27 New media in travel and tourism communication: toward a new

Alessandro Inversini, Zheng Xiang, Daniel R. Fesenmaier27 New media in travel and tourism

communication: toward a new paradigmAbstract: This chapter discusses the advent and the impact of Information andCommunication Technologies (ICT) on the travel and tourism industry. It firstreviews and highlights the most important milestones in the last two decades thatchanged tourism communication, focusing on three main areas of development:the persuasive nature of tourism websites, social media conversations, and mobilecomputing. It is then argued that these technological developments have led tothe transformation of tourism that is best characterized by the development of theInternet of Things (IoT) and the notion ‘travelling in the network.’ The chapterconcludes that this ambient networking of the various tourism systems will furthertransform the tourism experience and therefore lead to a new paradigm for tourismcommunication within an increasingly ICT-support environment.

Keywords: ICT, eTourism, communication, web development, social media, mobilecomputing, tourism experience, Internet of Things.

The development of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) in thelast two decades has dramatically transformed the tourism industry (Inversini andBuhalis 2009; Werthner and Klein 1999). Poon (1993) predicted that a whole newsystem of ICTs would be rapidly diffused throughout the tourism industry and noplayer could escape its impact. Indeed, ICTs have had a profound impact on theoperational and strategic practices of tourism organisations, and have altered thecompetitive landscape of enterprises and regions around the world (Fesenmaierand Xiang 2013). At the tactical level, ICTs enabled eCommerce and helped tourismorganisations maximise efficiency and effectiveness whereas at the strategic level,ICTs have helped to restructure the travel and tourism value chain as well as therelationships between tourism organisations and their stakeholders (Buhalis 2003).

Modern travellers are exigent and constantly in need of information duringthe entire consumption process of travel (Gretzel et al. 2006). The complex arrayof information needed by travellers before, during, and after the tourism experi-ence can be delivered on different devices, with different strategies, and by differ-ent stakeholders thanks to today’s technologies (Inversini et al. 2009). Wise tour-ism managers guard different channels and use various strategies to develop therelationships with customers and to provide them with the most relevant informa-tion at the right place and at the right time. This suggests that effective communi-cation holds the key to assisting travellers in the multifaceted pre-trip planningprocess, helping them making en route and on-site decisions, and supporting their

496 Alessandro Inversini, Zheng Xiang, Daniel R. Fesenmaier

engagement with their social circle after the trip (Jeng and Fesenmaier 2002; Gret-zel et al. 2006; Inversini and Cantoni 2009).

However, the intrinsic nature of the tourism product characterised by experi-ential services and goods with high level of complexity poses many challenges forthe industry (Gretzel and Fesenmaier 2002; Pine and Gilmore 1999). Travel andtourism is an unique industry wherein the purchased product is created at themoment when the actual experience takes place (Tresidder and Hirst 2012). Theintangibility of the tourism experience gives rise to many problems for effectivecommunications between the supply and demand. To address these challenges,many technological solutions have been proposed and tested in order to facilitateand enhance online tourism communications along with technological develop-ments in other domains, resulting in a rich stream of literature (Fesenmaier et al.2006). In the last two decades we have witnessed a series of significant develop-ment in online tourism communications characterised by richer content, more per-sonalized services, higher level of interactivity, and, most importantly, highlydiverse and extremely dynamic modalities of dialogues and engagement.

This chapter synthesises the literature that reflects the evolution of informa-tion and communication technologies in travel and tourism over the last two dec-ades. Specifically, this discussion focuses attention on three important areas of ICTdevelopment including website design, social media, and mobile technology asthey support a wide range of communication needs throughout the travel process.To provide an outlook for the future development, this chapter also proposes anemergent paradigm for online tourism communication.

1 New media in tourism communication: twodecades of change

Information is the lifeblood of the tourism industry, and the uses of ICTs havealways played a critical role in distribution and management (O’Connor and Frew2004; Sheldon 1997). From the development of Computer Reservation Systems(CRSs) in the 1970s to the Global Distribution Systems (GDSs) in the 1980s untilthe advent of the Internet in early 1990s, the tourism industry has always beenconfronted with the rise of new developments that posed as both opportunitiesand challenges (Buhalis and Law 2008; Ip et al. 2011). However, it was during thisfirst decade of the Internet (roughly from 1991–2002) that ICTs assumed a criticalimportance for communication purposes. As illustrated in Figure 1, the tourismindustry became one of the leaders in the use of the Internet as this new toolwas enabling them to communicate easily and effectively with their existing andpotential customers. Every American tourism organization had developed a web-site by the early 2000’s, and many had gone through the evolution from a simple

New media in travel and tourism communication: toward a new paradigm 497

Fig. 1: Six generations of Internet development.

‘electronic brochure’ to highly interactive systems that supported reservations,search and even virtual tours; importantly, the website had become the primary(and in many circumstances, the only) source of contact with potential visitors(Zach et al. 2010). In retrospect, this transformation is easily understood as theuse of computers already existed within the domain (i.e. the various GDSs linkingtravel agencies to the airlines). Also during this time, many innovative destinationmarketing organizations (DMOs) began to realize their new role as partners withinthe tourism system wherein they became ‘information brokers’ as they sought todevelop and coordinate a range of new systems that would be used by their stake-holders (Fesenmaier and Xiang 2013; Gretzel and Fesenmaier 2002; Wang andXiang 2012) to share relevant information.

Interestingly, the second decade (2001−present) was a time of even greaterchange for tourism marketing and communication where the focus of technologyemerged from website development (i.e., growth in the number of websites) andusability to one of persuasion and customer empowerment, and more recently toubiquity through mobile systems. That is, while many of the core industry changeswere realized in the first decade, the rise of Web 2.0 created a new round ofadaptation, which required another new and even more transformational frame-work for tourism marketing and communication. The first part of this second dec-ade of the Internet saw the expansion of high-speed connections where the rich-ness of the new interactive medium could be exploited (e.g. pictures and videos),leading eventually to the development of brochures which largely realized theinteractive and personalized vision of the early developers. The most importantfeature of this decade is the development of new ‘social’ systems. TripAdvisor, forexample, was launched in 2000 and fifteen years later (in 2014) it handled over50 million inquiries monthly; Wikipedia was launched in 2001 and by 2014, ithosted over 250 million articles in 285 different languages; and Facebook,


launched in 2004 grew such that it serviced over 1 billion users annually by 2013.Importantly, during about the same time mobile phone systems began to penetratethe marketplace to enable travellers to communicate more easily and from essen-tially anywhere on the planet.

Finally in the later part of the decade, the introduction of smartphones, mobilecomputing systems that incorporate a variety of technologies including communi-cations, global positioning systems (GPS), photography and the Internet, enrichedthe social environment further such that it empowers users to substantially controltheir travel experience anytime, anywhere. Within the tourism literature, Buhalis(2003) provided the leading book which discussed in practical terms how the tour-ism industry could successfully navigate through this new world. More recently,Sigala, Christou, and Gretzel (2012) offer a different vision, which is situated withinthis new rich socially created environment whereby the “army of travellers” is nowthe central player within the value chain; further, Wang, Park, and Fesenmaier(2012) conclude that the increased mobility supported through smartphones sub-stantially changes the nature of the travel experience. The Internet, together withthe new interactive way of communication provided by social media and with thelocation based browsing, fundamentally changed the nature of travel and tourismcommunication and marketing (Gretzel et al. 2006).

1.1 The website: from functionality to persuasion

The Internet provided the ability to expand the customer base to cover the globalpopulation cost effectively. Large organisations such as airlines and hotel chainswere able to access an international clientele and develop the tools to manageproperties around the world at the touch of a button (Egger and Buhalis 2008).Smaller companies could also for the first time develop their “virtual size” andoffer their services to global markets (Spencer et al. 2012). Tourism enterprises –at all levels − recognized the importance of technologies in their field and theyacknowledge that a correct management of an holistic online presence is a pre-requisite for success (e.g. Inversini et al. 2012).

Travel and tourism organizations rely upon the Internet to facilitate users’experience when approaching the destination in the online environment (Gretzelet al. 2006). Indeed, the cornerstone of the online tourism communication contin-ues to be the organization’s website (Baloglu and Pekcan 2006); for example, Choi,Lehto, and Oleary, (2007), as well as Wang (2008) and Zach et al. (2010), foundthat tourism destinations use official websites to provide users with informationduring the three phases of tourism goods consumption, in order to promote acoherent destination image throughout the travel experience. Similarly, hospitalitybusinesses also put a lot of effort in creating the hotel website to be the focal pointof the digital marketing and communication strategy as well as of the digital sell-ing strategy (Phelan et al. 2011) thus fostering disintermediation (Law 2009), or in


other words the possibility of selling rooms independently by third party operators.The adoption of these technologies required a lot of effort on the industry sidewhich was not prepared to embrace the changes required by the management ofa 24/7 worldwide contact point (i.e. the website) and a 24/7 worldwide sales centre(i.e. the reservations page) due to organizational problems (Card et al. 2003).

Tourism researchers drew inspiration from many other disciplines includingdigital communications (Hoffman and Novak 1996) and product design/marketing(Pine and Gilmore 1999) to conceptualize the key issues in online tourism commu-nications based upon the unique characteristics of the tourism product. Early aca-demic discussion around tourism websites (at both the destination and hospitalitylevel) dealt with issues related to website functionalities including completeness(Choi et al. 2007), quality (Inversini and Cantoni 2009), scope (Morrison et al.2004) and performances (Lee and Morrison 2010) using different methodologiesand outcomes. This literature as well as the amount of attention given to this topicdemonstrates the relevance of the subject both at academic and practical level (Ipet al. 2011). What is clear is that tourism websites, which moved from being anonline brochure to a more complex communication tools, are not mere technologi-cal artefacts but also instruments that impact on management, promotion, andcommercialization (Inversini et al. 2012). Moreover, they are important tools forstudying the preferences of the target audiences of the destination/hotel, engagingconsumers’ interest and participation, and capturing key information (Wang andFesenmaier 2006).

A key development in tourism website design evolved through seeing onlinecommunication from simply a collection of functionalities to a way of persuasionwith the emphasis on change in website users’ attitudes and behaviours. Whilethis line of research has taken on perspectives from multidisciplinary fields suchas human-computer interaction and digital communication, a solid grasp of theintangible, perishable, and experiential nature of the tourism product serves asthe conceptual foundation for developing effective online communication strate-gies. Early research in this area focused attention on offering rich and interactivevirtual experiences as well as community-based information exchanges for touristslooking for destination information (Cho et al. 2002; Wang et al. 2002). Gretzel andFesenmaier (2002) argued that the inherently complex and personally-basednature of the tourism product entails the integration of the narrative logic whenbuilding a tourism information system. From a human-computer interaction per-spective, Xiang and Fesenmaier (2005) further suggested that interface metaphorsshould serve as a critical element in website design that aims to represent thetourism product that best connects with the traveller’s mental model of a touristplace. In line with the development in computer science, tourism research alsoplaced much attention on online recommendation systems (Fesenmaier et al.2006). For example, strategies such as case-based reasoning and collaborative fil-tering have been built into systems that make suggestions for tourist destinations


(Ricci et al. 2002; Ricci and Werthner 2004; Gretzel and Fesenmaier 2006). As partof this effort, Gretzel et al. (2004) tested the effectiveness of using travel personal-ity to predict travellers’ preferences of suggested tourism destinations. Recently,research on persuasive communication in online tourism also took into considera-tion the travel information search process to understand the impact of differentchannels/websites on travel planning and decision-making on the Internet (Gretzeland Fesenmaier 2006; Kim and Fesenmaier 2008; Pan et al. 2011). Perhaps, aframework that integrates various elements of persuasion such as “attract, engage,relate, and learn” epitomizes best the communication strategies that are morelikely to succeed in online tourism (Gretzel et al. 2006; Wang and Fesenmaier2006). Generally speaking, the understanding of the tourism website continues toprogress from a representational tool to a communication platform that activelyengages and transforms its visitors.

1.2 The power of social media: from mass broadcasting tosocial conversations

The emergence of web 2.0 (O’Reilly 2009) and social media has generated impor-tant impact on travel and tourism, particularly in online communication. In gen-eral, social media can be understood as Internet-based applications that encom-pass media impressions created by consumers, typically informed by relevantexperiences, and archived or shared online for easy access by other impressionableconsumers (Blackshaw and Nazzaro 2006). These Websites, in various forms ofconsumer generated content represented by blogs, virtual communities, productreview sites, wikis, social networks, and collaborative tagging, and media sharingWebsites like YouTube and Flickr, have gained substantial popularity in onlinetravellers’ use of the Internet (Xiang and Gretzel 2010). Many of these websitessupport consumers in posting and sharing their comments, opinions, and personalexperiences, which then serve as potentially valuable information for others. Thisnew form of online communication supports the argument by Thomas Friedman(2006) that “the world is flat” because consumers are gaining substantially morepower in determining the production and distribution of information owing to theflattening of access on the Internet. Importantly, the ever growing presence ofsocial media has changed the dynamics of online communication, i.e., from massbroadcasting to social conversations.

Research has focused attention on the socio-psychological aspects of socialmedia use. From the early days of the commercialization of the Internet, travelrelated virtual communities have attracted the attention of tourism researchersbecause of their important role in generating online word-of-mouth. Virtual touristcommunities such as LonelyPlanet and IGoUGo, where tourists can exchange opin-ions and experiences on topics of common interests, have been around at leastsince the late 1990s, and several researchers have investigated their roles and


impacts in the context of travel (Tussyadiah and Fesenmaier 2008; Tussyadiahand Fesenmaier 2009; Wang and Fesenmaier 2006; Wang et al. 2002). Social mediagrew to include a range of new applications such as RSS-based content syndica-tion, AJAX, tagging, wikis, ratings and evaluation systems, virtual worlds (e.g.,Second Life), podcasting, blogs, and online videos. For example, consumer blogshave emerged as one of the most prominent themes in research on social mediain travel and tourism. This research aims to understand the functions of blogs increating and sharing new experiences (Pudliner 2007), its trustworthiness to onlinetravelers (Mack et al. 2008), as well as the use of it as marketing intelligence(Pühringer and Taylor 2008; Waldhör and Rind 2008). As evidenced by the successof websites like TripAdvisor, Yelp, and Zagat, online travel-related review sitesalso represent a significant proportion of social media in travel and tourism (Gret-zel and Yoo 2008). Multimedia sharing (i.e., video, photos, podcasting, etc), repre-sented by Websites such as YouTube and Flickr, has attracted tourism researchersby generating interests in understanding the role of social media in transformingtravel experiences (Tussyadiah and Fesenmaier 2008).

The structure of the tourism domain has changed drastically with the emer-gence of social media as new players in the field of online communication. Socialmedia has given rise to issues with respect to how tourism marketers can leveragethis electronic word-of-mouth in order to support their online marketing efforts.For example, Schmallegger and Carson (2008) suggested that strategies for usingblogs as an information channel encompass communication, promotion, productdistribution, management, and research. Many travel and tourism operations havealso recognized the importance of including consumer generated content on theirwebsites, usually in the form of edited testimonials (e.g., VisitPA.com and Shera-ton.com). Adoption of social media as a marketing tool has been widespreadamong hospitality and tourism organizations including using it for public relationspurposes (Chan and Guillet 2011; Curtis et al. 2010; Stankov 2010) as well as forprediction of market trends (Asur and Huberman 2012). However, organizationsare also facing huge challenges due to the loss of control in online communication(Fotis et al. 2011; Hays et al. 2013). For example, many of them are struggling withfighting negative comments or reviews that could have devastating impact on theirbusinesses (see, for example, http://www.bizjournals.com/boston/blog/techflash/2013/08/dirtiest-hotel-tripadvisor-lawsuit.html). Innovative organisations, on theother hand, will need to rapidly identify consumer needs and to interact withprospective clients by using comprehensive, personalised and up-to-date commu-nication media for the design of products that satisfy tourism demand (Yu et al.2011). Social media, thus, provide clear credentials for organizations and enableconsumers to tell their side of the story with the possibility of posting onlinereviews about a given product/service. Social networking sites offer innovativeways to develop customer relationship management strategies and engagementthat can have a direct influence a (i) company’s credibility, (ii) influence, (iii)


reputation and (iv) word-of-mouth advertising. It seems that social media willremain, in the foreseeable future, a significant force that drives the online conver-sations in travel and tourism.

1.3 Mobile computing: engaging consumers on-the-go

Mobile communication has evolved in the last few years. The advent of the AppleiPhone followed by the spread of the so-called smartphones has revolutionized theconsumer market. It was envisioned that smart phones soon would become an‘ordinary device’ for consumers in order to stay in touch with friends and to browsethe web (Katz 2008). into essential tools in the ordinary routines of the masses.This trend is generating an enormous impact in the tourism sector (Inversini andVioli 2013). There are indications that mobile technologies will become the nextwave of innovation that drives travel and tourism. With power-efficient processors,modern operating systems, broadband Internet access, large viewing screens, userfriendly interfaces, pervasive computing capabilities, as well as productivity-enhancing apps, smartphones offer a wide range of possibilities to support travel-lers in their use of information and communications home and away. Particularly,smartphones offer increased connectivity, communication, content consumption,and content creation. As such, mobile technologies have even been touted as thecatalyst for the emergence of a new generation of modern tourists (Gretzel 2011;Gretzel and Jamal 2009) Recent research indicates that the smartphone supportstourists’ needs for mobility and information/communication on-the-go and, inturn, transforms the meaning of travel (Wang et al. 2012).

There are several characteristics of mobile technology that distinguish it fromthe traditional, stationary technologies in terms of its support of the tourism com-munication. First, as discussed by Gretzel, Fesenmaier, and O’Leary (2006), tour-ists frequently need information support due to the uncertainty of the environ-ment, inadequate capability in making judgments because of a lack of experience,and unexpected changes in plans. Smartphones provide nearly anywhere and any-time access to information services, and connectivity with one’s social circles istaking shape, which is, in many ways, different from the time when most of infor-mation for travel is accessed on a desktop computer (Egger and Jooss 2010). Assuch, smartphones support the different phases in the travel process.

Second, information needs of users may change during a trip due to a possiblechange in location and context. As such, location-based and context aware servi-ces can then be used to support travellers on the go, particularly with the abilityto suggest modification in the planned tourism experience (Angerer 2010; Lamsfuset al. 2012). The notion of context can be defined as any situation that can be usedto characterize the situation of a person, place, or object (Dey and Abowd 2000).Time and location are two of the most important context parameters (Angerer2010) but dimensions such as weather or the users’ personal interests (Egger and


Jooss 2010) are crucial for the application of this technology in the tourism sector.They filter information and provide a series of choices that are relevant and tai-lored for the given user in the given context. Recently, context-driven services ariseto help tourists on the move by leveraging not only on “physical” aspects of con-text such as time and location but also potentially more complex situations per-taining to the nature of the tourism experience (Lamsfus et al. 2013). As such,mobile devices, and especially the smartphone, play a central role in facilitatingdynamic decision making for travellers on the move.

Third, another aspect of mobile communication is the connection betweentravel sphere and the traveller’s everyday life. Travel can be seen as a special stageof technology use, which is connected with other settings (Gretzel 2011). As aresult, tourist carries part of “himself/herself” (e.g. habits, routines, connectionswith friends and families) as well as her/his capability and mentality of technologyuse to the context of travel. Thus, use of the mobile technology consists of notonly the decision-making aspects of the trip but also the information, communica-tion, and entertainment needs resulting from the traveller’s everyday life. Forexample, travellers use the same social network applications (e.g., Foursquare,Flickr, Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Skype) in both travel and everyday lives.They follow the same procedures to find direction as they do in everyday life.Tourism marketing must consider the exchange of information between a travellerand others in different physical and virtual domains.

2 Travel in the network: toward a new paradigm fortourism communication

Technological forces of change have heavily impacted all facets of the tourismworld – they have fundamentally changed how travellers experience travel, howdestinations market themselves, which in turn, how the tourism industry developsand measures its success. Evidence of this restructuring is manifest in many ways,none more so that in an article by Gretzel (2012) entitled Travel in the Network:Redirected gazes, ubiquitous connections and new frontiers wherein she used, likeCastells (1996), the “network” as a metaphor to describe the various systems thathave fundamentally changed the travel experience; and in articles by McCabe(2012) and MacKay and Vogt (2012), who suggest that there is a huge “spillovereffect” which links our daily lives, both in terms of how we behave and our useof technology, and the way we experience travel. These articles are essential inthat they clearly explain the formation of new models of travel behaviour, newmodels for product design, and new models for research and evaluation which, inturn, establishes a new paradigm of tourism communication and marketing.

As suggested by Gretzel (2012) and others (see for example, Gretzel et al. 2006;Wang and Fesenmaier 2012), travel today differs substantially from travel fifty


years ago when mass tourism began in earnest. Indeed, it appears that the changein travel follows in parallel to the “stages of change” model proposed by Con-tractor, Wasserman and Faust (2006), Gretzel, Yuan and Fesenmaier (2000), andYuan, Gretzel and Fesenmaier (2005) regarding the impact of technology on organi-zations. In particular, they argue that the first two stages of technology use createan “expansion” in activity, but not any fundamental change in behaviour and thatonly in the third stage we do see real structural changes in the nature of use –that is, travel behaviour. A recent book by Turkle (20011) is mirrored by Gretzeland her colleagues (2012, 2006), MacKay and Vogt (2012), Tussyadiah (2012), Tussy-adiah and Zach (2012), and Wang and Fesenmaier (2012), who suggest that thereare now important structural changes in travel behaviour whereby travellers tendto ‘extend’ daily life into travel, become much more involved in creating/control-ling the tourism experience by sharing with others, are more involved and creativeas they seek authentic experiences, and today’s travellers tend to adapt muchbetter to local settings by using various forms of mobile technology.

These new notions to describe change in travel behaviour require a new para-digm of tourism communication and marketing. In particular, the metaphor of“travel in the network” suggests there are a number of new conditions for tourismmarketing and communication as the result of behavioural change in travel. First,it has already been well documented that, in general, today’s marketing and com-munication practice, from political campaigns to selling groceries, is primarilydriven by information technology as the penetration rate of the Internet, for exam-ple in the United States, has reached to a maximum level of saturation (seewww.pewinternet.org). Also in travel and tourism, the Internet is the predominantinformation source for travel planning, Within this context, the notion of “travelin the network” offers a new lens for understanding today’s travellers. That is,instead of simply seeing travellers as users of technology, today’s travellers canbe considered an active partner in technology-supported networks, which furtherconsist of numerous information spaces (e.g., DMO websites) and channels (e.g.,OTAs and travel search engines) that support the basic information activities ofthe traveller. Thus, the Internet is no longer a monolithic eCommerce platform;instead, it offers countless networks and platforms vying for the traveller’s atten-tion and spending power by supporting information seeking and transactions(Xiang et al. 2008). And from a communication and marketing standpoint, creatingand delivering the right message to the right person at the right moment is funda-mentally important. Indeed, it may be of primary importance for marketers to focuson understanding how travellers navigate these information spaces and channelswithin the network structure in order to build and anticipate their upcoming travelplans and experiences.

Second, technology-supported networks are social and community-based.Indeed, tourism information on the Internet has been such from the very momentwhen the Internet became a public and commercial infrastructure; examples


include VirtualTourist and IGoUGo whereas virtual places travellers congregate toshare their experiences (Wang and Fesenmaier 2006). However, the explosivegrowth of Web 2.0 with a variety of tools and platforms that support consumer-generated content has further transformed the Internet into the networks for socialinteractions (Xiang and Gretzel 2010). Facebook, Twitter, Youtube, and Pinterestare quintessential Web 2.0 applications in that they are developed as novel waysto facilitate exchange of information and social networking. Particularly in traveland tourism, websites such as TbripAdvisor and Yelp are social spaces whereinword-of-mouth is created, distributed, and shared among peer travellers and con-sumers. As a result, tourism marketing and communication is no longer a practiceof advertising and promotion; rather, the focus now has shifted to participating inand being part of the online conversations. Therefore, social media marketing hasemerged as a new strategic area for tourism marketing with a growing interest in“listening” to the online social spaces in order to effectively manage a destina-tion’s reputation (Gretzel, et al. 2006; Inversini, Cantoni & Buhalis. 2009; Sigalaet al. 2012).

Third, another important aspect of the travel in the network metaphor is thattechnology-supported networks are mobile, where today’s cutting-edge apps offerall kinds of tools for travellers to search for information and to make decisions on-the-go thereby creating what are described as Tourism Activated Networks. It isargued that mobile technology such as smartphones (and iPads) can be used tostrengthen traveller’s social ties and interactions. For many people, a mobilephone is far beyond a communication tool or an accessory of daily lives, and ithas become an inseparable part of his/her life or even body (Turkle 2011; Wangand Fesenmaier 2012). As such, the ubiquitous presence of these devices in peo-ple’s lives potentially intensifies and encourages the participation in mobile socialnetworking.

3 ConclusionsTwo decades of ICT development has changed the fundamental nature of tourismcommunication. Today’s tourism businesses are engaging travellers and guestswith richer content and higher level of interactivity as well as through varioussocially constructed media spaces. Without doubt, ICT will continue to evolve andconsequently drive tourism communication and marketing. The networks that sur-round travellers in trip planning and their mobility encompass systems that cap-ture and generate enormous amount of consumer data, and the so-called Big Data(George, Haas, & Pentland 2014) offer numerous opportunities and pose new chal-lenges for tourism marketing and communication offering enhanced customerintelligence, improving business processes, and, ultimately, enabling the develop-ment of new strategies for navigating an increasingly competitive environment.


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Documents

27 New media in travel and tourism communication: toward a new