Exploring user acceptance of 3D virtual worlds in travel and tourism marketing

The virtual world of Second Life provides opportunities for companies in communicating marketing messages to targeted markets and capturing the attention of potential customers. Second Life has also been used by the travel and tourism industry as a collaborative and commercial tool for communicating with travelers in marketing tourism destinations (e.g. Tourism Ireland) as well as business management (e.g. Starwood Hotels; Crowne Plaza; STA travel agents). However, few studies have applied formal theory to understand the significance of virtual worlds to tourism destination marketing. The purpose of our study was to develop a research framework identifying the factors that affect tourists' experience and behavioral intentions within a 3D tourism destination by examining the applicability of the Technology Acceptance Model and Hedonic Theory. From a theoretical point of view, this study provides a research framework to capture the entertainment nature of virtual worlds and to reflect the concept that people in these worlds are technology users as well as potential consumers; it does so by extending the Technology Acceptance Model to incorporate the hedonic elements of enjoyment, emotional involvement, positive emotions, and flow experience for understanding the use of 3D virtual worlds within the context of travel and tourism. For destination managers, this study could help in designing engaging and interactive 3D tourism destination sites that contribute to an increase in people's interests in visiting the tourism destination in the future.     

Building the Destination Brand: An Empirical Comparison of Two Approaches

Destination brand strategies have in the main assumed that consumers actively seek and process information about potential destinations with their choice determined on the basis of a favorable attitude toward the destination. This article examines an alternative approach to destination branding, which relates to building the salience of the destination to increase the likelihood that the destination will be considered in purchase situations. The study examines the predictive validity of brand salience measures for a set of travel destinations compared with the predictive validity of traditional attitude-based measures. The results of the research provide empirical support for a salience approach to destination marketing for domestic tourism in Australia.     

Short video marketing and travel intentions: The interplay between visual perspective,visual content,and narration appeal

Social media short videos represent a powerful tool for tourism destination promotion. However, little research has investigated their effect on tourist travel intentions. Drawing on the construal level theory and the elaboration likelihood model, this study investigates the interactive effects between visual and verbal framing of promotional tourism short video on travel intention through two scenario-based experiments. Study 1 examined the interaction effect between visual perspective and visual content. The results indicated that the match between first-person (versus third-person) perspective and activity-centric (versus site-centric) content fosters higher travel intention through enhancing imagery fluency. Study 2 further examined the moderating role of narration message appeal and revealed that first-person perspective with activity-centric content leads to higher travel intention when paired with rational (versus emotional) narration messages, with affect intensity playing a significant mediating role. These findings contribute to knowledge on short video marketing and provide valuable insights for tourism marketers.     

When,where, and with whom during crisis: The effect of risk perceptions and psychological distance on travel intentions

We investigate how risk perceptions and psychological distance impacted people's travel intentions during Covid-19. Our findings reveal that traveling to a high-risk destination increased people's risk perceptions of Covid-19, and their risk perceptions at the destination, which, in turn, reduced people's travel intentions. We identify temporal, spatial, and social distance (the “when, where, and with whom” of traveling) as moderators of these effects; while social distance moderates the effect of risk, on risk perceptions, temporal and spatial distance moderate the effect of risk perceptions on travel intentions. We outline theoretical contributions and implications for tourism during crisis.     

Typography in destination advertising: An exploratory study and research perspectives

In a tourism context, visual copy is an important element of print advertisements. More specifically, pictures have a significant influence on the destination attraction value and visit intentions. Curiously, typography has never been investigated academically as an execution element, despite suggestions from researchers that typography could influence the evaluation of advertisements. This experiment examines the impact of typography on advertisement evaluation in a tourism context and the impact of attitude toward the advertisement on attitude toward the destination. The impact of advertisement evaluation on destination evaluation is also tested, and results show that typography does influence advertising responses. This study highlights the important role of typography in print media destination advertising and enriches this field with a new variable: attitude toward the typography.     

The effectiveness of the destination logo: Congruity effect between logo typeface and destination stereotypes

A well-designed logo can assist destination marketers in the development of destination identity and image, and yet the factors that contribute to an effective destination logo are poorly understood. Thus, this study aims to explore how typefaces influence the effectiveness of logos of destinations with differing stereotypes. By conducting four scenario-based experiments with different experimental stimuli, this study has revealed a congruity effect between logo typeface and destination stereotypes. Specifically, linking logos with handwritten typefaces with warm destinations, and machine-written typefaces with competent destinations can elicit more favorable attitudes and stronger travel intentions toward those destinations (Study 1). The results further showed that the congruity effect on tourists’ travel intentions is sequentially mediated by processing fluency and attitude (Studies 2a, 2b) and is attenuated for tourists with high needs for cognition (Study 3). This research also offers practical suggestions for destination marketers around the design of effective logos.     

Visiting friends or relatives?

Visiting friends and relatives (VFR) contributes significantly to tourism activity and revenues, accounting for about 48 percent of domestic travel in Australia. Implicit in most discussions of VFR travel is that it represents one homogeneous market. This paper examines this assumption and demonstrates – based on data from 67,024 domestic and international tourists to Australia – that this is not the case. The profile of people visiting friends (VFs) differs significantly from that of people visiting relatives (VRs). This finding has major implications for tourism marketing which need to target VFs or VRs in distinctly different ways, rather than generically marketing to VFR travellers.     

Could virtual reality effectively market slow travel in a heritage destination?

A recent trend in tourism research involves the application of high technology in marketing practices such as virtual reality (VR), cell phone apps, and new media. Among these, VR is the most novel. In 2016, Discovery Travel created TRVLR, which includes all seven continents. Even earlier, specific tourist destinations were providing VR content about their respective locales. These venues expose potential tourists to tourist locations by immersing them in a visceral, 360-degree storytelling setting. However, while VR has gradually grown in popularity in the tourism industry, the marketing effects have been infrequently studied by academia. This research asked participants to view a VR presentation of a famous 700-year-old Chinese painting, and investigated viewers' nostalgia and ST travel intentions. Information was collected from 308 samples at certain popular tourist destinations around Fuzhou in the Fujian Province of China, and Taipei and Taoyuan in Taiwan. Structural equation modeling was then used to analyze the collected data and test the hypotheses. The findings indicate that VR is a very useful tool for encouraging respondents to travel to Jinan in a slower and more intensely observational manner, significantly arousing their sense of nostalgia and leading to a strong intention to ST to Jinan. This research provides important insights into how this new technology might function as a tool for marketing Jinan, a tier-two but historically important destination in China. The implications of these findings are important to understanding the associations for potential tourists among VR use, destination marketing, and travel intention, particularly when the object city is relatively unknown.     

Understanding the Relationship of Service Fairness,Emotions, Trust,and Tourist Behavioral Intentions at a City Destination in China

This study presents a cognitive appraisal model that identifies consumption emotions and trust as key mediators in the relationship between perceived service fairness and behavioral intentions (i.e., revisit intentions and word-of-mouth (WOM) referrals). The structural equation modeling (SEM) technique was employed to examine empirically a conceptual tourist behavior model using questionnaires answered by 541 tourists in Xiamen, a “garden city” in China. The findings confirmed the mediating role of emotions and trust, which imply that the travel behavioral intentions formation process is both an emotional experience process and a relationship building process between tourists and the destination service providers. By understanding the relationship and linkages between perceived service fairness and behavioral intentions, city managers, urban tourism managers, and service providers can formulate more effective marketing strategies to strengthen tourists’ loyalty, revisit and WOM referral intentions.     

Predicting Wine Tourism Intention: Destination Image and Self-congruity

Using the context of wine tourism, this study tests an integrated structural model of destination factors and self-congruity to predict behavioral intentions. A survey of 696 respondents throughout Australia showed that functional destination image, affective destination image, and self-congruity predict attitude toward wine tourism, which in turn predicts behavioral intentions. The moderating influence of wine involvement was also tested through multigroup and latent mean analysis. Consumers who were highly involved with wine appeared to be more influenced by affective destination image and self-congruity than those who indicated low wine involvement.     

The impact of uncertainty on tourists’ controllability,mood state and the persuasiveness of message framing in the pandemic era

Drawing on uncertainty theory, this study examines how to boost travel intention by analyzing the impacts of uncertainty on the effectiveness of destination marketing messages. Three studies (including four scenario-based experiments and five pretests) were employed to examine these impacts. Study 1 demonstrated that travel outcome uncertainty impacts travel intentions and revealed controllability and mood state as parallel and serial mediators. Study 2 showed that a combination of low (vs. high) uncertainty and gain (vs. loss) framing leads to higher travel intentions. The results further show that in the temporal distance condition, the effect of message framing is attenuated. Study 3 revealed that a combination of low (vs. high) uncertainty and hedonic (vs. utilitarian) attributes increased travel intentions. The research also provides practical implications for global tourism marketers to lower the uncertainty barrier.     

Adding character: The role of destination mascots in tourism development

This study explores the use of destination mascots in tourism development. It steps away from the traditional investigation of yuru kyara by focusing on a wider range of anthropomorphic messengers. By mapping the historical trajectory of mascots, the researchers isolate a special subcategory of anthropomorphic characters: destination mascots. Destination mascots are introduced as a new tourism construct and a distinct type of marketing activity. This paper aims to develop and promote the term destination mascot in tourism literature. It describes the many facets of destination mascots and catalogues five distinct functions mascots can carry out for their destinations: mascots as place identity markers, cultural constructs, bonding tools, social engagement tools, and information carriers. Supplemented with multiple examples from past and present literature, this study deepens and broadens our understanding of mascot culture. It brings into view many avenues that invite further exploration.     

Why do people share their travel experiences on social media?

Tourism practices and destination decisions are more and more affected by the opinions of trusted friends channeled through social media, and it is therefore of great interest to explore the role that this plays in the travel context. It is also valuable to understand the behaviour of people commonly known as “lurkers”, who travel but do not share their experiences with others. We draw on social influence theory and its three constructs – identification, internalization, and compliance, as well as the users’ personality, to investigate these issues. Based on 381 responses, findings reveal two dominant reasons: first, perceived enjoyment was the most important motive for travellers to share their travel experiences on online networks and travel websites. Second, security and privacy issues are the top latent reasons. This study extends the tourism literature by combining all online behaviours into one single model. We also provide suggestions for further research.     

Destination familiarity and favorability in a country-image context: examining Taiwanese travelers’ perceptions of China

Building on international marketing research on the country-of-origin image effect, this research examines how people evaluate a culturally familiar country as a tourist destination. Derived from a sample of 710 Taiwanese travelers, research findings showed that when evaluating China as a tourist destination, respondents relied on both their general image of the country (country image) as well as tourism-specific perceptions (destination beliefs), while a few respondents with low familiarity with China relied only on their general image of the country to evaluate the destination. The research also showed that respondents with high levels of familiarity with China had more positive destination beliefs, resulting in more favorable destination evaluations; however, country image was found to be persistent and difficult to be changed by destination promoting materials and/or actual visits. The paper concludes with recommendations for destination marketing in the context of international tourism.     

Critical factors in the identification of word-of-mouth enhanced with travel apps: the moderating roles of Confucian culture and the switching cost view

The constant changes in new technology are affecting China's tourism environment. Tourists have become increasingly reliant on travel apps when searching for a tourism destination. This study reinvestigates whether the perception of an app advantage influences word-of-mouth (WOM) intentions through satisfaction and stickiness in the dynamic tourism environment of China. Mediation–moderation hypothesis is applied to build a conceptual framework of support for a proposition explaining how travel apps influence WOM. This study also explores the role of Confucian values and switching costs in this context. These findings provide important insights into why and when travel apps influence tourists’ tourism behaviors.     

The Effect of Uganda’s Official Tourism Website on Travel Motivations and Constraints

Destination marketers increasingly rely on the official tourism website as an early point of contact with potential tourists. This research examined the effect of Uganda’s official tourism website on interest in traveling to Uganda, travel motivations, and travel constraints. Novelty preference and gender were included as moderators. A two-group randomized experimental design was used (N = 278) with exposure to Uganda’s official tourism website as the intervention (n = 139). Pre-test results show that interest in traveling to Uganda was greatest among novelty seekers. Gender had no influence. Pre-test motivations were learning, culture, novelty, and an interest in travel. Pre-test constraints were perceptions that Uganda is not safe and unfamiliar. Post-test results show that exposure to the website significantly increased interest in traveling to Uganda among all groups. Furthermore, this occurred by mitigating travel constraints rather than by stimulating travel motivations. Generalized implications for destination marketing are discussed.     

Reconciling unsatisfying tourism experiences: Message type effectiveness and the role of counterfactual thinking

While attracting new tourists is an important issue in destination marketing, it is also imperative to manage tourists' experience post-trip, particularly in cases of unsatisfying experiences. Yet, the questions of how to rectify unsatisfying tourism experiences received little attention in tourism scholarship. In the present research, we investigated the effectiveness of different forms of marketing messages and the role of counterfactual thinking in the ability of a marketing message to improve tourists' attitudes towards the destination and intentions to recommend, when a tourism experience was not up to tourists' satisfaction. A scenario-based experiment was conducted with 480 respondents. The results showed that user-generated messages and the messages employing emotional appeal were more impactful than destination-generated or rational messages. Respondents who engaged in downward counterfactual thinking, that is imagining the situation in which their experience could have been worse, was shown to have a greater positive effect on unsatisfied tourists.     

Understanding the impact of culinary brand equity and destination familiarity on travel intentions

This paper explores determinants of brand equity and the role of destination familiarity for travel intentions in culinary tourism from the perspective of foreign tourists. This analysis advocates four elements for brand equity (brand loyalty, brand image, perceived quality and brand awareness) for culinary travel intentions in Taiwan. Building on extensive literature, this study developed and empirically tested a model of the relationship using survey data collected from 407 foreign tourists from ten regions. The results indicate that there is a direct positive relationship between brand equity and travel intentions in culinary tourism. Moreover, the study recognizes the moderating role of destination familiarity, which positively moderates the effect of brand loyalty and perceived quality on travel intentions.     

The Amazing Race to India: Prominence in reality television affects destination image and travel intentions

Considering the increasing popularity of reality television shows, this research investigated the impact of a destination placement in reality television on tourism. Two experiments reveal that a reality show can change the image of the destination in which the show is set. This positively affects cognitive, affective and behavioral outcomes. Specifically, it changes perceptions in accordance with the depiction of the destination in the reality show, increases knowledge about the destination, favorably affects viewers' attitude toward the destination, and even more importantly, increases the intention to travel to the destination. Our findings are of interest to destination marketing organizations; they inform them on how to promote touristic destinations.     

The Relationships of Destination Image,Satisfaction, and Behavioral Intentions: An Integrated Model

Built upon the tourism and marketing literature, a conceptual model depicting the relationship among tourism destination image components, satisfaction, and behavioral intentions was proposed. A conceptual model consisting of six hypotheses was empirically tested using survey data from 550 Chinese tourists who visited Zhang-Jia-Jie, a major Chinese tourism destination shown on the list of the World Natural Heritage. The empirical findings reveal that: (a) overall tourism destination is reflected by both cognitive image and affective image, and (b) overall tourism destination image has an indirect impact on behavioral intentions through satisfaction. Theoretical and managerial implications are discussed before the article concludes with limitations and directions for future research.