Policy implications for building destination loyalty of cruise passengers in Southern Thailand
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2022
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2565
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eng
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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
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National Institute of Development Administration. Library and Information Center
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Suraporn Mulkunee (2022). Policy implications for building destination loyalty of cruise passengers in Southern Thailand. Retrieved from: https://repository.nida.ac.th/handle/662723737/6609.
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Policy implications for building destination loyalty of cruise passengers in Southern Thailand
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Abstract
Given the fast-paced development in cruise tourism industry, thus many potential countries offer considerably more competition. In the huge growing cruise tourism industry, Thailand has a tremendous prospect for taking benefits from the expansion rate in the cruise market from the loyalty of cruise passengers who have experience at Thailand's port of call to revisit to the destination as land-based tourists or recommend to others. In terms of the loyalty of cruise passengers as land-based tourists, there is still not any study result that can be applied as proposed policy implications for building destination loyalty of cruise passengers to revisit as land-based tourists and recommend to others in Southern Thailand. On this account, the aims of this study were; 1) to explore the factors relating to the destination image, destination experience quality, perceived destination value, and destination satisfaction, which affect the destination loyalty of cruise passengers, 2) to examine the causal relationship among destination image, destination experience quality, perceived destination value, destination satisfaction, and destination loyalty of cruise passengers who experience in Southern Thailand, 3) to develop the model of destination loyalty for cruise passengers who experience in Southern Thailand, and 4) to propose policy implications for building destination loyalty of cruise passengers to revisit as a land-based tourist and recommend to others in Southern Thailand.
The study employed mixed method research. The quantitative research methodology was employed using an online questionnaire to collect data from 440 cruise passengers who being foreign tourists and had experienced at Thailand port during their cruise, and purposive sampling was performed to recruit cruise passengers’ respondents. The descriptive analysis was frequency, percentage, standard deviation and mean, while the inferential analysis was performed with confirmatory factor analysis (CFA), Structural Equation Model (SEM). Moreover, the in-depth interview was also performed to collect the data from a specific population of small size but noteworthy in terms of their opinions of cruise tourism as to the key informants. There were 12 key informants by had experience in cruise tourism for a least three years. They were office in two groups; government sectors and private sectors. The interview data were analyzed with thematic analysis. The study results and described below.
(1) The descriptive of traveling information showed that the purpose for cruise and visiting Thailand of the majority of respondents is leisure/holiday. Most cruise passengers have visited Thailand less than three times and were first-time cruising to Thailand destination. A beautiful environment and scenery is the majority motivation to travel while natural attractions and city tours are the most preferred attraction and activity onshore destination. Most cruise passengers arrange onshore excursions by purchasing shore excursions and spending on shore excursions and activities. Social media is the largest channel to gather information to travel to Thailand's destinations.
(2) The level of cruise passengers’ perception upon variables affecting loyalty of cruise passengers to revisit as a land-based tourist and recommend to others in Southern Thailand. The results can be summarized that cruise passengers have perceived destination image at a high level of agreement. Consequently, the destination image has six elements receiving all high levels of the agreement. Regarding destination experience quality, cruise passengers have perceived destination experience quality at a high level of agreement. Perceived destination value, all four observation variables were perceived at a high level of agreement. Destination satisfaction has a high level of agreement. Finally, cruise passengers who experienced in Thailand’s destination have a high level of agreement of destination loyalty.
(3) The factors relating to the destination image, destination experience quality, perceived destination value, and destination satisfaction, which affect the destination loyalty of cruise passengers were employed by using SEM. The factor variables analysis was performed in all measurement models. The CFA analysis result revealed destination image has six components, destination experience quality has four components, and perceived destination value has four components. Destination image had comprised of 6 latent constructs which are tourism environment, tourist resources, tourist activities, tourist infrastructure, social environment, and accessibility. Destination experience quality is comprised of 4 observed variables as follows: immersion, surprise, participation, and fun. Perceived destination value, is involved of 4 observed variables as follows: functional value (quality), functional value (price), social value, and emotional value. Destination satisfaction and destination loyalty are comprised of 6 indicators.
(4) Regarding the causal relationship, the result has presented six hypotheses were supportive which are destination image positively influences on perceived destination value, destination image positively influences on destination satisfaction, destination image positively
(5) The analysis results of The model of destination loyalty for cruise passengers who experience in Southern Thailand was confirmed by the good model fit indices: The chi-square statistic (X2) of the structural relationship model = 2855.193, degrees of freedom (df) = 1063, P-value = 0.087, the ratio between the chi-square value and the number of degrees of freedom (X2 /df) = 2.685, comparative Fit Index (CFI) = 0.975, Tucker-Lewis Index (TLI) =0.971, and Root Mean Square Error of Approximation (RMSEA) 0.039.
(6) Based on the above study results, the researcher proposes three policies implications for building destination loyalty of cruise passengers to revisit as land-based tourists and recommend to others in Southern Thailand: 1) Strengthening the effectiveness of destination image for cruise tourism 2) Building the greater memorable experience quality for cruise tourism, and 3) Creating and empowering destination value for cruise tourism.
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Thesis (Ph.D. (Integrated Tourism and Hospitality Management))--National Institute of Development Administration, 2022