The impact of social media phenomena on destination preferences: A cross-generation comparison

With the development of new technologies, the rapid increase in commercial transactions, negotiations, information transfer, sharing of feelings and thoughts, and the use of social media over the internet have made the internet effective in all areas of life. Like every sector where the internet has entered, the tourism sector has also taken its place in the virtual environment. As a consequence of this fact, digitalization and e-marketing activities in tourism are increasing day by day. Today, tourists can obtain touristic service information such as the destination, the hotel they will stay in, the means of transportation they will use, through social media platforms, and thus they can easily plan their holidays. In this context, the use of social media affects the choice of vacation. In this research, it is aimed to evaluate the effect of social media influencers on destination preference in the context of different generations. The data needed in the study, in which the relational research method was used, were collected with a questionnaire. The data were obtained from 450 followers over the age of 18 who follow or are affected by social media influencers, and 55 surveys that were inconsistent were removed and analyses were carried out on the data of 395 surveys. SPSS (Statistical Package for Social Sciences) program was used for data analysis. In the study, percentage, frequency, mean and standard deviation values were used in the analysis of descriptive data, correlation analysis was used in the relationship measurement tests, and regression analysis was used in the hypothesis tests. As a result of the analyses, it has been concluded that the perception levels towards social media influencers differ in the context of generations and that social media influencers are an important determinant for destination preference. On the other hand, it has been concluded that the effect of social media influencers on destination preference differs in the context of X, Y and Z generations.