Abstract:

Based on observations regarding the increasing role of CSR in the tourism industry and the positive impact of CSR actions on customer perceptions regarding a brand, the main purpose of this study is to examine to what extent the hotels in Romania are communicating their own Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) actions in the online environment.  Exploratory in nature, based on the content analysis of 189 hotels web presence, mainly WebPages, the research aims to measure the dimension of the CSR activities presented by the Romanian hotels on their websites and other online platforms, to determine the categories of CSR activities communicated and to profile the hotels more interested in communicating the CSR activities in the online context. The limits of the research result both from considering mainly the information posted on hotels’ WebPages as important platforms used to communicate with customers, but also from the fact that the CSR actions are analyzed only from the perspective of their communication in the online environment. A non-random sampling was considered by selecting the units listed on Booking.com in descending order of the score at the moment the information was collected. All 5-star units and almost half of the 4-star units were investigated on the basis that they may have CSR actions. Even if the research shows a limited interest of hotels to communicate CSR-related information in the online environment, there is a difference between the 4 and 5-Star hotels.