Factors influencing Malaysian millenials’ intention to visit Indonesia’s halal tourism destinations

Abstract

Indonesia's tourism sector is expected to become the most significant contributor to the country's foreign exchange in the future, with anticipated double-digit growth in international tourist arrivals. It is a formidable challenge since the average growth of inbound tourists globally and in South-East Asia is predicted by UNWTO to only grow in single digits between 2010 and 2030. In early 2016, the Indonesian Halal Tourism Development Acceleration Team (IHTDAT) was formed as a breakthrough in seeking innovation and opportunities to achieve the expected targets. Among the main concerns of IHTDAT is whether the marketing promotion and the religiosity of the target market play roles in determining the intention to visit Indonesia's Halal Tourism Destinations. Malaysian Muslim Millennials are expected to continue contributing as the most international Muslim visitors to Indonesia. For this reason, it is necessary to focus on these valuable market segments and incorporate the two antecedents as determinant variables of the theory of planned behavior (TPB). Relying on the extended version of TPB, this study uses a quantitative research methodology and collects 396 purchase intention data through the distribution of self-administered online questionnaires. The Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) was used for data analysis and filtering. Furthermore, the data analysis in this research employed a PLS-SEM (Partial Least Square – Structural Equation Modeling) approach, and SmartPLS software was adopted to validate this research model. The findings of this study confirm that the original three TPB variables - attitude, subjective norm, and perceived behavioral control - were empirically found to predict a traveler's intention to visit halal tourist destinations. As for the two antecedent variables of marketing promotion and religiosity, the former relates to the intention to visit, while the latter did not directly influence the intention to visit. However, from the indirect relationship test, religiosity has a significant indirect relationship with the intention to visit with the full mediation role of attitude. Meanwhile, marketing promotion is indirectly related to the intention to visit, which is partially mediated by the three TPB variables. The empirical finding shows that the attitude variable has the most significant role in the framework. Meanwhile, marketing promotion is the antecedent variable that needs to be focused on influencing Malaysian Muslim Millennials' interest in visiting Indonesian halal tourism destinations. Thus, external stimuli of marketing promotion should be strengthened to engage with the technology-savvy millennial generation. There is a need to shift the traditional marketing promotion approach into the digital marketing strategy. From the various options available, millennials are more suitable to be focused on social media marketing through applications of Facebook and Instagram. Future research may explore user-generated content for a more trusted and engaging social media.