Memorable Tourism Experiences and Satisfaction Towards Revisit Intention at Tasik Puteri Terengganu
Abstract
Memorable tourism experiences have been debated recently in previous studies. Many scholars agree that facilitating and enhancing experiences is the most effective approach for destinations' attraction to resilience and flourish. Therefore, this study aims to investigate the significance of memorable tourism experience attributes towards satisfaction and revisit intention among tourists at Tasik Puteri, Terengganu, Malaysia. There are limited studies on Tasik Puteri, even though the lake has a beautiful tourist attraction, heritage, and history. A quantitative technique using a questionnaire as an instrument was the method used for this study. The data was gathered via face-to-face with 202 respondents at Tasik Puteri over three months (January to March 2022). Utilising the Smart PLS 3.3.9 software, the measurement and structural model were then evaluated. The findings revealed that only novelty and meaningfulness had a significant relationship with satisfaction and revisit intention. Interaction and involvement have an insignificant relationship with endogenous variables. It is demonstrated that novelty and meaningfulness are vital in attracting tourists to revisit Tasik Puteri, Terengganu, Malaysia. Hence, knowing the significant attributes could contribute to an increase in domestic travellers and their experience. It could contribute to the demand sophistication as one of the transformation strategies in Malaysia's National Tourism Policy 2020 to increase the enhancement value of services and goods to tourists. Thus, this study can assist the stakeholders such as Ketengah in pinpointing relevant elements which should focus on domestic travellers’ value.
Keywords: Memorable Tourism Experience, Meaningful, Novelty, Revisit Intention, Satisfaction
Introduction
Nowadays, providing memorable tourism experiences among tourists is vital in sustaining competitiveness in destination attractions (Seyfi et al., 2020; Vada et al., 2022). Hence, experiences are seen as immaterial, distinctive, continuing, and incredibly personal experiences (Kim & Chen, 2021). Therefore, there is a growing awareness that providing exceptional tourist experiences may be utilised to stand out or draw in more visitors as a competitive advantage as perceived destination competition increases. It can also help foster engagement and loyalty between destinations and the return of visitors (Chen & Chen, 2010; Vada et al., 2019).
Problem Statement
Moreover, in the context of tourism, "memory is perhaps the single most important source of information [that a traveller] will use in deciding whether or not to revisit" a certain place (A Braun-LaTour et al., 2006). According to Tung and Ritchie (2011), research has frequently explored the benefits of tourists, memorable tourism experiences with outcomes like returning to the places and recommending it to others. In previous memorable tourism experience studies, researchers that have conferred on the elements of memorable tourism experience (Kim et al., 2012) seven experience variables are suggested such as hedonism, and refreshment, lead to strong memorability. Many scholars concur that facilitating and enhancing experiences is the most effective approach for attractions and tourism-related businesses to prosper (Hall & Williams, 2019; Kim & Chen, 2021; Vada et al., 2022). In addition, all these components are perceived as an influence on tourist revisit intention. Thus, revisit intention has been accepted as the effects on tourist behaviour. An individual's willingness to return to the same setting or location and suggest it to others is referred to as having a revisit intention (Su et al., 2018). It was found that when a person demonstrates a genuine willingness to present a specific behaviour, (s)he often engages in that behaviour (Phillips et al., 2013). Hence, revisit intention may reflect the purpose or commitment on the part of the visitor to return to the destination and enthusiastically recommend it to others.
Therefore, the study site was selected to be Tasik Puteri, Bukit Besi, which is situated on Peninsular Malaysia's East Coast. This location is renowned for its ecotourism draw and is one of Terengganu's most popular tourist spots. Newspapers and social media outlets have promoted Tasik Puteri as a location with a lovely lake and scenery surrounded by natural features including waterfalls (Ithnin, 2021) and a location for sporting tourism activities (Ketengah, 2019; Lisut, 2018). Based on the body of literature that already exists on Tasik Puteri and Bukit Besi, studies have primarily focused on science and technology fields, such as the impact of past iron ore mining on Tasik Puteri's water quality (Khalid et al., 2018) and lake water treatment (Draman et al., 2020; Sidek et al., 2018). A few research concentrate on the legacy and history of Tasik Puteri, a stunning tourist destination in Bukit Besi, Terengganu. The findings showed the necessity to examine the travel pattern regarding memorable tourism experiences among the tourists that visit this destination.
Research Questions
The research question of this study is:
Do memorable tourism experience attributes (novelty, interaction, involvement, and meaningfulness) significantly affect satisfaction and revisit intention at Tasik Puteri Terengganu, Malaysia?
Purpose of the Study
Therefore, this study investigates the significance of memorable tourism experience attributes towards satisfaction and revisit intention at Tasik Puteri Terengganu, Malaysia. The goals of this study are to investigate the significance of a) novelty, b) interaction, c) involvement, and d) meaningfulness toward satisfaction and revisit intention. Figure 1 highlights the framework used in this study.
Method
Study design
This study used a quantitative approach to investigate the significance of memorable tourism attributes towards satisfaction and revisit intention among domestic travellers to Tasik Puteri, Bukit Besi, Malaysia. Self-administered questionnaires were used as a survey instrument to achieve the research objective. The population of this study is domestic travellers in Terengganu. Based on statistics, there were 1.28 million domestic travellers visiting Terengganu in 2021 and 202 total sample respondents. Domestic travellers have been chosen due to a policy by the government that focuses on domestic tourism that involves local people and destinations. In this study, convenience sampling was employed. One of the screening questions to qualify the respondent to participate is “Have you visited Tasik Puteri, Bukit Besi Terengganu?” If the answer is “yes,” the respondent proceeds to the next question. The data was gathered over three months (January to March 2022) via face-to-face at Tasik Puteri Dungun. Then, the structural model and measurement were evaluated using the SmartPLS 3.3.9 software with the data gathered.
Findings
Profile of respondents
The demographic of profile respondents as showed in table 1 revealed that 61.9 percent of respondents were female, and 38.1 percent of respondents were male. Concerning the age range, 9.4% of respondents were under 20, while 44.1% were in the 20–30 age range. Additionally, 24.3 percent of respondents were between the ages of 31 and 40, while the remaining 22% were, respectively, between the ages of 41 and 50 (17.8 percent) and 51 and older (4.4 percent). In terms of origin, 41.1 percent of respondents were native to Terengganu while 58.9 percent were not. 56.4 percent of respondents had made three trips, 34.2 percent had made one, and the remaining 9.4 percent had made two, according to the results for the frequency of visits. The majority of respondents (55.2%) reported they came to the site for vacation-related reasons, followed by business goals (22.6%) and visiting friends or family (11.3%), which made up the last demographic group, "reason for visit." 7.78% of individuals who responded continued to use the site for other purposes.
Partial least squares method
The partial least squares (PLS) method was used in this study to explore the integration among variables. According to Vinzi et al. (2010), the PLS is a prevalent structural equation model for management that is component-based (Henseler et al., 2009). Chin (1998) claimed that the PLS method has become increasingly common in tourism and business research in the last decade, influenced by its flexibility and ability to handle small to medium-sized samples. The PLS removes hypothesis that the variance and covariance of the dependent variable are homogeneous. According to Chin (2010), the analysis is carried out by considering the composite reliability, average variance retrieved, and bootstrap for t-values. All the study's variables are thought of as reflecting indicators. In order to determine the significant loadings, path coefficients, and indirect effects of the variable in both models included in this study, SmartPLS Version 3.0 and the bootstrapping approach (500 resamples) were used.
Measurement model result
The analysis commenced using convergent and discriminant validity analyses to assess the reflective measures. Factor loadings, composite reliability, and average variance extracted (AVE) were performed to examine convergence validity. All reflective items as showed in table 2 had loadings above the suggested value of 0.7. The scores for composite reliability (CR), which indicated how well the items indicated the latent construct, ranged from 0.935 to 1.000 and went over the suggested value of 0.7. The average variance collected was greater than the suggested value of 0.5, ranging from 0.828 to 1.000. By comparing the average variance retrieved from each concept with communal variances shared with other components, discriminant validity was assessed. table 2 presents the outer loadings, AVE, and CR.
Structural model result
Table 3 and figure 2 summarises the PLS analysis-generated structural model. This table displays the observed p-values and standardised path coefficients (β) together with the degree of significance that was attained. Model 1 shows the outcome of the association between the variables, as shown in Table 3. The direct effect consists of five constructs. The results showed that interaction does not influence satisfaction (β=0.066, p=0.640). Moreover, involvement does not influence satisfaction (β=-0.109, p=0.430). Next, meaningfulness significantly influenced satisfaction (β= 0.454, p=0.000), while novelty also significantly influenced satisfaction (β=0.270, p=0.020). Lastly, satisfaction significantly influenced revisit intention (β = 0.594, p=0.000).
Meanwhile, for indirect effect, there is no significant effect between interaction, satisfaction, and revisit intention (β=0.039, p=0.637). The same goes with involvement, satisfaction, and revisit intention (β=0.064, p=0.425), whereby the results showed no significant relationship between these exogenous and endogenous variables. However, the results presented significant influence among these three (β=0.270, p=0.001) variables; meaningful, satisfaction, and revisit intention. Furthermore, from the results obtained, novelty, satisfaction, and revisit intention exhibited significant influence (β=0.160, p=0.031) among each other.
Discussion
The study outcomes indicated that interaction had no significant effect on satisfaction. This current study also showed no relationship between involvement and satisfaction. However, this study's outcomes displayed a positive effect on the relationship between meaningfulness and satisfaction. Furthermore, this study also demonstrated a positive relationship between novelty and satisfaction and a positive relationship between the endogenous variables, satisfaction and revisit intention. For the former, the result is supported by a study by Toyama and Yamada (2012), who stated that tourists' perceptions and overall satisfaction are significantly influenced by novelty. Meanwhile, for the latter, Mai et al. (2019) in their study highlighted that tourist satisfaction and intent to return are believed to be essential components for any destination's success, among other factors. According to Nguyen Viet et al. (2020), satisfaction directly affects revisit intention, supporting the results obtained from this study.
In Table 3, this study identified the importance of the indirect effects of the novelty relationship on satisfaction and revisit intention. Zhang and Xu (2019) claim that at a deeper level, emotional arousal, and sensing seeking, both associated with the novelty of a destination, are found to affect a tourist’s liminal experience positively. Chen and Chou (2019) and a perceived “coolness” of a destination is positively associated with traveller satisfaction. Therefore, according to Goo et al. (2022), novelty-seeking positively affects a traveller’s intention to revisit a destination (Jang & Feng, 2007). This study also verified a significant relationship among meaningfulness towards satisfaction and revisit intention. Moreover, this study does not support the relationship between interaction toward satisfaction and revisit intention or between involvement towards satisfaction and revisit intention. This dissimilar with study by Nguyen Viet et al. (2020) found that, tourists can have a genuine and memorable experience by developing a deeper understanding of and active participation in local culture and local people's way of life. As stated by Tung and Ritchie (2011), this will ultimately lead to a surge in their revisit intention (Chen & Rahman, 2018; Romão et al., 2015; Vu et al., 2020).
Conclusion
The study investigates the memorable tourism attributes towards satisfaction and revisit intention to ecotourism destination in Tasik Puteri, Terengganu. Five variables are tested towards the memorable experience, and further, the indirect effects are tested to revisit intention. The result reveals that tourists' novelty and meaningfulness are the significant attributes that influence the experience and their revisit intention. However, at this destination, the tourists perceived interaction and involvement are still insignificant in their behaviours. This study showed that ecotourism destinations must offer unique activities, amenities, and values to tourists to attract, give them a positive experience, and influence their desire to return.
Future studies should enhance the study with different dimensions and perspectives to gather more understanding of the significant attributes of memorable tourism experiences. Moreover, knowing the significant attributes could contribute to the increasing number of domestic travellers and their experiences. It could contribute to the demand sophistication as one of the transformation strategies in Malaysia National Tourism Policy 2020, which could be increased by the enhancement value of services and goods to tourists. Thus, this study could assist the stakeholders such as Ketengah in pinpointing relevant elements which should focus on domestic travellers’ value.
Acknowledgments
This study is funded under Research Collaboration fund (RCF 2020-SS( 9/2021). Thank you to UiTM Cawangan Terengganu and KETENGAH for supporting this study.
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Fuza, Z. I. M., Hamid, M. A., Mahmood, R., Ahmad, Z., & Lah, C. Z. C. (2023). Memorable Tourism Experiences and Satisfaction Towards Revisit Intention at Tasik Puteri Terengganu. In N. M. Suki, A. R. Mazlan, R. Azmi, N. A. Abdul Rahman, Z. Adnan, N. Hanafi, & R. Truell (Eds.), Strengthening Governance, Enhancing Integrity and Navigating Communication for Future Resilient Growth, vol 132. European Proceedings of Social and Behavioural Sciences (pp. 526-535). European Publisher. https://doi.org/10.15405/epsbs.2023.11.02.41