Hotel website performance: evidence from a transition country

The Purpose – An evaluation of 197 hotel websites in Croatia was conducted to determine whether hotels in this economically lagging transition country exploit the potentials of the Internet as a marketing tool. Design/Methodology/Approach – A team of 30 trained assistants evaluated the websites using an amended modified Balanced Scorecard (mBSC) approach from the user-friendliness, site attractiveness, marketing effectiveness, and F&B informativeness perspectives. MANOVA was used to test main and interaction effects of hotel size, quality rating, and location on four website performance perspectives. Findings – Although hoteliers recognize the importance of online presence, most are not effectively using websites from the user-friendliness, marketing effectiveness, and F&B perspectives. Hotel quality rating, location, and their two-way interaction are significant in explaining differences in site attractiveness and marketing effectiveness. Hotel size does not explain the differences among the four website perspectives. Originality – In lieu of the rapidly evolving IT and consumer trends, this study provides hoteliers with an updated website assessment tool that can serve as a point of comparison against contemporary e-marketing approaches. Moreover, since tourism website evaluation is an under researched topic in transition economies, this article makes a contribution in the needed direction. The study ends with a discussion of results and implications for hoteliers, policy makers, and scholars.