ONLINE REPORTING OF CORPORATE SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY OF THE HOTELS IN BULGARIA: CURRENT SITUATION AND MARKETING IMPLICATIONS

Sa？etak Social responsibility of hotel and tourism industries becomes a significant issue during the last decade. Observations within the hospitality sector during the last 10 years confirm that hoteliers have already started to incorporate CSR and the online reporting in their businesses. The international hotel chains with strong brands like Marriott, Hilton, Radisson, Hyatt etc. have special CSR sections on their websites where they report all activities and initiatives related to their policy in this area. But how are the hotels in Bulgaria situated with regard to this important issue? The objectives of the paper are: 1. To conduct a review of the studies about CSR reporting in the hotel sector; 2.To analyse the differences in the online reporting policies with regard to their star category and city- or resort profile; 3.To draw conclusions and suggestions for better use of CSR online reporting as an instrument for Internet marketing and hotel brand strengthening; After literature review a websites’ content analysis of the hotels in Bulgaria was conducted based on a check list of 6 indicators for CSR reporting. The random sample of hotels includes 130 properties of various profiles. The analysis of the visualized CSR reporting is conducted on a comparative basiс depending on the profile characteristics. The paper contains conclusions about the differences in the online reporting of the hotels in Bulgaria and some marketing implications of better usage of CSR online reporting as a marketing tool