The Involvement of Reviews in Online Travel Agencies to Increase Hotel Booking Intention in Batam

Hotel reservations are currently dominated by online bookings from Online Travel Agent, therefore this research was created to assist hoteliers in knowing how the role of online reviews can influence consumer purchase intentions in making online reservations. There is no previous research that discusses this topic with the setting in Batam, so this research was made to discuss it. This research used quantitative method and tested using IBM SPSS, with the target population of respondents who have made hotel reservations using OTA in Batam, at the end of this study it is proven that the independent and mediating variables have a significant influence on the dependent variable. However, this study has limitations, which there are still invalid items and there are still many that can be researched in more detail for further research.


INTRODUCTION
Tourist visits to Indonesia during the Covid-19 pandemic which decreased dramatically did not make Indonesia lose its tourists, as evidenced when the pandemic gradually recovered in 2022 there was an increase in the number of tourist visits to Indonesia up to many times the previous year with a total visit of 5.89 million visits (BPS, 2021).
After Soekarno Hatta Airport and Ngurah Rai Airport in Bali, Batam City has become one of the main entrances for the largest number of visitors.The biggest entrance in Batam City is through the sea route or harbor.The number of tourists entering through the Batam Sea Gate amounted to 562,920 visits or 9.56% of the total visits in 2022.And in 2023 in the first quarter of the year has reached 585,860 visits through the Batam Sea Gate (BPS, 2021).
The air gate in Batam City certainly also brings a lot of domestic flights with the destination of Hang Nadim Airport in 2022 as many as 12,862 flights or an increase of 25.54 percent with the number of passengers as many as 1.77 million people or an increase of 72.41 percent compared to the previous year (BPS Kepulauan Riau, 2023).
Of course, the improving condition of tourist visits to Batam City greatly affects the existing tourism sector, especially in booking hotels.As the tourism industry has developed in recent years.According to Statistics 2019, about 12% of tourists book hotels offline and the other 88% book hotels online.Therefore, online hotel booking is very important for hotels to get more customers to increase their revenue and profit, where the intention of online booking is very significant for the development of the hospitality industry in the present and future (Xin et al., 2020).
The business world is now going international, competition is inevitable for business people.In the world of tourism, this competition makes hoteliers have to strategize in order to compete (Widhya Pibriari et al., 2023).One of the characteristics of a global business is to utilize technology as a platform for operations so that it is still able to provide optimal satisfaction and service to customers.
The Internet is currently an important distribution channel for the hospitality industry.The development of technological advancements has also led many hotels to improve operational activities through the integration of information technology (Hermanus & Indradewa, 2022).Therefore, online travel agents have an important role to play in the tourism industry to fulfill customer needs.Travelers can easily search for information from online travel agents and make decisions in booking hotels (Aeknarajindawat, 2019).
In previous research, it was mentioned that in online hotel booking, there are so many travelers who rely on OTA (Online Travel Agent).Such as research (Myat et al., 2019), There are 80% of hotels that create their own websites and can be found on the World Wide Web (WWW), but these websites are unable to compete with online booking through Online Travel Agents.Thus, OTA (Online Travel Agent) becomes a profitable online channel between hotels and travelers, so it is important for hotels to increase their revenue, and OTA (Online Travel Agent) also shows information to travelers related to details about the hotel to the feedback they collect from consumers who have already stayed, this is also important for hotels to improve their good image.
Although online hotel booking continues to undergo a major transformation from year to year with the support of technology and the internet.Many are factors in influencing consumer purchase intentions of people who have different needs, interests and desires.
Consumers also vary in terms of age, education level, income and taste, all of these factors affect consumer purchase intentions.Because of these factors, it is difficult for hoteliers to satisfy every guest.
In the past, it was easier to understand guests' desires.Nowadays the company has grown a lot.To know the purchasing behavior of guests, hoteliers can ask questions such as what they want, where, when, why, how, and who (Logt & Degree, 2017).
Consumer intentions should be considered and recognized because the actions taken by consumers are certainly based on consumer intentions, so to be able to increase bookings, you must first increase the factors that make consumers intend to place booking online (Hsu et al., 2017).Electronic commerce can be said to be an important role in reaching out to customers (Aulia & Kusumaningrum, 2022) Based on the above data and previous studies that have not conducted such research in Batam City, this research is made with an effort to examine several factors that influence purchase intention such as the factor of reviews on social media.In the hope, this research can achieve its goal to find out whether online reviews from an expert can influence a person's purchase intention in booking a hotel in Batam City or not.And hope to provide benefits for hoteliers to better understand the factors that influence consumer purchasing decisions on Online Travel Agent, namely reviews from experts or people with an impact in an online review column on OTA (Online Travel Agent), so that they can design strategies and develop plans for accommodations that are managed in providing excellent service to consumers, so that consumers voluntarily leave positive comments on the OTA (Online Travel Agent) channel so that in the future it can further convince consumers to book online.
Previous research states that purchase intention and expert reviews can influence online reviews, and these online reviews will affect consumers' online ordering intentions.
So that these four variables become the basis for the hypothesis in this study.
Purchase intention is the desire of the buyer to make a purchase transaction on a product or service.This purchase intention is an important indicator in consumer behavior when making an actual purchase.This purchase intention does not only occur during the first purchase, purchase intention also occurs when consumers want to make repeat purchases, Visitors may have the intention to repurchase, one of which is because they get satisfaction, when visitor satisfaction is achieved, it will trigger loyalty from visitors, one of the ways to achieve visitor satisfaction is to improve the quality of service from the company on their own (Ramadhani et al., 2022).In the world of hospitality, the purchase intention of consumers reflects when consumers want to book a room (Lien et al., 2015).
Reviewer expertise is defined as the ability to review and understand more about a product or service to process and display information (Han, 2021).Reviews from experts are usually more followed and trusted by customers, these experts can be artists, celebrities, or people who are famous on various social media platforms (Rinayanthi & Intan Nirmalasari, 2023), because reviews from an expert are more informative, such as providing additional information in a more characteristic manner and highlighting many other points of view to consumers (Park & Lee, 2008).
In previous research, it was mentioned that customers who plan to book a hotel pay attention to reviews on social media or online travel agents before making a booking at the hotel.Positive reviews can increase their booking intention, and negative will decrease their booking intention.In addition, online reviews uploaded by previous travelers can be in the form of videos or images, this can be one of the most important for future travelers to determine their decision (Kim et al., 2017) Purchase intention is a condition where the customer is in a state to make a purchase of a product or service (Rasheed et al., 2014).Customers tend to dig for more information when they want to make a purchase (Athapaththu & Kulathunga, 2018) such as digging up reviews as material for evaluating the desired product on websites or third parties that help in sales (Mudambi & Schuff, 2010).Online reviews also have a level of trust, many people trust more if the reviews are written by expert reviewers or reviewers who get a lot of support from consumers for providing informative reviews (Yoo & Gretzel, 2011).Based on this explanation, it can be illustrated that when consumers' intention arises to book a hotel online, consumers will read online reviews from experts first until finally making a booking (Xie & So, 2018).The four variables that make up this research model have an influence relationship with one another, so the following framework is compiled:

METHOD
This research uses quantitative methods, where this research requires a sample which will then be tested and analyzed, therefore the 17 questions in the questionnaire use a 5 point Likert scale so that they can be measured.This research is able to produce findings from these testing and measurement procedures (Dr.Sigit Hermawan; & Amirullah, 2016).
Data collection is carried out using purposive non-probability techniques, which means that the questionnaire is only addressed and answered by a population that meets the criteria, namely people who have booked hotels in Batam City through Online Travel Agent.
Using the formulation of (Hair et al., 2006) related to the minimum number of samples that must be collected, this study must get a sample of 170 Respondentsts.With a ratio of 1: 10, every 1 question represents as many as 10 Respondentsts.
Data collection was carried out using google form as a forum for distributing questionnaires.Google forms are distributed by researchers through Whatsapp, Instagram, and Line social media.Respondentsts who are the target of this research are people who have experience in booking hotel accommodation online through Online Travel Agent at Hotels in Batam.Data collection through questionnaires starts from March to June 2023.
Data testing in this study uses IBM SPSS software by applying the results of descriptive statistical analysis, quantitative analysis, and classical assumption tests.Descriptive statistics are used to describe the data that has been collected and analyzed as it is, but not as a conclusion.(Utama & Mahadewi, 2012).Quantitative analysis to draw conclusions from the data that has been collected using statistics.The table above shows the total Respondents based on the intensity of their stay.It can be seen that there are many Respondents who stay at hotels quite often.This shows that the Respondents who filled out the questionnaire are Respondents who really have experience staying at hotels and booking hotel rooms in Batam through OTAs.From the data above, it can be concluded that 3 and 4 star hotels are the most preferred types of hotels by the people of Batam City with a total of 110 and 105 Respondents, followed by 5 star hotels with 97 Respondents.Many Respondents who choose 3 and 4 star hotels can be because hotels with these stars already have quite complete and comfortable facilities.(Anindyajati, 2019), as well as its pocket-friendly price (Hasbi, 2016)  This table shows that Traveloka is the most preferred OTA by Respondents.Traveloka can be the most preferred OTA choice perhaps because Traveloka appeared when the internet was developing, so it has been known to the public for a long time, has a choice of various payment methods, offers the lowest prices, is easy to use and provides many promos.(Annur, 2022).

Descriptive Statistics
This study has four variables consisting of two independent variables and one dependent variable with one mediating variable.It can be seen that the average of each variable is above 4, so it can be said that the answers from Respondents are classified as good.

Quantitative Analysis Validity Test
The validity test was carried out to determine whether the questions in this study were appropriate to represent the variables studied.the question is declared valid if the loading factor value is> 0.6 (Utama & Mahadewi, 2012) Based on the test results, out of 17 question items, there are 2 invalid question items.Thus, these questions were not included in the next test.

Reliability Test
The reliability test is used to measure the level of consistency of Respondents to the questions distributed in the research questionnaire.The variable can be said to be reliable if the Cronbach's alpha value is> 0.6 (Hair et al., 2006).Based on tables 8 and 9, it can be concluded that the independent variables have a significant effect on the mediating variable and the dependent variable simultaneously.

Uji Hipotesis T
The T test is used to determine the effect of the independent variables partially.How is the influence between Purchase Intention, Reviewer Expertise, and Online Reviews on online booking intentions by consumers at accommodations in Batam City.The significance of the effect of the independent variable on the mediating variable and the mediating variable on the dependent variable above is significant.

CONCLUSION
This study aims to analyze how the influence between purchase intention, expert reviews, and online reviews on online booking intentions through Online Travel Agent at hotels in Batam City.
From the test results it can be concluded that purchase intention, reviewer expertise, online reviews, strongly influence online booking intentions.The results of this study are in line with many other studies such as research from (Alzate et al., 2021) , (Lien et al., 2015), (Kim et al., 2017), (Xin et al., 2020), (Park et al., 2007), (Xie & So, 2018), (Aeknarajindawat, 2019) dan (Du et al., 2021) which states that online reviews have an effect on online booking intentions.OTAs provide a review feature that can help hoteliers in developing a good image of the hotel, positive reviews from customers or experts really help increase bookings.This is a great opportunity in one aspect of increasing reputation, so this must be given more attention by hoteliers and must think about how customers can volunteer to provide good reviews on OTAs, or do marketing by paying experts to do reviews, but must be considered, what kind of reviews are preferred by customers.The limitation of this study is that the results of the validity test have 2 invalid variables.Researchers provide recommendations for other researchers who want to conduct this research in the future, can conduct research in other cities in the Riau Islands so that the results of the study can be taken into consideration because of the differences in research results.And millions can add other variables to the study such as price (Lien et al., 2015), app quality, number of app users (Yoo & Gretzel, 2011), trust, brand image (Chiang & Jang, 2014), timeliness (Sutha & Thangadurai, 2016), and there are many more variables that can affect online booking intentions.
Image 1. Research ModelThe hypotheses in this study are: H1: The Effect of Purchase Intention on Online Reviews H2: The Effect of Reviewer Expertise on Online Reviews H3: The Effect of Online Reviews on Online Booking Intentions (Lestari, 2021)f methods used in this study Validity Test, Reliability Test(Agustin, 2017).The classical assumption test must be met as one of the requirements in multiple regression analysis research.By conducting several tests, namely the F and T Hypothesis Tests, and the last is the Coefficient of Determination Test(Lestari, 2021)Respondents who filled out the questionnaire must have booked hotel accommodation online through an Online Travel Agent at a hotel in Batam.

Table 7
Based on the results of the reliability test above, all variables in this study are reliable.

Table 4 .12 Determination Coefficient Test
(Chiang & Jang, 2014)ove show that the online order intention variable is influenced by the purchase intention variable, expert reviews, online reviews by 43.8%, while the other 56.2% is explained by other factors not included in the model, such as price(Lien et al., 2015), app quality, number of app users(Yoo & Gretzel, 2011), trust, brand image(Chiang & Jang, 2014),  timeliness & Thangadurai, 2016), and there are many more variables that can affect online booking intentions.