| dc.description.abstract | The purpose of this paper was to examine the preferred social media application
network by employees in the tourism and hospitality industry. The specific aims were
to examine the preferred social media amongst Facebook, WhatsApp, Twitter,
Instagram, LinkedIn, email and YouTube, examine the relationship between
respondent’s gender, a position at workplace and choice of social media and finally find
out official the duties performed by the respondent’s using the smartphones. The
finding indicated that the most popular social media platform was WhatsApp (93%)
closely followed by Email (84%) and the least being LinkedIn used by only 25% of
respondents. Employees’ gender (χ2=5.880, df =1, p<0.05) and position at the
workplace (χ2=9.585, df =2, p<0.05) had minimal influence on the selection of social
media preference. The majority (81 %) of the respondents perform up to 50% of their
official duties with the help of their smartphones translating to improved and effective
customer services, reduced operation cost, and healthier business performance. The
study concluded that WhatsApp and Email were the most preferred social media
network and were used to communicate and transact business with customers and other
stakeholders in the tourism and hospitality industry. Smartphones are no longer luxury
tools but are part of the technology that every employee in the industry must adapt to. | en_US |
