The objective of this research is to study how Finnish consumers are influenced by user-generated hotel reviews when selecting accommodation for domestic trips. The selected target group for the research are millennials, also known as generation Y. The division of people into different generations and studying the behaviour of different generation cohorts is a great way for researchers and ana-lysts to learn how consumers’ views and behaviour is changing and evolving over time (Dimock, 2019). In addition, people that belong into the same genera-tion group generally have grown up with similar world events and life experi-ences and therefore they have learned to possess similar values, beliefs and pref-erence and to form a generational identity with long-term behavior and con-sumption patterns, which are a very relevant research topic (Kim & Park, 2020).
Therefore, it is important to select a specific generation, in this case millennials, as the focus of this research in order to learn more about the tourist behavior and views of especially this generation cohort.
The term millennial is generally considered to include all people who were born in the years beginning from 1980 until mid-1990s (Dimock, 2019). However, other interpretations exist regarding who is considered to belong to the millenni-als. For instance, another perspective suggests that millennials include every in-dividual born between 1980 and 2000. (Ketter, 2020.) Millennials are one of the largest generational cohorts and therefore they obtain notable buying power.
That makes millennials a significant consumer group and an important market for many industries, products, and services. (Mangold & Smith, 2012.) Previous research points out specific characteristics, which are very suitable for describing millennials as a generation cohort. Millennials are often considered to be tech-savvy, trustworthy, social, open-minded, optimistic, self-assured and very goal-oriented. (Kim & Park, 2020; Moreno et al., 2017.)
As consumers, millennials are found to value especially high quality, af-fordable prices and easy accessibility (Naderi & Van Steenburg, 2018). In terms of how millennials behave as consumers, it has been studied, that millennials are shopping and consuming more compared to previous generations. However, millennials are not found to be as brand loyal than the generations before them.
The reason behind this phenomenon is most likely the vast amount of infor-mation available regarding different available options and price promotions. In
addition, millennials like to select brands that are the most suitable in terms of their personalities, values, and overall lifestyle. (Moreno et al., 2017.) In terms of environmental issues, there is a growing interest and generally positive attitudes among millennials regarding the topic (Jain et al., 2020). However, previous re-search presents, that most of the millennials are mostly green in terms of their attitudes rather than in terms of their behavior as consumers. This is most likely due the usually high cost and inconvenience that are often the issues with more environmentally friendly product options. On the other hand, there a other views that show millennials as a generational group that are the most active in terms of environmental issues and willing to compensate more in order to purchase more sustainable options. (Naderi & Van, 2018.)
Millennials as a generation have grown up during the era of digitalization, where technological innovations have integrated into the everyday lives of mod-ern-day people and therefore the millennials have become very familiar with technology overall. In other words, millennials are generally perceived as the first digital native generation. (Moreno et al., 2017.) In terms of different technologies, millennials have become especially familiar with different smart technologies, such as smartphones, and with the use of social media. Millennials are very used to performing their different daily activities, such as information search and en-tertainment through social media and smartphones. (Kim & Park, 2020.) Overall, it has been researched, that millennials prefer more interactive types of media compared to more traditional media and are quite sensitive and responsive to-wards electronic word-of-mouth (Moreno et al., 2017). In addition, millennials are a generational cohort which most likely likes to share their own recommen-dations regarding products and services for others (Wang et al., 2018).
2.5.1 Millennials as tourists
Among millennials, travelling is considered as one of the main priorities for many. In terms of Europe, it was researched that millennials are the generation group, which travels the most internationally. Therefore, it is important to un-derstand millennials as tourists because their behaviour will most likely have a significant impact on the tourism industry. (Ketter, 2020.) Compared to previous generation groups, millennials are often more open and enthusiastic regarding travelling also internationally, most likely because of their ability to be more tol-erant and open-minded regarding changes (Lewis et al., 2021). Compared to pre-vious generational cohorts, even though millennials are often lacking extensive financial resources and are limited in terms of time available for travelling, mil-lennials still have very strong tendency to travel (Veiga et al., 2017). Regarding millennials as consumers, millennials are studied to value experiences more over physical goods. Therefore, millennials are more willing to spend money on trav-elling rather than focus on saving the money for the future. (Ketter, 2020.) In ad-dition, the technological developments have offered millennials possibilities to interact with people around the world and get more familiar with the world
out-side their home countries which may further support their interest towards in-ternational travelling. In other words, millennial tourists want to receive authen-tic experiences and learn more from other cultures through travelling. (Lewis et al., 2021.)
The opportunities for millennials to travel have increased significantly in the recent decade and it has notably increased the eagerness of millennials to travel. It has been studied that often the reasons why millennials are willing to travel are the desire to discover new places and cultures and willingness to learn languages and meet new people. (Șchiopu et al., 2016.) Millennials as tourists are usually quite diligent, responsible, and aware in terms of the environment and the environmental impact of their actions. It is also suggested that millennials tend to be quite appreciative of the local cultures and nature when travelling in general. (Lewis et al., 2021.)
Regarding how millennials like to travel compared to older generations, they are often quite open for new tourism trends and usually millennials tend to organize their trips independently rather than utilize group trips or package tours (Ketter, 2020). Furthermore, millennial tourists find sharing economy, which is one of the new trends in the tourism industry, as enjoyable to utilize because it lets millennials to adapt to the local culture better (Lewis et al., 2021).
For instance, different accommodation options that are part of the sharing econ-omy, such as Airbnb, interest millennials more than previous generations. In addition, millennials as tourists enjoy creative tourism, where the objective is to take full control over trip planning and to find unique travel experiences which suit the personal interests and lifestyle of the millennial tourists. Millennials also like to find and explore travel destinations, which are considered to be off-the-beaten-track destinations, which refers to places outside traditional, popular and overcrowded destinations. (Ketter, 2020.)
Because millennials are very used to utilizing the Internet and social media in their daily activities, especially social media is a popular tool among millenni-als for travel planning and for consuming travel-related content (Lewis et al., 2021). Furthermore, digitalization is very much present during the whole process of travelling for millennials, for example through the active use of smartphones (Ketter, 2020). Millennials often get inspired from travel related content posted on social media by other travellers, and tend to share their own travel experiences as well (Șchiopu et al., 2016). In addition, the influence of travel related social media influencers is significant for millennials who are planning trips. Overall, recommendations by others, electronic word-of-mouth and user-generated con-tent play an important role in travel planning and travel related decision-making of millennials. (Lewis et al., 2021.)