Volume 8 (2017): Issue 1 (May 2017)

Customer engagement can be used as a proxy in customer behaviour research for evaluating customer relationships towards a company and/or brand. Companies are increasingly recognizing the value of establishing close customer relationships. The objective of the research was to explore the associations among customer engagement dimensions and loyalty for evaluating customer relationships in hotel industry. Furthermore, the study evaluated the level and influence of new customers and repeat customer segments. The questionnaires were completed by 240 customers from five star hotels (30% customers) and four star hotels (70% customers) in Jammu and Kashmir, India. Descriptive, exploratory factor analysis, confirmatory factor analysis and regression analysis were used to test the constructs. The results suggested that customer engagement (CE) makes a substantial contribution to the prediction of loyalty in building customer relationships. The findings proposed that hoteliers can actively incorporate strategies to enhance CE, which eventually develops a sustainable loyal customer relationship. The results could be effective to hoteliers in engaging customers while marketing, branding, differentiating and segmenting its products and services in building loyal customer relationships. Moreover, segmenting the customers offers a deeper and more inclusive knowledge of nature of customer relationships and how engagement can be fostered and developed among diverse customer segments.

This paper is an expedition study analysing the features of trips of ‘nature-based tourists’ from amongst daytrip tourists in Japan with the aim of seeking for expansion possibilities of Japanese-type ecotourism. Approximately 400,000 people visit Nabari City in Mie Prefecture, the target destination in this paper, on an annual basis with the aim of enjoying the nature. Samples used for analysis in this paper have been collected from 437-day trip visitors from amongst 500 visitors to major sight-seeing spots of Nabari City from October to December 2014. It has been found through analysis that whilst nature-based daytrip visitors in Japan were satisfied with natural environments themselves, they were less satisfied with regards to activities and services during their trips. Cluster analyses for grasping tendencies per markets were performed and disclosed.

Ecotourism has been described as the ideal kind of tourism, as it aims to conserve the natural, cultural and other tourist resources for continuous use for future generations whilst still bringing benefits to the present societies. Theoretically, it sounds so promising and attractive, but when it comes to its actual implementation, significant constraints bar the way to success. Various countries that attempted to foster sustainable development in their communities, either partially achieved their goals or their implementation totally lapsed. These fruitless efforts clearly reflect the huge gap that still exists between the theory and practice of ecotourism. The purpose of this paper is to fill this gap that seems to have been growing in recent years by explaining what has been done wrong and what specific policies and procedures could help bring a positive change. This paper aims to move from theory to practice and concentrate on how the implementation of ecotourism can be achieved properly and lead to success. The key factors responsible for failure are addressed, so they can be avoided and mistakes of the past will not be repeated. It also serves as a guide to more effective strategies of promoting ecotourism successfully around the world.

Terrorism, pandemic diseases, and other threatening events have recently heightened the sense of personal risk for tourists considering international travel. This article addresses the paucity of research assessing perceptions of risk both before and during travel to risky destinations. Tourists on two nature tours in Mexico were interviewed and observed while engaged in the travel. Many types of specific perceived risks were uncovered, including insect-borne disease, traffic accidents, financial losses, and unattained goals. Some correlates of perceived risk were tour company reputation, stage of family life cycle, age, and motivation. Based on the types of perceived risk and the factors, five propositions are discussed. One unexpected proposition addresses the role of age and states that as the perceived years of physical ability to travel decreases, the tolerance for safety risk increases. Another proposes that eco-tourists with intense, destination-specific motivations are more tolerant of travel risk than those with casual and/or social motivations. The article concludes with suggestions for tour industry managers and directions for future research.

Tourism depends largely on the good will of local inhabitants and over the past decades many studies have been conducted concerning the attitudes of residents towards tourism. There is not much academic literature concerning nightlife, and in most cases the nightclubs are an element of a context in which another phenomenon is analyzed. There is a limited amount of literature analyzing the differences between men and women in their role as residents of a tourist destination, and there are also no studies concerning the attitudes of women towards nightlife. This paper intends to provide a first study of the attitudes of women towards the nightclubs, in the case of Ibiza Island. The analysis of the attitudes towards nightlife was carried out by means of an array of items integrated into a broader survey on attitudes of residents towards tourism. A total of 418 valid questionnaires were obtained, 266 of them were completed by women. Although the general view of the sector is negative, women are much more critical about the island’s nightlife. When breaking down the sample of women it can be seen that one part of women has similar opinions to those of men (Moderates), mainly those that depend economically on the sector, but the other part has very contrary opinions (Haters). Women have a more conservative and adverse stance towards risk than men, and they are more contrary to offers that may have a significant negative impact on local society, as would be the case for nightclubs.

Honeymoon tourism is an important research area in tourism and travel literature because of its increasing economic importance for host destinations and their specific niche market characteristics. This study used a survey to investigate demographics, the importance of attributes in destination selection, overall satisfaction, loyalty and souvenir purchase preference amongst 540 domestic honeymoon tourists visiting Antalya, Turkey. It also identified in the context of destination marketing both domestic and international competitors of Antalya as a honeymoon destination. The results offered market-specific knowledge about honeymoon tourism in Turkey, such as the identification of the most important attributes in destination selection, tourists’ souvenir purchases, overall satisfaction and loyalties. The study concludes with a discussion of theoretical and managerial implications of the findings and recommendations for future study.

How long a tourist stays in a host country acts as an indicator of tourism industry’s contribution towards the national economy. The purpose of this study is to examine how socio-demographic characteristics of international tourists, their travelling purpose, tourism products and characteristics of the destination influence the length of stay in Norway, by estimating a parametric survival model. Total cost of trip, purpose of travel, type of accommodation and transportation, age of tourist and geographical area are key elements that explain the variation in the length of tourist stay in Norway. The Cox proportional hazard model with time-independent covariates indicates the survival probability of tourists with less budget constraints and younger ages is higher than that of low-spending tourists and elderly travelers. Moreover, tourists with the purpose of friend and family visitation are at lower risk of leaving Norway than are tourists with other purposes. In terms of tourism products, choosing camping sites as the type of accommodation and road transport as the mode of transportation are associated with the highest survival probability. Another key finding is that tourists stay longer in northern Norway than in southern Norway; hence, on average, tourists’ overall expenditures are higher in northern Norway.