Investigating the effects of offline and online social capital on tourism SME performance: A mixed-methods study of New Zealand entrepreneurs

Abstract

Entrepreneurial social capital develops through the accrual of resources gained from an entrepreneur’s social ties. These are integral to entrepreneurial success, enabling access to financial, marketing, and human resources, and innovation. Entrepreneurs increasingly manage their networks through online platforms such as Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter. However, there are major gaps in the extant empirical research concerning how online social capital is manifested, if this differs from an in-person context, and the effects ‘online’ and ‘offline’ social capital resources on tourism business success. This study adopts a mixed-method approach to examine tourism entrepreneur’s behaviours in building offline and online social capital, and their nuanced effects on firm performance. The results found tourism entrepreneurs’ networking activity manifests in three distinct configurations, Active Online Networkers, In-Person Networkers, and the Less Engaged. Each configuration demonstrated varying effects on expected business growth and performance with regards to number of employees, sales revenues, and net profit.