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The success of tourism destinations is in many cases measured from a competitive advantage perspective, not from a collaborative advantage perspective, which limits the possibilities of destination marketing in a collaborative cross-border context. Currently, the marketing efforts of Victoria Falls are highly fragmented as each country promotes the attraction separately. The purpose of this paper is to explore the cross-border destination marketing possibilities and realities of Victoria Falls from a demand and supply side perspective.

A quantitative approach was applied in this study, with two separate surveys being conducted. Data for the demand side were collected by means of a questionnaire that was distributed by fieldworkers, while data for the supply side were collected online. The data were analysed using descriptive statistics, factor analyses and one-way analysis of variance.

Five specific tourist motivations for visiting Victoria Falls were identified using demand data, of which sightseeing and destination attributes were the most important. Significant differences were found for tourists’ cross-border experiences using different border access points. Using supply data, challenges and opportunities of cross-border marketing were analysed. The most important opportunity was identified as cooperation, while the key challenges were economic and policy related. It is important to see the bigger picture and how cooperation can benefit both countries, which is unfortunately not currently the case for Zambia and Zimbabwe.

There is a need for tourism destinations to shift from competition-based strategies to collaboration-based strategies in order to be successful. Cross-border marketing requires that each country understands tourists’ motivations and experiences. For Zambia and Zimbabwe to increase their tourist arrivals, income and investment opportunities, both countries must move away from isolating their marketing efforts of Victoria Falls. It is important to look beyond the individual benefits for each country and focus on the combined benefits. The challenges identified in this study must be addressed if Zambia and Zimbabwe’s cross-border marketing of Victoria Falls is to be effective. The integration of demand and supply views is thus critical for cross-border marketing to be effective and successful.

Research on cross-border destination marketing of shared border attractions is limited. With regard to Victoria Falls, such research has never been explored in an academic context. This study has value for destination marketers of Zambia and Zimbabwe, especially for attractions that are shared between their borders such as Victoria Falls and Kariba Dam. Additionally, the study has implications for attractions that are shared across the borders of southern African countries like Zimbabwe, South Africa and Mozambique, as well as other attractions shared between borders in the global context.

The Polish–Slovak borderland is a mountainous area with extraordinary natural conditions for tourism development. The main aim of this chapter is to analyze theoretical aspects of a relationship between transport and tourism and to assess selected changes in cross-border transport that have influenced tourism in Polish–Slovak tourism regions. We have tried to answer the questions on changes in transport infrastructure (based on the analysis of the cross-border projects) and public transport (based on the analysis of timetables of the cross-border public transport connections) in the borderland during the last 30 years and to answer the question whether these changes are in accordance with the sustainable development goals. The Polish–Slovak border is seen as a barrier to transport. The increasing cross-border movement of people and goods through Polish–Slovak border after 1989 required the opening of new border crossings and the construction of new cross-border transport infrastructure. Investments to the road infrastructure have led to using of individual automobile transport. Public transport is currently of marginal importance in cross-border transport. The three cross-border rail lines are in poor technical condition, and plans for their modernization are uncertain. Bus transport has been limited on two tourist-oriented lines in the central part of the borderland. In terms of the structure of the use of means of transport, therefore, no change in trends should be expected and most of the incoming people will continue to cross the Polish–Slovak border by their own means of communication. What is worrying, in the future, in the absence of modernization of the railway infrastructure and no organizational measures, there will be a further decline in the importance of public transport in relation to individual road transport.

Geographic periphery regions are the focus of sustainable regional development research, with ongoing discussions on core–periphery relationships to address economic disadvantage and remoteness. However, periphery regions face challenges due to the high efficiency of core regions. Tourism provides an alternative economic landscape, revitalizing stagnant sectors and driving strategic exploration. The Sino-Russian border, spanning 4,209 km, represents a periphery where tourism plays a vital role. This chapter views Sino-Russian cross-border tourism through the lens of the core–periphery model, suggests two conceptual models of developing experiential cores in the cross-border areas of geographic peripheries, and argues for peripheries' potential to become sustainable experiential cores post COVID-19.

Under the Directive 2011/24/EU, medical tourism and cross-border health are interrelated terms regarding the freedom to move to get the most accessible medical treatment into EU Member State within the defined procedures for reimbursement. Little known empirically regarding the efficiency of the cross-border health/medical tourism industry. This study aims to measure its efficiency in Europe for the years 2010-2014, by using Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA).

Data obtained from OECD and the European Core Health Indicators (ECHI), which is collecting the data through Eurostat. Eurostat collects data on health-care activities and provides data on hospital discharges, including the hospital discharges of non-residents and these include hospital discharges of in-patients and day care patients. The analysis uses “DEA.P, 2.1 for windows” by Coelli (1996).

The results show that the Members States health systems were very efficient in handling non-residents in-patients; however, when managing day cases/outpatients, the efficiency scores dropped.

The findings would have significant associations affecting intentions to revisit clinics and the destination country. In addition, will be useful to those seeking a better understanding of the cross-border health and medical tourism industry efficiency.

Extending the findings of the European Commission report (2015c) by examining how well medical tourists are informed about the decision they are making, would be of perceived value. These are important indicators at European level by helping each Member State to measure its medical tourism services.

This study aims to examine the patterns of cross-border consumption of Mexican tourist-shoppers to the USA. More specifically, integrating literature from two ends – retail studies on shopping motivations and tourism research viewing cross-border shopping as leisure activities, this study aims to investigate the motivations of Mexican travelers as cross-border shoppers.

A survey instrument was developed incorporating a set of 30 shopping motivation questions. Data were collected using the intercept survey methodology from 92 Mexican visitors who shopped at a major outlet shopping center in Central Texas in 2007. The motivational items were subsequently factor analyzed for possible underlying dimensions.

Motivations of cross-border shopping by Mexicans in Texas demonstrated a combination of two aspects, the utilitarian and pleasurable shopping experiences. The cross-border consumption and shopping by Mexican residents in Texas, therefore, were both functional and recreational.

With a better understanding of the pattern and motivations of cross-border shopping, this study developed a model to capture the stimulating influence of the retail environment as well as a framework to illustrate the integrated role of shopping and tourism in the process of developing a “must visit” destination.

Increased competition and the constant need for companies to differentiate make markets more competitive and consumers more demanding when making purchasing decisions. Consequently, companies recognized the importance of marketing and economics, which has gradually replaced its transactional practices, focused essentially on a single transaction, with relational practices, in which the customer is considered an integral part of the process. Creating long and profitable relationships has become a business priority and the use of tools such as customer relationship marketing (CRM) has become crucial. With the increasing importance of health and wellness tourism, thermalism has become a very competitive product wanted by tourists who need treatments that are not available in their country due to lack of availability or because they are quite expensive. Since tourism is integrated in the services sector, a set of relational marketing strategies can be applied to establish and maintain relationships with tourists. Therefore, it is important to understand how relational marketing can improve health and wellness tourism. Based on a combination of theoretical and practical research, this chapter explores the dynamic system and mechanism of innovation and development of relational marketing strategies in specific contexts of tourism (i.e. health and wellness tourism) considering cross-border (i.e. Northern Euroregion of Portugal and Galicia). From an interdisciplinary perspective, the chapter presents insights for marketing and tourism (health and well-being) and for the economic development of territories (i.e. cross-border regions).

As much as any cross‐border destination may be an attractive notion, it clearly requires more profound research as both theoretical and practical research seems hardly satisfactory. This paper will attempt to present tourism development of the cross‐border region of Bug, consisting of three national components: Polish, Belarusian and Ukrainian. There are both advantages and disadvantages resulting from the fact that one part of the destination belongs to the European Union (EU) and the other does not. The authors analyse the potential of the Euroregion and present main actors responsible for the destination development. Based on both desk and field research, special attention is given to the model of tourism organisation. The theory of tourism transformation is carefully scrutinised. One can distinguish 4 stages of this process, namely: preparation, creation, verification, gratification (Studzieniecki 2000, p127).

The purpose of this paper is to provide insights to relevant theories, challenges and the future opportunities for binational tourism in the Niagara region.

A selected cross‐section of relevant publications including news media items are reviewed. Data gathered by a group of graduate students from Niagara College during their externships with the Binational Tourism Alliance, are utilized. Binational tourism initiatives from different parts of the world are analyzed.

This paper implies that in order to strategize binational tourism in Niagara, relevant theories, international best practices, historic developments of binational initiatives in Niagara as well as news media reports should be analysed. It concludes that Niagara's tourism industry, on both sides of the border, must continue to work in close partnership on their binational tourism strategy and binational positioning in order to remain competitive as a major tourist destination in the world.

Inputs from the Executive Director of the Binational Tourism Alliance of the Niagara region as a co‐author, enhances the practical value of this paper. Not much research has been undertaken on the topic of binational tourism in Niagara. Therefore, particularly, the tourism policy makers as well as other stakeholders of tourism in the Niagara region should benefit from this paper.

Europe as a destination seems to be in a critical stage. There is more competition than cooperation between European nations and regions Our continent needs new solutions and patterns of tourism development. As new initiatives take place in transborder regions it is important to analyze opportunities for transborder tourism development. Several euroregions function only as “umbrellas” facilitating tourism development in national components however some of them are becoming attractive transborder destinations. The author tries to compare regions and euroregions as destinations. The paper shows the role of structural funds (e.g. Interreg), in transnational cooperation and to describes examples of good practice in transborder tourism. According to Association of European Border Regions, “the border regions themselves would not be able to overcome their problems without being granted assistance from the UE. The Oresund is one of the first euroregions promoted as transnational destination. The creation of a transborder destination is a long term process. It requires stable partnership between national components that leads from alienation to integration

The research analyses the spatial-temporal behaviour of international visitors using mobile positioning data (MPD) in three second-tier cities in Hungary: Szeged, Debrecen and Pécs. The purpose of this study is to identify the origins of visitors, length of stay, seasonal concentrations and mobility between cities.

A large volume of data generated by foreign mobile phone users was processed and analysed for six consecutive months in 2018. The movements of around 3.5 million foreigners visiting Hungary were captured.

The data showed significant differences in tourist turnover, mobility patterns and flows indicating different levels of tourism activity and potential in the three cities. This included day trips, cross-border tourism, seasonal fluctuations and activity-driven demand (e.g. special events and cultural tourism).

MPD cannot fully explain or predict drivers of visitor behaviour, such as purpose of visit, the precise activities that they undertake there and the experiences that they gain. It can, however, provide information on spatial and temporal flows, patterns and concentrations of visitors.

The investigated cities should follow distinct tourism development policies to attract more tourists and strengthen the links with their neighbouring destinations at the same time as differentiating themselves through marketing as competitive alternative destinations.

Augmenting tourism has socio-economic implications for residents and communities. The development of cultural tourism and local event-based tourism must incorporate community needs.

The paper analyses the extent to which MPD can provide insights into visitors’ spatio-temporal mobility and flows in relatively under-visited second-tier cities and it highlights opportunities and gaps for big data research in an urban context.