With the exhibition sector becoming increasingly important for the hospitality and tourism industry, it is critical to understand what drives the success of an exhibition. Through a comprehensive literature review, we first identified two broad categories of factors, namely exhibition attributes and exhibitor perceptions, that influence exhibitor satisfaction and loyalty. Next, a meta-analysis was conducted based on 26 empirical papers studying the Chinese exhibition market to quantitatively evaluate these relationships. The results show that among the exhibition attributes, booth management, service personnel, and exhibition environment are the most important factors affecting exhibitor satisfaction, while exhibition brand is the most important factor affecting loyalty. Among exhibitor perceptions, service quality is more important for satisfaction, while perceived value is more meaningful to loyalty. This study offers insights into strategies for exhibition organizers to cultivate long-term relationships, and to better cope with the challenges of emerging forces such as the Internet.

Purpose This paper aims to take International SPOrt (ISPO) as a typical case to study how exhibition organizers can reshape their relationship with users through business model innovation to answer the question that how enterprises can help the exhibition industry to upgrade and develop through business model innovation in the internet environment. Design/methodology/approach Faced with the development of internet technology, the impact of online platforms, the relationship between exhibition organizers and their customers are facing unprecedented challenges. On the basis of the literature review, this study analyzed the innovation of exhibitors’ business model from three modules: value proposition, revenue logic and cost base and how to reshape their interaction with users through innovation. This study systematically analyzed the innovation of the ISPO business model and the process of reshaping its relationship with users and dynamic interaction with a single case study method. Findings The main conclusions are as follows: the starting point of reshaping the relationship between exhibition organizer and users in the internet era is to re-understand the needs of customers, the key point of reshaping the relationship is to further cultivate the industrial value and the sustainability of the relationship lies in the customer life cycle management. Originality/value From the perspective of exhibition organizers filling the gap of case study in the field of the exhibition. In the area of the exhibition, previous studies rarely started from the perspective of exhibition organizers, but, this paper discusses the interaction between exhibition organizers, exhibitors and visitors from this perspective in this study.

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