Gabriella Stephanie Siregar

Gabriella Stephanie Siregar is a PhD student at Coventry University, where she specialises in sustainability within the hotel industry, particularly examining customer trust in green marketing. With a strong background in management, Gabriella earned her Bachelor’s degree in Business Management, majoring in Business Administration, from the State Polytechnic of Batam.

Her academic accomplishments include winning the Southeast Asia Sales Competition and participating in the Indonesian International Student Mobility Awards (IISMA) exchange programme, during which she studied at Coventry University. Gabriella also gained valuable industry experience through an internship at Malone Group, where she developed practical insights into business operations and project management.

After completing her Master’s by Research at Coventry University, she was transferred directly to the second year of the PhD programme due to her exceptional progress. Her current research seeks to provide a deeper understanding of sustainable business practices by exploring the customer's trust decision-making process in hotel's green marketing.

Passionate about bridging academic research with practical solutions, Gabriella is committed to helping businesses adopt transparent and effective sustainability strategies.

The Green Marketing Dilemma: Trust, Perception, and Greenwashing in the Hotel Industry

Abstract: In recent years, the hotel industry has embraced green marketing initiatives to respond to growing environmental concerns and the increasing demand for sustainable practices. Hotels are striving to showcase their commitment to sustainability, but often, the sheer volume, frequency, and intensity of these green marketing campaigns can be overwhelming and unclear. This lack of clarity can lead to confusion among customers, making it difficult for them to distinguish genuine efforts from mere marketing tactics. This ambiguity frequently leads to customer scepticism and accusations of greenwashing, casting doubt on the authenticity of hotels' green marketing efforts. This paper aims to analyse the influence of green marketing on customer perceptions and explores how it shapes their trust before making a purchase decision. To investigate the process through which customers develop trust in a hotel's green marketing effort, we developed a conceptual framework that was built on a systematic literature review of peer-reviewed academic journal articles, ensuring a robust foundation for our analysis. We demonstrate that effective communication, characterised by clarity, transparency, and consistency, is crucial for cultivating customer trust. Effective green marketing strategies have demonstrated a significant boost in enhancing a hotel's reputation and its perceived trustworthiness among customers. However, it is not just the strategies themselves that matter; customers' internal states also play a crucial role in their decision to trust and engage with green marketing initiatives. This paper offers useful insights not only for hotels but also for other organisations in the tourism and hospitality sector to adopt effective green marketing strategies by examining the intricate connection between green marketing communication and customer trust.