Market Value Chain and Web Marketing in Tourism Context

Web marketing refers to a broad category of advertising that takes many different forms, but generally involves any marketing activity conducted online.Information and communication technology (ICT) developments are permeating every aspect of tourism marketing. This paper proposes a methodological framework, which will enable tourism businesses to develop and implement their electronic marketing and commerce activities. This paper initially reviews the e-business models literature. In the second section ICT implications in marketing and tourism are discussed. Then it presents the e-tourism business models and subsequently proposes a framework contributing to the planning and implementation of e-commerce initiatives. This methodological framework might also be used to analyse electronic applications in tourism. Keywords: Tourism and Travel industry, Market value chain, web marketing, Business models, Management & Reengineering

Electronic tourism

The constant development in technology, communication and particularly the Internet, has revolutionized the entire tourism industry, by generating new business models, restructuring the distribution channels, reshaping the production process involved in tourism industry and last but not least has influenced the suppliers of touristic services as well as the stakeholders. In this work I have tried to enhance the implications of electronic tourism for the visitors, the tourism operators, highlighting the informational systems which serve the touristic services. E-tourism comes to support the tourists by providing specialized sites and software which reduce the time necessary for the touristic destinations , making easier the process of booking or renting a car or help planning the trip and making a decision. One of the most common problems associated with the developing distribution is the large amount of information available for the client and to be able to explore it, I have presented intelligent agents with all the advantages this new artificial technology brings along.e-tourism, portal, intelligent agents.

Thai E-Tourism Business Progression Classification

This research aims to investigate the progression of e-business adoption in Thai tourism enterprises in order to define the progression levels. The levels of E-tourism business progression are determined in four stages: online presence, interactive online presence, electronic transactions, and enterprise integration. The survey results reveal that e-business progression of most Thai tourism enterprises remain in online presence stage. Most Thai tourism enterprises which adopted e-business have not progressed further to stage 2, 3, and 4. There are more hotels which have reached higher stages than travel agents for almost every web features. This can be implied that the tourism enterprises have not paid careful attention to details of their websites, nor do they perceive usefulness and importance of informative websites. We conclude that the lack of perceived usefulness and an importance of ebusiness could impede the progression to further stages

SOME ASPECTS OF APPLYING MOBILE INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY IN TOURISM

The study focuses on the contribution of mobile information technology to the development of tourism in Bulgaria. It helps to improve the methods and mechanisms of collecting, processing, analysing, storing and using information. The emerging popular computer systems, video systems, teleconferencing systems and electronic systems have led to the complete automation and widespread use of electronic equipment in business. The application of mobile information technology facilitates accommodation and transport bookings, entertainment services, the purchase of tourist products, the availability of and accessibility to different types of tourism and destinations, as well as the tourism potential of countries and regions

Characteristics of hotel premises in Belgorod city

Hotel industry is regarded as one of the factors in the development of tourism and the initial basis for planning the production of the tourist product. It determines the specificity of the development of tourism, being the basis for the production of the tourism product in planning the priorities of the investment policy. The article presents the results of the authors’s research, as well as materials open print and electronic resources. The authors analyzed the state of hotel real estate market of Belgorod, the structure of the number of rooms, hotel occupancy assessed by type of rooms, highlighted promising areas of the hotel business. It should be noted, that the development of domestic tourism, the growth of business and cultural activity in the region will contribute to the further development of tourism infrastructure and, in particular, the hotel industryyesБелгородский государственный университе

Enhancing stakeholder networks in wine tourism – evidence from Italian small municipalities

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to explore validity and reliability of a possible collaboration model for wine tourism with a “public” basis, i.e. from the point of view of the municipality engaged in promoting the wine tourism industry insisting on the territory. Design/methodology/approach – The survey, proposing a theoretical/empirical framework, has investigated, through an electronic platform, the municipalities belonging to the National Association of “Wine Cities.” Findings – The research has demonstrated a substantial trustworthiness of the model, with further evidence about the underestimation of stakeholder networks on behalf of Italian small municipalities. A clear difference of perception between non-small municipalities and small municipalities has emerged with regard to the perceived relevance of the collaboration with the territorial wine tourism players/stakeholders. Practical implications – A recent legislation in Italy, just focused on small municipalities, might help overcome these gaps, between non-small municipalities and small municipalities, releasing in the territories new energies for the development of wine tourism, from both planning and financing points of view. Originality/value – Italy as country is the largest producer of wine in the world. Similarly, wine tourism, as additional wine business opportunity, is a successful phenomenon in Italy, even though with great margins of development (especially with comparison to the New World of Wine). One of the main limits of this delay is the lack of public-private collaboration, at widespread level, among the players/stakeholders of the sector. The model that has been proposed in this research contributes scientifically and practically to fill this gaps

Improving the deployment model of modern electronic marketing methods for the Cyprus tourism organisation.

Traditional business models that used to govern the operations of travel and tourism businesses, defined in a rigid way their functional areas and the relationships among them. The advent of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) has driven the transformation of these business models into novel destination marketing models. National Tourism Organisations’ task of managing the process of destination marketing has been augmented with the advent of electronic marketing methods. The complexity of managing the diverse interests of the multiplicity of the stakeholders involved in destination marketing has been extended by the novel electronic communication channels that have been introduced. This has made the need of establishing an explicit model for managing the process of destination marketing more imperative than ever before. Recognising the need for explicitly managing the process of destination marketing for the Cyprus Tourism Organisation (CTO), an integrated marketing model has been developed to guide the management of the destination’s marketing process. The key for optimising the destination’s marketing processes is the successful implementation of the model through the integration of traditional with electronic marketing activities. The model is founded upon the CTO’s marketing executives’ mindset and expectations and facilitates the satisfaction of the CTO’s online visitors / customers’ expectations. Moreover, it reflects on the CTO’s existing marketing services, the Cyprus tourism industry’s eMarketing deployment and European NTOs’ eMarketing deployment level. The utter objective that is aimed to be achieved through the implementation of the developed model is the improvement of Cyprus’ competitiveness as a tourism destination worldwide

Opening new dimensions for e-Tourism

In this paper we describe an e-Tourism environment that takes a community-driven approach to foster a lively society of travelers who exchange travel experiences, recommend tourism destinations or just listen to catch some interesting gossip. Moreover, business transactions such as booking a trip or getting assistance from travel advisors or community members are constituent parts of this environment. All these happen in an integrated, game-like e-Business application where each e-Tourist is impersonated as an avatar. More precisely, we apply 3D Electronic Institutions, a framework developed and employed in the area of multi-agent systems, to the tourism domain. The system interface is realized by means of a 3D game engine that provides sophisticated 3D visualization and enables humans to interact with the environment. We present "itchy feet", a prototype implementing this 3D e-Tourism environment to showcase first visual impressions. This new environment is a perfect research playground for examining heterogeneous societies comprising humans and software agents, and their relationship in e-Tourism. © Springer-Verlag London Limited 2006

Regional tourist destinations - the role of information and communications technology (ICT) in collaboration amongst tourism providers

The tourism industry can be seen as one of the first business sectors where business functions are almost exclusively using information and communications technologies (ICT). This has impacted on the way in which regional tourism destinations are promoted. The method of promoting regions via the development of regional tourist destination websites or portals using Internet technologies is increasingly being adopted both in Australia and around the world. This paper investigates whether this approach is the most effective to achieve increased awareness and subsequent visitation of a region. Are there other ways to achieve a similar outcome? One such alternative is via a bottom up approach achieved through co-opetition or collaboration established within the group of local tourism industry operators. This cooperative networking is made possible via the use of ICT to facilitate the establishment of virtual business networks amongst tourism operators in a local community, cascading into an informal secondary tourism network within that region. In many Australian regional areas the tourism bureau has been the key node for local tourism, but this structure has been fraught with many problems. Little is known about their effectiveness in delivering services to local small and medium tourism enterprises (SMTEs). The role of tourism bureaus in local tourism networks is changing and a study of this dynamic is provided here as an example of the interaction between top down and bottom up approaches. Published case studies from around the world are considered demonstrating alternative approaches to using ICT to promote a region and communicate with potential visitors. Future empirical research is required to more fully understand the effectiveness of the different approaches

eEnabled internet distribution for small and medium sized hotels: the case of hospitality SMEs in Athens

Advances in information and communications technologies (ICTs) have strategic implications for a wide range of industries. Tourism and hospitality have dramatically changed by the ICTs and the Internet and gradually emerge as the leading industry on online expenditure. The Internet revolutionised traditional distribution models, enabled new entries propelled both disintermediation and reintermediation and altered the sources of competitive advantage. This paper explores the strategic implications of ICTs and the perceived advantages and disadvantages of Internet distribution for small and medium-sized hospitality enterprises (SMEs). Primary research in Athens hotels demonstrates the effects of the Internet and ICTs for secondary markets, where there is lower penetration and ICT adoption. Interviews and questionnaires identified a number of strategies in order to optimise distribution. The analysis illustrates the strategic role of ICTs and the Internet for hospitality organisations and Small and Medium-sized organisations in general. Most hotels employ a distribution mix that determines the level and employment of the Internet. The paper demonstrates that only organisations that use ICTs strategically will be able to develop their electronic distribution and achieve competitive advantages in the future