Consumer Generated Media in Hospitality and Tourism: Travellers' Likes and their Concerns about the Latest Innovation in Hospitality Marketing

This paper explores the influence of consumer - generated media (CGM) on hospitality consumers based on the results of a large online survey . Consumers surveyed like CGM information when booking travel for a number of reasons primarily as it is developed by ‘real travellers’; presents a range of different traveller’ opinions ; and is relevant to the user. At the same time, there were concerns raised about relying on CGM when booking travel, particularly related to the option for hospitality businesses to post ‘fake’ content and for the opinions presented on these sites to be extremely biased. -- International Conference on Hospitality and Leisure Applied Research (I-CHLAR 2011