The impact of social media branding and technology adoption on green tourism: the role of tourist behavior as a mediator in developing countries post-COVID-19—context of Zimbabwe

Abstract

Green tourism, social media branding and technology adoption have recently become the most powerful elements in the tourism world during and post-COVID19 pandemic. This paper aims to investigate the effects of social media branding and technology adoption on green tourism with tourists’ behavior as a mediator post-COVID 19 in developing countries such as Zimbabwe. The positivism philosophy was adopted in line with the quantitative nature of the study. The research embraced an explanatory survey research design, and a structured questionnaire was used to gather primary data. The survey’s population was drawn from tourists who visited Zimbabwe post-COVID 19 era. This research used (PLS-SEM) on a sample of 408 as guided by the Krejcie and Morgan table for determining sample size. The findings indicate that social media branding and technology adoption have a positive impact on green tourism and that tourists’ behavior partially and fully mediates the two indirect relationships. The distinctiveness of the current papers lies on fact that it can be a guideline to policymakers, green tourism supply chain and environmentalists in developing strategies that promote green tourism in Zimbabwe and other developing countries.