How Familiarity Shapes Tourist Decisions: A Look at Reputation, Trust and Revisit Intentions in Ho Chi Minh City
Description
While Ho Chi Minh City boasts a strong reputation as a tourist destination, it struggles with declining repeat visits and lower brand awareness among international travelers. This research aims to understand the connection between a destination's reputation, the trust it inspires in visitors, and their intention to return. Employing a mixed-methods approach, the study combined qualitative insights from literature reviews, content analysis, and expert interviews to build a conceptual framework. This framework then guided a quantitative analysis of 400 valid responses using linear regression and Pearson's multivariate correlation techniques. The results reveal a significant positive influence of destination reputation on both trust and revisit intentions. Interestingly, trust acts as a mediator in this relationship. Furthermore, the study found that familiarity with the destination moderates these effects, shaping tourist perceptions and ultimately their travel decisions. These findings provide valuable insights for developing social media influencer marketing strategies within the tourism industry.