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The purpose of this paper is to analyze the relationship between tourists' user‐generated content on the web and destination branding, as well as to discuss the online strategies used by destination management organizations.

The research adopts an exploratory study of social media sites and destination brands, relying on qualitative research methods, content analysis and field research.

Tourists are largely contributing to destination image formation, while avoiding the use of the formal elements of the brands. The most popular strategies used by destination management organizations exhibit some crucial weaknesses. However, a strategy based on analytics brings new opportunities for destination branding.

The study provides an innovative analysis of tourist‐created content and its impact on destination branding and presents a theoretical model of generic web‐based strategies.

Purpose: This study links SDG goal 9 of industry, innovation strategies and another infrastructural environment to branding relating to destination and interactive marketing. Digital marketing tools with various applications aim to offer hi-tech services to customers in interactive marketing services, namely multiple goods and services, data and innovative techniques in the tourism and travel sector. Exploring the study would add to the existing literature supporting interactive marketing procedures and destination branding. Branding relating to destinations fosters tourists around the globe facilitating economic growth and development and supporting the local economies.

Need for the Study: It is observed from the literature that very few studies have been identified across the globe from various researchers on the interactive marketing and destination branding that ensures brand loyalty and reassesses the intent of the tourists just before the epidemic pandemic in the form of COVID-19. Artificial Intelligence, as part of information technology, offers various interactive marketing services in the form of different social media marketing strategies, attractive websites for tourists and travel providers and image building on destination branding. This study would help fill the marketing gap, which results in branding relating to destination, brand loyalty and reassessing the intent of various tours and travel plans just before the pandemic.

Methodology: The study focused on the literature, demonstrating the stimulus organism methodology and examining the impact of potential marketing strategy, which is interactive focusing on the destination branding, loyalty relating to the brand and also procedures to revert with the intent that would motivate and facilitate the customer’s confidence showering the loyalty relating to the brand in the travel and tourism sector.

Findings and their Practical Implications: The study revealed that the marketing relating to interactive methodologies in the hi-tech digital approaches ought to be carried out to create opportunities for prospective tourists willing to get information about various tourists destinations with the help of various marketing techniques such as different social media applications, easy access of websites for accessing the tourist destinations and relevant information, accessing images pertinent to the tourism destinations with the ease of chat box and providing suitable audios and video sources to the potential customers.

The paper examines the role and significance of gastronomic manifestations in the context of destination branding, within the framework of image transfer mechanisms and the Associative Network Memory Model.

The research was conducted on a sample of 53 gastronomic events in the tourist destination of Vojvodina.

The results indicate that gastronomic manifestations image has a positive impact on the brand image and brand identity of the destination, as well as the destination's overall image. Furthermore, the study found that the food experience has a positive influence on the image of gastronomic events and the destination.

The study contributes to the advancement of research on tourist destination branding.

This chapter examines the significance of multisensory experiences in the branding of the Swedish tourist destinations. Firstly, it provides a critical review of the relevant literature in the field of nation branding. It discusses about the tourism branding strategies that are intended to attract more visitors to Stockholm and in other areas in Sweden. Secondly, this contribution suggests that the destination marketers are engaging with tourists and are providing them with multisensory experiences to drive their emotional resonance for the Swedish destinations. Thirdly, it analyses how the ‘Swedishness’ could be expressed through the destinations’ attractions and from creative marketing campaigns. In conclusion the author provides four case studies on ‘The Swedish Number Campaign’, ‘ICEHOTEL’, ‘The ABBA Museum’ and ‘IKEA Museum’ to better explain how the Swedish destinations are providing the mentioned multisensory experiences to tourists.

This chapter explores the concept of branding in a contemporary competitive arena of places. The multi-dimensional interpretations of places offer a variety of possibilities to better understand the true essence of destination branding. One of the common interpretations of places is through the study of their images, as destination branding requires a thorough understanding of destination image. The important foundation and relation of destination image are specified and explained. The notion of destination branding has evolved from the fields of marketing and urban studies and has become a cross-disciplinary research area. Thus, the researchers explain that destination branding as well as ‘place branding’ are dynamic concepts that are being continuously being explored in academia for the benefit of practitioners in travel and tourism. This chapter suggests that the use of brand equity is also one of the frontier areas of study in ‘place branding’ as it emphasises the need to thematise destinations (e.g. for their historical heritage, cultural value, natural attractions, etc.) and places for residence (e.g. as green cities, creative cities, smart cities, etc.).

The purpose of this paper is to provide a suggestion for the research framework on tourists as target groups for planning city branding strategies with reference to possible differences for tourists having a different country of origin. This framework was applied to analyze and compare the perception of Banja Luka city brand (Bosnia and Herzegovina) by four main target group by country of origin.

The suggested research framework combines qualitative generation of tourist’s city brand associations and brand personality with quantitative measurements of city brand perception (scale developed following the framework of Anholts’ (2006) City Brand Index adjusted to tourists as target groups).

The developed research framework was demonstrated in the example of Banja Luka main target groups. Three dimensions of city brand which largely coincide Anholt’s (2006) dimensions were extracted: tourist attractiveness, life standard and safe and pleasant atmosphere. Differences between analyzed countries were found in city brand perception, brand associations, brand personality, but also in all other analyzed categories.

Possible limitation of the study is the fact that results were interpreted including both those who have visited Banja Luka and those who are not personally familiar with it.

Practical implications of research findings are demonstrated in form of branding suggestions focused on particular target groups.

The study suggests a research framework on tourists as target groups in the city branding process. Also, it contributes to a very scarce research on differences in city brand perception by target groups by country of origin, but also to the literature related to Banja Luka city brand and tourism development.

In the competitive realm of destination branding, understanding the factors that lead tourists to develop a deep emotional connection with a destination’s brand is essential. At the heart of this emotional bond lies destination brand love – an exceptionally profound sentiment transcending mere satisfaction or preference. This concept has recently garnered attention from both tourism academia and industry practice. However, there remains a void in exploring the factors and mechanisms that pave the way for tourists to develop deep affection for a destination’s brand. This study examines the influences of self-congruence and destination immersion on destination brand love. In addition, the linkages from the four facets of self-congruence to destination brand love via the mediating role of destination brand immersion are also scrutinized.

With data collected from 421 tourists in Vietnam, the partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) approach was applied to test the research model and hypotheses.

The results reveal that (1) ideal and ideal social self-congruence impact destination brand love, (2) all four facets of self-congruence impact destination brand immersion and (3) there is an indirect effect of the four facets of self-congruence on destination brand love, mediated by destination brand immersion.

The study’s findings provide evidence that destination characteristics must be symbolic of the destination brand and consistent with its image among tourists, which is essential in understanding the complex behavior of tourists. Indeed, the results indicate that facets of self-congruence significantly influence both destination brand immersion and destination brand love. Therefore, destination marketers should develop marketing strategies that emphasize personal relevance to the tourist destination to increase their sympathy and love for the destination.

Adapting self-congruence theory and the psychology of flow theory, this study presents a model that elucidates both the direct and indirect relationships among the four facets of self-congruence: destination brand immersion and destination brand love based on the aspects of congruence between tourists and destinations. From this, it helps to explore the factors and mechanisms that pave the way for tourists to develop deep affection for a destination’s brand.

This paper aims to examine the relationships between brand equity, customer satisfaction and cultural distance for a tourism destination. The mediating role of customer satisfaction and the moderating effect of cultural distance in these relationships are assessed.

The direct–indirect–moderating relationships were assessed by applying covariance-based SEM (CB-SEM), mediating and multi-group analysis. A paper survey was used to collect data from 618 tourists (domestic and international tourists) visiting a destination in Vietnam.

The findings support direct positive links between the dimensions of brand equity and customer satisfaction, except for the effect of destination brand awareness on destination brand loyalty. This work further demonstrates the mediating effect of customer satisfaction on the indirect relationships between the dimensions of brand equity. Cultural distance was found to moderate the connections between the research concepts.

Future research should explore the model’s relationships based on comparisons in different destinations, to better understand the impact of cultural factors.

This study identifies specific factors to increase branding efficiency by developing and testing the relationship between brand equity and customer satisfaction. Using moderating variables through the lens of cultural distance, it proposes a mediated model. This work contributes to practice by informing destination managers on how to improve brand equity and satisfaction based on the cultural characteristics of international and domestic visitors.

The purpose of this paper is to examine an integrated model of perceived brand salience, perceived brand quality, perceived brand image and perceived brand loyalty in the Dead Sea tourism destination of Jordan from international tourists’ perspectives.

A structured and self-administered survey was employed targeting international tourists who were visiting the Dead Sea tourism destination. The authors delivered 300 questionnaires to international tourists, from which 237 were retained and valid for the analysis. A series of exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses was used to assess the research constructs dimensions, unidimensionality, validity and composite reliability. Structural path analysis was also used to test the hypothesized relationships of the research model.

The structural findings show that perceived brand salience has positively and significantly affected each of perceived brand quality and perceived destination loyalty. Perceived brand quality has positively and significantly affected each of perceived brand image-physical environment, perceived brand image-people characteristics and perceived destination loyalty. Each of perceived brand image-physical environment and perceived brand image-people characteristics has positively and significantly affected perceived destination loyalty. The structural findings indicate that perceived brand quality has exerted the strongest effect on each of perceived brand image-physical environment and perceived brand image-people characteristics. Further, the structural results show that R2 result of 0.48 indicates that 48 per cent of variation in perceived destination loyalty was caused by perceived brand quality, perceived brand image dimensions (physical environment and people characteristics) and perceived brand salience path.

This paper has examined only three drivers of destination loyalty; meanwhile, other factors such as tourists’ satisfaction and retention are potential areas of future research. Also, this study investigated international tourists’ perspectives in the Dead Sea tourism destination only, which means that its generalization potential to other destinations is limited. Therefore, comparative studies inside and outside Jordan’s tourism destinations are potential areas of future research. Other limitations and future research areas are also outlined.

The paper highlights the strategic importance of perceived brand quality and perceived brand image dimensions (physical environment and people characteristics) on perceived destination loyalty. Perceived brand quality acts as strong antecedent to perceived brand image dimensions, and perceived brand salience is an essential element of perceived destination loyalty. Perceived brand quality, perceived brand image dimensions and perceived brand salience are major drivers of perceived brand destination in an integrated manner. Also, perceived brand image dimensions of the physical environment and people friendless and kindness are also vital for creating perceived destination loyalty. Further, an integrated model of perceived brand salience, perceived brand quality, perceived brand image dimensions and destination loyalty is required by tourism organizations operating in the Dead Sea destination to win international tourists now and in the future.

This paper represents an early attempt to reveal and examine potential drivers of perceived destination loyalty in the Dead Sea, Jordan. Accordingly, it should shed more light into the strategic role of perceived brand quality, perceived brand salience and perceived brand image dimensions and how they affect perceived destination loyalty. Further, the paper is the first of its kind that investigated an integrated model of perceived brand salience and perceived destination loyalty via perceived brand quality and image dimensions from international tourist perspectives in Jordan. The main issue here is that tourism organizations operating in the Dead Sea tourism destination have now valuable empirical evidence concerning the drivers of perceived destination loyalty from international tourists’ perspectives.

The purpose of this study is to analyze Chinese tourists' perceptions toward the 2010 World Expo and the impact of a mega event on the host city and visitor satisfaction.

Guided by the conceptualization of hosting special events for destination branding, this study examines empirically tourists' perceptions and experiences of the 2010 Shanghai World Expo and the host city. Ten hypotheses were tested using SEM to identify and analyze the factors and relationships that influence mega events and host cities.

Data collected from 600 tourists who visited the 2010 Shanghai World Expo provide support for the proposed model. The empirical test provides support for eight of the ten hypotheses and it reveals that the hosting of the World Expo had significant positive impact on Shanghai but not vice versa, and the Chinese tourists exhibited loyalty to the host city.

Using a moving event such as Expo, the Shanghai brand is simplified. The sample includes only domestic tourists and future research should include an international sample for comparison.

The results help in identifying and managing the factors that contribute positively to the host destination brand when hosting mega events.

This study is the first attempt to empirically test the conceptual framework of leveraging a mega event for enhancing the host destination brand by using the 2010 Shanghai Expo as a case study. It validates that the strategic fit between the event and host city, community support and event quality are essential in enhancing host destination brand and tourist loyalty.