functional, hedonic, social, and psychological [31]. Therefore, the subsequent suggestion is:

H2: Tourists consider the functional, social, psychological, and hedonic benefits necessary when planning and taking trips.

As explained by Mangold and Faulds that consumers see social networks as more consistent than corporate-sponsored communication, and it is indispensable that social media in business is active and communicating with consumers [12,40]. They must ensure that everyone has access to the content and is accessible to discovery, enjoyable, helpful, and useful. Thus, the last suggestion is:

H3: Tourists perceive Social Media sites as reliable, informative, interesting, helpful, accurate, easy to find, entertaining, and valuable.

Method

The participants were asked to pass the survey questionnaires to test the above hypothesis and consequently answer the research questions. The populations for this particular study consisted of social media users and travel habits of respondents in Cambodia (N = 500). All participants in this study were volunteers. Thus, this study employed both qualitative and quantitative. Also, the data is deployed to SPSS V.25 for analysis. Firstly, some basic descriptive statistics, including frequencies and descriptive are carried out in SPSS to assess the sample and what characteristics influence the respondents and what functionalities and advantages are most relevant, and thus to check the hypotheses. Second, the principal component analysis (PCA) is done to minimize a more controllable number of factors in a broad range of variables – efficiency and perceived benefits.

Findings

Based on the results, the representative shows that majority of informants were female (51.8%) with the group of age between 18-24 (83.6%), and most are the undergraduate level of education (85.2%) (Appendix 1A). Again, the finding illustrated that most of the respondents claimed they spend between 1 to 3 hours (53.8%) on social media every day. Concerning the group of dynamic members in social media, the higher proportion of informants considered themselves as speculators (31.8%) and traveled abroad habits at least once a year (37.4%) with the purpose of leisure (95.8%) (Appendix 1B).

Next, the more frequent source of information used by respondents when planning travel and trips is often using social media (43.6%). The second most popular is family and friends (43.6%), which the respondents often use their family or friends as their source of information. Also, mobile App sites are often using as the third source and tourism information (35.6%) and (35.0%), respectively. However, they never travel agencies/tour operators (35.6%) and rarely use travel websites (32.0%) as an information source for anticipating trip. Also, informants rarely use TV/Radio (44.0%) and never use travel magazine (31.8%) when planning a trip and traveling (Appendix 1C).

Analysis and Discussion

One of the main objectives of this paper is to determine which functionalities and benefits are more important for travelers. So, one question was asked in the questionnaire for that purpose, one about the functionalities. More specifically, to avoid that respondents answered what they thought was correct instead of what they considered necessary, the respondents are asked to rate the importance of various statements that represented the functionalities indirectly to avoid individual biases.

A factor analysis is conducted to reduce the extensive lists of functionalities into fewer factors and, consequently, find out which are the principal components for the sample. In other words, two-factor analysis are conducted to determine how the sample perceived the different types of functionalities, if they perceived any differentiation between the different types of functionalities and which types of functionalities are considered more valuable. Ten items of the functionalities scale are subjected to a principal component analysis (PCA) in SPSS, but firstly, the suitability of data for factor analysis is evaluated. The examination of the correlation matrix reveals the presence of various coefficients of 0.3 and above. The Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin value is 0.867, which exceeds the recommended value of 0.6, and Bartlett’s test of sphericity reaches statistical significance supporting the factorability of the correlation matrix.

PCA reveals the presence of three components with eigenvalues exceeding 1, explaining 45%, 14%, and 10% of the variance, respectively. An inspection of the scree plot reveals a clear break after the third component, so it is decided to retain three components for further investigation.

To helping the interpretation of the three components, varimax rotation is performed. The rotated solution reveals the presence of a simple structure with these components showing several strong loadings, and all variables, loading substantially in one of the components. The tables used in the analysis and interpretation of this factor analysis can be consulted in Appendix 2.

By comparing the rotated components matrix with the mean importance ratings that the respondents attributed to the functionality statements in the descriptive table (which can be consulted in Appendix 2), it is clear that the sample of this study does not differentiate functionalities. As a result, component 1 includes Reputation, Presence and Identity, and component 2, also the Identity proportion, and last component 3, consisting of Present function. These components are also having some portions of conversation, identity and sharing.

While respondents do not differentiate functionalities, it is evident that respondents consider component 1 more important than component 2 and 3. Respondents consider Reputation the most important Social Media functionality; the two statements used to test the importance of this functionality are part of component 2 and 3 which have the highest mean importance: know the identity has a mean importance of 3.20 out of 5 and share the travel experience mean importance of 3.18 out of 5 (Figure 2).

Figure 2: Functionality means importance (Overall matrix scorecard).

The other elements that have the highest mean importance for the sample is opportunity of engagement (who wrote a review) (3.17 out of 5), and opportunity for engaging in various groups (3.13 out of 5) which are related to the conversation functionality, know the geographical visitors who wrote review (3.11 out of 5), which is associated to the present functionality and the dialogue in realtime with travelers (3.10 out of 5), which is part of the conversation functionality.

It can be concluded that tourists will consider functionalities important when planning and taking trips, which means that H1 is accepted. Reputation is the most critical functionality for tourists, and some aspects of the Sharing, Identity, and Conversation functionalities, listed above, are also quite important.

On the other hand, ten items of the benefits scale are subjected to a principal component analysis (PCA) in SPSS, but firstly, the suitability of data for factor analysis is evaluated, just like it is done for the functionalities. The examination of the correlation matrix reveals the presence of various coefficients of 0.3 and above. The Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin value is 0.810, which exceeds the recommended value of 0.6, and Bartlett’s test of sphericity reaches statistical significance supporting the factorability of the correlation matrix.

PCA reveals the presence of three components with eigenvalues exceeding 1, explaining 42%, 13%, and 11% of the variance, respectively. However, an inspection of the scree plot reveals a clear break after the third component, so it is decided to retain only three components for further investigation.

To helping the interpretation of the components, varimax rotation is performed. The rotated solution reveals the presence of a simple structure with both components showing some strong loadings and all variables, loading substantially in one of the components. The tables used in the analysis and interpretation of this factor analysis can be consulted in Appendix 3.

By comparing the rotated components matrix with the mean importance ratings that the respondents attributed, the perceived benefits in the descriptive table (Appendix 3) can be consulted. As it can be seen on the component 2 includes the Social benefits for the sample of communicating with other members with a mean importance 3.43 out of 5 where the respondents consider component 1 more important including convenience of communicating with others and obtaining information in Social Media with a mean important score 3.12 out of 5 which was the Functional Benefits, trusting the site/community with a remarkable mean 3.04 out of 5 that was Social Benefits, and seeking to perceive of affiliation in the community with a remarkable mean 3.02 out of 5 which was the Psychological Benefits. Furthermore, the component 3, which respondents consider the critical was the Functional Benefits the same as component 2 (Figure 3).

Figure 3: Benefits' mean importance (Overall matrix scorecard).

The most important perceived benefits of using Social Media when planning and taking trips are the Psychological Benefits; the statements used to test the importance of this benefit are part of component 2 and 3 which have some of the highest mean importance ratings: Social Benefits when asked about communicating with other members has a mean important of 3.43 out of 5, obtaining travel information was the part of Functional Benefits, and Hedonic Benefits embedded by seeking enjoyment/having fun with the same mean of 3.23 out of 5, also with the higher mean importance to the Hedonic Benefits was to be entertained/be amused by other members with the score of 3.21 out of 5 (Figure 2). It can be concluded that the social, psychological, and hedonic benefits are considered necessary when planning and taking trips. Thus, H2 is accepted.

Furthermore, to discover what is the tourists’ perception of Social Media sites when planning and taking trips, and consequently test hypothesis 3, the sample is asked to rate, in a scale of 1 to 5 (5 is strongly agreed), the extent to which they agree that Social Media sites are reliable, informative, interesting, helpful, accurate, easy to find, entertaining and valuable. It is considered that any mean score that is higher than 2.5 out of 5 means that the respondents perceive Social Media in that way, and a mean score lower than 2.5 means that respondents do not perceive Social Media in that way.

As illustrated in Figure 4, it is clear that the informants perceive Social Media sites when planning and taking trips as Helpful, Informative, Interesting, Easy to find, Reliable, and Valuable. However, most respondents of this study do not perceive Social Media sites as Informative, Accurate, and Valuable. Hence, H3 is rejected.

Figure 4: Perception of social media.

Social media impact in tourism

The study identifies the most important social network functions for travelers and reveals their perceived advantage.

The main benefit for passengers is their functional benefit in the collection of information, efficiency, and convenience for the collecting information on social media. Nonetheless, trust is also a part of social benefits, which is a crucial attribute to use social media. Therefore, even if travelers do not see the bulk of the advantages of social media as significant, they only find essential and useful information from social media websites related to tourism and tourism if they trust the business and the platform. Therefore, the company's reputation is the main factor in social media use during planning trips, which ensures that tourism firms will, above all, win the confidence of the voyageur in the social media.

A good reputation alone may provide a lasting competitive advantage as it can be VRIN. It is evident that travelers have a good reputation only by analyzing the importance they place both on the features and the benefits. Because the users feel the evaluations of visitors to be less skewed (Bickart and Schindler), most tourism and hospitality companies do not believe, and so, while tourism companies and sites have a positive reputation and only a couple of rival social media tourist companies are of a positive reputation, this feature is also uncommon [37].

Positive sharing and identity could be a source of competitive advantage sustainability because of value, rareness, imitability, and non-substitutable. When there is a question of functionalities and benefits, it is clear that positive sharing and identity are the value to travelers by merely analyzing the importance given to them.

As explained by Bickart and Schindler, the reality that users see tourist comments as less extreme than expert, this may understand that they do not believe most of the leisure industry. Therefore, few tourism companies compete on social media where tourism companies and sites are available, and this function is correspondingly rareness (Barney). A positive sharing and identity could be the result of a casual social relationship within a socially complex of the industries and its key stakeholders and rely on specific record adjustments that are typically difficult to replicate in this situation, positive sharing and identity are imitability. There is no proven substitute to replace a company's positive sharing and identity, so it non-substitutable, and as a result, can be a root of sustainable competitiveness.

This set of resources is valuable because it was considered the most important and influential for tourists. It could be regarded as rare if a travel operator emphasis on the above all belongings to provide tourists with a particular and individualized experience. Again, if a travel industry presents the features which visitors’ value most and offers tailored content and an extensive network, it is imitability and non-substitutable due to high connectivity effects and individualization. As a result, switching costs increase.

According to Kaplan and Haenlein claimed that social site lead to reach potential visitors at lower costs and higher effectiveness than communication tools and traditional promotion methods. Travelers do not rely on direct advertising, which focuses on the benefits of the destination. Instead, they need private access, such as two-way communication that includes compassion and emotional expression. Social networks offer an excellent opportunity to create engaging content and stimulate user interaction to stay competitive in their destination. A communication strategy focused on social networks is essential to differentiate the tourism business [10].

Conclusions

In response to the constructed question, the model “Social Media in Tourism value creation” is established to elaborates the perceived benefits of travelers while planning and taking trips. As Wang et al. argues, the propensity of travelers utilizes social media for planning, and traveling relates to the perceived benefit in such situations. The findings show that there is a correlation when taking and planning tips; tourists consider the functionalities of social media as significant. Also, tourists view the functional, hedonic, social, and psychological benefits essential when planning and traveling as well as their perceptions on social media sites as easy to find, engaging, entertaining, informative, reliable, useful, valuable and accurate.

After examining the approach on tourism impact of social media, the most critical positive sharing and identity and various social media resources for travelers are vital and could be the source of sustainable competitive advantage because of Value, Rareness, Imitability, and Non-substitutable. Travel industries can increase the conversion cost if they have a successful value creation strategy and focus on personalizing their services.

The travel industry provides travelers with service customization by giving a social media platform that systematically shares the experiences of users and similar people, and offers users the possibility to customize their privacy settings, and personal information will be added value.

Limitations and Future Study

Specific restrictions can be viewed as opportunities for future research. Firstly, the majority of informants were in the age group of 18-24, which represents for Cambodian tourists. It is interesting to test a tremendous representative over the age of 25, since it is social media that uses more social media or different. There may be interesting to have more respondents of different nationalities.

Secondly, it will be interesting to note that future studies will be carried out in a more conveniently to specify if some sort of the proposals examined in this investigation are practical. Consequently, one can research with a variety of tourism-related social networking sites that focus on various features, which is a way to see which features are more relevant to travelers.

Lastly, because this research is relevant to the whole travel and tourism business, forthcoming study should pay attention to specific areas, for example, the hospitality business, to figure out the specific strategic resources and competitive advantages when using social media.

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