Search results

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the unexplored part of the historical evolution of travel agencies in Spain, from the end of the 20th century to the 21st century. When examining promotion strategies, the study focuses on the change in marketing and public relations strategies based on the incorporation of information and communication technologies and, in particular, the use of the internet.

This study draws on a qualitative analysis of the different strategies used by traditional agencies and online agencies in Spain from the mid-19th century to the present. This analysis shows how traditional communication strategies survived at the beginning of the 21st century, together with other more innovative ones, while some disappeared, being eliminated by the new online travel agencies, which created a particular conception of marketing and communication. This paper is divided into the following parts: the introduction; the beginnings of travel agency promotion in the 20th century; the evolution of promotion in travel agencies since the late 20th century; communication innovation at the beginning of the 21st century; online travel agencies; and conclusions.

This study shows that although online agencies did not manage to position themselves with a large turnover, they generated advantages and sharpened their imagination to create a new, more economical advertising model, eliminating the costs of public relations and advertising campaigns. In addition, they allowed clients to have greater independence when making their reservations, while enabling them to monitor the tastes of potential and real clients and add blogs so that consumers could express their degree of satisfaction with the product or services provided by the agency.

The focus of attention is the travel agency sector in Spain and, more specifically, communication. Studies on travel agencies and their marketing have been very scarce and partial, impeding professionals in the tourism sector from having a broad vision to direct their promotional and public relations actions. The originality of this article lies in its making a comparison between two different visions of tourism marketing and, specifically, of travel agencies, that is, the traditional vision and the innovative one. It thus helps all professionals in the sector to value and improve their marketing and communication strategies.

The metaverse, which is now revolutionizing how brands strategize their business needs, necessitates understanding individual opinions. Sentiment analysis deciphers emotions and uncovers a deeper understanding of user opinions and trends within this digital realm. Further, sentiments signify the underlying factor that triggers one’s intent to use technology like the metaverse. Positive sentiments often correlate with positive user experiences, while negative sentiments may signify issues or frustrations. Brands may consider these sentiments and implement them on their metaverse platforms for a seamless user experience.

The current study adopts machine learning sentiment analysis techniques using Support Vector Machine, Doc2Vec, RNN, and CNN to explore the sentiment of individuals toward metaverse in a user-generated context. The topics were discovered using the topic modeling method, and sentiment analysis was performed subsequently.

The results revealed that the users had a positive notion about the experience and orientation of the metaverse while having a negative attitude towards the economy, data, and cyber security. The accuracy of each model has been analyzed, and it has been concluded that CNN provides better accuracy on an average of 89% compared to the other models.

Analyzing sentiment can reveal how the general public perceives the metaverse. Positive sentiment may suggest enthusiasm and readiness for adoption, while negative sentiment might indicate skepticism or concerns. Given the positive user notions about the metaverse’s experience and orientation, developers should continue to focus on creating innovative and immersive virtual environments. At the same time, users' concerns about data, cybersecurity and the economy are critical. The negative attitude toward the metaverse’s economy suggests a need for innovation in economic models within the metaverse. Also, developers and platform operators should prioritize robust data security measures. Implementing strong encryption and two-factor authentication and educating users about cybersecurity best practices can address these concerns and enhance user trust.

In terms of societal dynamics, the metaverse could revolutionize communication and relationships by altering traditional notions of proximity and the presence of its users. Further, virtual economies might emerge, with virtual assets having real-world value, presenting both opportunities and challenges for industries and regulators.

The current study contributes to research as it is the first of its kind to explore the sentiments of individuals toward the metaverse using deep learning techniques and evaluate the accuracy of these models.

This study aims to understand how female executive travellers should be characterized by inter-winning socio-economic segmentation and leisure travel motivation.

This study identifies push factors as a motivation for leisure travel among female executives in India. Quantitative research methodology was applied based on 892 online responses to a questionnaire. Principal component analysis was applied to identify the underlying dimensions of push motivational items.

The findings disclose five-factor dimensions of self-esteem; knowledge- and novelty-seeking; stimulus; escape; and self-recognition. Among the five identified dimensions, stimulus was the most important factor for motivating female executives to travel for leisure, followed by knowledge and novelty-seeking.

This study was conducted on 1,100 female executive travellers, meaning the results are only valid for this cultural context. All data was collected through a referral chain network survey among female executives via Google survey forms. While segmenting types of travellers amongst females, usage of push motivation framework as a variable remains pervasive in tourism research.

Although literature on female travel motivation is abundant, however, to the authors’ knowledge, empirical studies that focus on female executives leisure travel motivations are still rare. These findings are, therefore, valuable for illuminating tourism stakeholders to cater this potential segment more customisedly.

In recent years, there has been a growing interest in the potential of data analytics to enhance project delivery. Yet many argue that its application in projects is still lagging behind other disciplines. This paper aims to provide a review of the current use of data analytics in project delivery encompassing both academic research and practice to accelerate current understanding and use this to formulate questions and goals for future research.

We propose to achieve the research aim through the creation of a systematic review of the status of data analytics in project delivery. Fusing the methodology of integrative literature review with a recently established practice to include both white and grey literature amounts to an approach tailored to the state of the domain. It serves to delineate a research agenda informed by current developments in both academic research and industrial practice.

The literature review reveals a dearth of work in both academic research and practice relating to data analytics in project delivery and characterises this situation as having “more gap than knowledge.” Some work does exist in the application of machine learning to predicting project delivery though this is restricted to disparate, single context studies that do not reach extendible findings on algorithm selection or key predictive characteristics. Grey literature addresses the potential benefits of data analytics in project delivery but in a manner reliant on “thought-experiments” and devoid of empirical examples.

Based on the review we articulate a research agenda to create knowledge fundamental to the effective use of data analytics in project delivery. This is structured around the functional framework devised by this investigation and highlights both organisational and data analytic challenges. Specifically, we express this structure in the form of an “onion-skin” model for conceptual structuring of data analytics in projects. We conclude with a discussion about if and how today’s project studies research community can respond to the totality of these challenges. This paper provides a blueprint for a bridge connecting data analytics and project management.

Heritage tourism is an increasingly popular form of tourism that allows individuals to connect with the past and immerse themselves in cultural and historical narratives. Hence, the purpose of this study is to explore the intricate relationships among vicarious nostalgia (VNOS), memorable tourism experiences (MTEXs) and their collective influence on tourists’ behavioral intentions (BINTs). Additionally, this study examines the moderating effect of social return (SN) in the context of heritage tourism.

Data were gathered using a self-administered questionnaire from 259 tourists visiting heritage sites in Jaipur. The proposed model was tested using structural equation modeling.

The results confirmed that VNOS had a significant positive impact on BINT in the context of heritage tourism. The causal relationship between VNOS and BINT was fully mediated by MTEX. The results further verified that the presence of SN strengthens the association between MTEXs and BINT.

This research will guide the firms associated with heritage tourism to target specific cohorts interested in heritage tourism. Policymakers may find it easier to create unique offerings and packages that appeal to visitors interested in historical sites and produce memorable travel experiences. One key implication is to create “social media friendly spaces” at different locations of the sites. To increase tourism, managers may use the findings from this research to create plans for the ethical promotion and protection of cultural and natural heritage sites.

Overall, this research advances the understanding of the role of VNOS in heritage tourism by elucidating its cognitive and emotional aspects and their subsequent influence on the memorability of tourist experiences and BINT s. Additionally, by considering the moderating effect of SN, this study provides a comprehensive view of how these factors collectively shape tourists’ decisions and actions in the context of heritage destinations. This research has been conducted in the heritage city of Jaipur (North-Western India), which, surprisingly – despite its popularity as a heritage tourism site – has not been sufficiently explored in the scholarly research.

This study aims to examine the impact of the structural linkages between memorable tourism experiences, destination attachment, tourists’ satisfaction and customer-based destination brand-equity on tourists’ storytelling intentions.

The authors proposed a conceptual model that examines how memorable experiences contribute to tourists’ sense of attachment to a destination, which can lead to their willingness to share their trip stories. Using partial least square estimation, the authors analysed the conceptual model through data generated by a survey of 448 Indian domestic tourists.

Study confirms the validity and usefulness of the conceptualized model, as it shows significant correlations between the key variables. Specifically, the authors found that positive and memorable tourism experiences significantly affect tourists’ attachment and their satisfaction with destinations. As a result, tourists who form a strong customer-based destination brand equity are more likely to develop storytelling intentions.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, current study is the earliest to explore the association between memorable tourism experiences, tourist satisfaction, attachment, customer-based brand equity and how they impact storytelling intentions of tourists.

This paper aims to explain the implications of the impending establishment of national blockchain infrastructure by governments around the world, and how these structures can be integrated with existing legislation and assist in the prevention of financial crime.

The methodology used is a literature review and analysis of progress being made to establish national blockchain infrastructure. It provides a discussion of the connection between blockchain and financial crime, and how this infrastructure will interact with existing regulatory frameworks, and particularly, financial crime legislation.

This paper documents financial crime risks posed by digital currencies and smart contracts and the role that national blockchain infrastructure can potentially play in mitigating these risks. It highlights the need for governments to devote resources to developing this infrastructure and associated regulatory frameworks.

There are few, if any, academic papers in the financial crime, or wider literature, that have examined the potential for national blockchain infrastructures prevent financial crime, including the implications for existing regulation in the field.

Based on the key dimensions of the Metaverse environment (immersiveness, fidelity and sociability), this paper aims to develop the concept of sensory word-of-mouth (WOM) in Metaverse – the metaWOM. It attempts to upgrade the Reviewchain model and suggests the utilization of non-transferable tokens (NTTs) in curbing the explosion of fake WOM.

Following Macinnis’ (2011) approach to conceptual contributions, the authors browsed the currently available literature on WOM, Metaverse and NTT to portray the emergence of metaWOM.

By relying on Metaverse’s three building blocks, the authors map out the persuasiveness of metaWOM in the Metaverse-like environment. By incorporating NTT in the Reviewchain model, the authors upgraded it to provide a transparent, safe and trusted review ecosystem. An array of emerging research directions and research questions is presented.

This paper comprehensively analyzes the implications of a Metaverse-like environment on WOM and debates on technologies that can enhance the metaWOM persuasiveness. The proposed model in this paper can assist various stakeholders in understanding the complex nature of virtual information-seeking and giving.

This is the original attempt to delineate the sensory aspect of WOM in the Metaverse based on three crucial aspects of the Metaverse environment: immersiveness, fidelity and sociability. This paper extends the discussion on the issue of fake reviews and offers viable suggestions to curb the ever-growing number of fraudulent WOM.

To cater to the senior tourist market, it is essential to comprehend the factors motivating and deterring them from international travel post-COVID-19. This study aims to focus on senior citizens’ destination choice intentions and aims to develop a model that prioritizes positive and negative factors leading to international travel destination choices. It uses push–pull factors, perceived travel risks (PTRs) and perceived travel constraints (PTCs).

Decision-making trial and evaluation laboratory (DEMATEL) and fuzzy technique for order of preference by similarity to ideal solution (Fuzzy TOPSIS) are two multi-criteria decision-making (MCDM) techniques used to identify connections between variables and determine their relative importance in the decision-making model.

DEMATEL found push and pull factors are “effects” while PTCs and PTRs are “causes” affecting senior citizens’ destination choices. Push factors and PTCs have a greater impact than pull factors and PTRs. Fuzzy TOPSIS highlighted “improving health and wellness” and “self-fulfillment and spirituality” as key push factors, “health safety and security quotient” as the most important pull factor, and “interpersonal constraints” as the most critical PTC. Finally, “health risks” is the top PTR.

This paper adds to the tourism literature by looking at the relationship between senior tourists’ motivation, PTRs and PTCs and showing how the subfactors affect their choice of destination rank. The data analysis techniques used in this study are also novel, having never been used before in senior tourism research. Finally, even though there is a lot of research on senior tourism, not much is known about how Indian senior tourists act. In light of this study’s findings, practical recommendations were offered to tourism stakeholders worldwide, interested in tapping into the market of Indian outbound senior tourists or repositioning product or destination offerings to take this promising market or similar markets into account.

为了成功迎合蓬勃发展的老年旅游市场, 了解激励和阻止老年人国际旅行的因素尤为重要, 尤其是在 COVID-19 之后。本研究侧重于老年人的目的地选择意向, 并基于推拉因素、感知旅行风险 (PTR) 和感知旅行限制 (PTC), 旨在开发影响老年人国际旅游目的地选择的积极和消极因素的模型。

决策试验和评估实验室 (DEMATEL), 和与理想解决方案相似度的模糊偏好顺序 (Fuzzy TOPSIS) 是两种多标准决策 (MCDM) 技术, 用于识别变量之间的联系并找出它们在决策模型中的相对重要性。

DEMATEL的结果表明, 推力和拉力因素是“影响”, 而感知旅行约束（PTC）和感知旅行风险（PTR）是影响老年人目的地选择意愿的因素中的“原因”。推动因素和 PTC 比拉动因素和 PTR 发挥更重要的作用。 Fuzzy TOPSIS分析结果表明, “改善健康”和“自我实现和精神”是推动因素下最重要的因素。此外, 目的地的“健康安全商数”是拉动因素中最重要的, “人际约束”是PTC中最重要的。最后, 研究结果表明, “健康风险”是 PTR 中最重要的。

本文通过评估旅游动机、PTR 和老年游客 PTC 之间的相互关系, 为现有的旅游文献做出了贡献。此外, 该研究展示了影响老年游客目的地选择意愿的因素中各个子因素的比较优先级。本研究中使用的数据分析技术也很新颖, 以前从未在老年人旅游研究中使用过。最后, 虽然对老年旅游有丰富的研究, 但印度老年旅游者的行为相对不为人知。研究结果向有兴趣进入印度出境老年游客市场或重新定位产品或目的地的全球旅游利益相关者提供了切实可行的建议, 以考虑这个有前景的市场或类似市场。

Para atender a un mercado turístico de la tercera edad, es esencial comprender los factores que les motivan y les disuaden de realizar viajes internacionales tras el COVID-19. Este estudio se centra en las intenciones de elección de destino de las personas mayores y pretende desarrollar un modelo que priorice los factores positivos y negativos que conducen a la elección de un destino de viaje internacional. Utiliza los factores push-pull, los riesgos de viaje percibidos (PTR) y las limitaciones de viaje percibidas (PTC).

Decision Making Trial and Evaluation Laboratory (DEMATEL) y Fuzzy Order of Preference by Similarity to Ideal Solution (Fuzzy TOPSIS) son dos técnicas de toma de decisiones multicriterio (MCDM) utilizadas para identificar las conexiones entre variables y determinar su importancia relativa en el modelo de toma de decisiones.

DEMATEL descubrió que los factores de empuje y atracción son “efectos,” mientras que las PTC y las PTR son “causas” que afectan a las elecciones de destino de las personas mayores. Los factores de empuje y los PTC tienen un mayor impacto que los factores de atracción y los PTR. El Fuzzy TOPSIS destacó la “mejora de la salud y el bienestar” y la “autorrealización y espiritualidad” como factores de empuje clave, el “cociente de seguridad y protección de la salud” como el factor de atracción más importante y las “limitaciones interpersonales” como el PTC más crítico. Por último, los “riesgos para la salud” son el principal PTR.

Este artículo se suma a la literatura turística al estudiar la relación entre la motivación de los turistas sénior, los PTR y los PTC y mostrar cómo afectan los subfactores a su elección del destino. Las técnicas de análisis de datos empleadas en este estudio también son novedosas, ya que nunca se habían utilizado en la investigación sobre el turismo senior. Por último, aunque existen muchas investigaciones sobre el turismo sénior, el comportamiento de los turistas de la tercera edad en la India es relativamente desconocido. A la luz de los resultados del estudio, se ofrecen recomendaciones prácticas a las partes interesadas en el turismo de todo el mundo, interesadas en aprovechar el mercado de los turistas senior indios emisores o en reposicionar la oferta de productos o destinos para tener en cuenta este prometedor mercado o mercados similares.

This study aims to explore the role of digital technologies in tourism entrepreneurship. In particular, the main objective of this research is to examine the relationships among proactiveness, innovativeness, digitalization, and firm performance and growth in the hotel industry.

The data for this investigation were collected from 110 one- or two-star hotels that were operating in Poland during the time of this research. This study employs PLS-SEM to analyze the relationships among the examined variables.

The results show that digitalization has a significantly positive impact on a hotel’s performance. Moreover, digitalization mediates the impact of entrepreneurial behaviors on performance. In particular, digitization is a full mediator for the impact of proactiveness on firm growth and innovation on market performance. Additionally, there is a partial complementary mediation effect of digitalization in the case of impact of innovativeness on firm growth; digitization is not a mediator for the impact of proactiveness on firm growth.

Previous studies have not captured the relationships among entrepreneurship, digitalization, and performance; this study helps to fill the gap and examine these associations in the hospitality industry. The outcome of this study provides valuable insights for hoteliers for understanding the role (and importance) of digitalization in the context of proactiveness and innovativeness.