QUESTION
Assessment 2
Essay
Delivering media products and services to specific tourism and/or
hospitality audiences
Introduction:
Tourism and hospitality businesses face similar issues of recognition and differentiation
within a crowded and highly competitive market for related products and services. Ensuring
that the appropriate marketing strategy has been developed and implemented by a business
is crucial for success. Being able to reach a specific audience that identifies with your
product and/or service is proving harder and more complex to achieve.
The changing media and communication landscape over the last five years bears witness to
the need to understand and relate to differing methods of reaching a more fragmented and
diversified market for tourism and hospitality. Tourism and hospitality owners and operators
must understand and be conversant with these dynamic media and communication tools.
These tools range from products such as smart phones and tablets to software and social
media platforms such as twitter and Facebook.
Based on the above introduction discuss the current and future implications for tourism and
hospitality owners and operators of the role of media technology and its relationship with
media audiences. In your analysis ensure that you describe and evaluate the current
offerings of media tools, products and services available to the tourism and hospitality
industry. Also you must explain why certain media products and services would be better
suited to particular tourism and hospitality businesses rather than others – give examples to
back up your argument.
Students are advised to limit their analysis to a single business entity or industry sector
(hotels, pubs, restaurants, venues, or attractions for example).
Key factors to consider when structuring this essay:
1. The type of business and its demographics (audience)
2. Technology choice, training, implementation and ongoing operational costs (product
lifecycle)
3. Competition and market conditions
4. Return on investment (measurability and expectations)
5. Future trends
6. Minimum of ten references
SOLUTION
Introduction
Tourism industry is one of the largest revenue generation sectors for the global economy, because it earns currency not from its own country but from various foreign countries. According to the World Travel and Tourism Council (2003), there are great and vital role of travel and tourism industry in the world economy. Every country has a rich source of Tourist attraction, which can be used by media technology to attract the maximum nuber of tourist and this in turn requires effective promotional strategy by the industry itself.
Australian travel and tourism industry is contributing around 4.2 percent of the current GDP. It also contributes to the highest share of job and employment with 4.7 percent of contribution and supporting to the exports by 10.5 percent. (Australian Tourism Satellite Accounts in 2006-07).
For this the medium used shold be extensive and diversified so that it can reach out to maximum number of people all over the wolrd and also give them detailed information about such places, so that they are attracted to such tourist sites.
If we consider the Tourist industry today, it has grown to such an extent because of the effective use of media and communication for its growth and expansion of business.
Media is a communication medium to distribute or carry the information to the mass media and reach out to people.It shows the effectiveness in our ability to make an effective and enhanced move or step to make our message viable for the mass audience.
Media is working as a bridge between the people and the tourism industry in various ways, such as
- Making aware about the tourist places: We need to make the common people and society aware about the various tourist and historical places to make them motivated towards these tourist places. Media and communication sources will play a vital role in the effective communication among the society and the common people.
- Reviewing the advantages and significance of the tourist places: People can see and review the blogs and comments of the common people and they can understand the various new and innovative things about the tourist places. These aspects could be possible only with the help of new technologies and media partners such as various social sites like Facebook, Twitter and other web blogs and portals.
- Online booking and registration for the convenience: New media sources and communication technologies also help the consumers to avail various services easily such as online booking, ticketing, cab bookings and all. Various web portals are there which provide information and reviews regarding the travel and tourism and they also provide these kinds of online booking facilities for the ease and convenience to the customers.
- Current happenings of particular tourist places: Media also helps the common people in getting news and happenings in the travel and tourism activities such as various attractive packages for the family, corporate and all. These are kinds of value addition in the traditional media activities and show the effectiveness of the media towards the growth and development of the travel and tourism perspective.
- Time saving and ease of information: Integrated media sources are very much effective and time saving activity for the common people and it is really a significant characteristic for the effective and integrated point of consideration of the emerging new media sources to be adopted by the travel and tourism industry.
These aspects are the most vital and important and only explored with the help of media and information technology. These aspects really play an important role for the development and the expansion of the travel and tourism industry among the common people.
Media is a kind of filler between the society and the tourism industry and helps the common people towards the travel and tourism as the most effective part of entertainment and refreshment at this busy schedule and life.
Current and Future Trends
After the globalization, media and communication has been a great and vital significance in the promotion and brand building for any product or services. They are the most effective and important sources of the information gathering for the common people and it is also a good source for the brands or the service providers to use it as a medium for the advertisement or the brand promotion in an integrated way.
E-commerce is again an emerging media sector for the virtual marketplace to provide ease and convenience to the customers regarding the products or the services in which we are deadline with. In service industry it becomes more vital to understand the tourism services and the tourist places before going there. So the media helps a lot in making a clear and brief overview of the places and the kind of services being provided by the service provided in travel and tourism industry.
Customers also get ease of registration and the online booking of the travelling media such as flights, cars, trains and cabs booking without going out and spending their important and valuable time. These aspects are the most significant characteristic for the consumer point of view. They get all the information and briefing over net and as per their ease and convenience they can opt for it. So these aspects are indicating a great and emerging future for the media and communication partners and services in travel and tourism industry. They both can work as an interdependent to each other for their synergy and growth in an effective and integrated manner for the sustainable development and competitive advantage.
Most of the people are using mobile communication and internet, and they have a facility of online access to the website related to the travel and tourism at the hand at any point of time. So there is no doubt that it is going to be the best suitable and effective source of communication and promotion for the hospitality industry to make the travel and tourism service more customer friendly and integrated.
E-commerce, M-commerce, Social media sites and other sites are the most favourable and effective places for the market players to advertise and attract the potential customer and grab the market share with their effective and integrated tools and technological perspective. It is a kind of value addition in their strategies to grab the opportunity which is there in the market but need to understand and make an effective strategy for successful catching up the market share and to gain the growth and competitive advantage.
These aspects and the more consumer demands and dependency on the media and communication technologies are indicating a great and significant future for the travel and tourism industry in coming future based on the media and communication technologies.
Implications
Media and information technology and their implications are really very much effective and useful in various ways to explore the present condition of the travel and tourism industry;
- Cost saving: Media sources and new kinds of information technologies are more cost effective and more integrated for the effective and efficient flow of communication to the mass audience.
- Effective way of communication: Media sources are the most effective way of communication and they help in the growth and development of the industry.
- Increasing adaptability ratio: People are getting attracted towards the new media sources like websites, web portals, online marketplace, m-commerce and e-commerce. These aspects showing the consumers increasing adaptability of the new and innovative media sources.
- Emerging future aspects of the media communication: These media sources are the emerging sources of communication and branding, i.e. integrated marketing communication. So we can predict the potential growth and future of travel and tourism industry based on these media sources.
These aspects are really indicating the great and vital implications of the media and information technology for the betterment of the travel and tourism industry and it potential growth. We can see the current trends among the youngster and other segments of the society over the emerging media and communication technology and e-commerce & m-commerce. These aspects are showing the great and potential benefits of the successful implications of the media and information technology in the travel and tourism industry.
According to Duncan (2002), the marketing and communication activity to create and send a message to the receiver through the different media and channel is known as the interactive communication process. These implications are really an effective source of communication and successful messaging to the consumers.
Relationship with media audiences:
For the effective flow of communication there is a great need of transparent and integrated relationship between the media and the audience. So the reliability and credibility of the communication and the message could be maintained between the sender and the receiver. If the media is having a good and effective relationship with the customers and clients and stakeholders then it will be more effective and fruitful for the industry to be more dependent and reliable over these media sources for their effective flow of communication among the consumers and the stakeholders. Without a good and effective relationship between the media and the audiences we cannot think of the effective flow of communication and messaging to the consumers and the stakeholders. That is why the new and effective way of communication is being used by the consumers to improve their communication techniques and the relationship from the media sources.
Discussion and Evaluation
The main theme behind this report is to understand the role of media in the expansion of the travel and tourism industry. For the purpose of integrated marketing communication there is a great need of the effective source of media that could work as a bridge to fill the gap between the receiver and the sender. New and updated technologies and sources of communication are emerging day by day which have their own implications and importance in this regards. We can also see the increasing consumer dependency towards the new and effective media sources for the effective communication and processing of the various services such as online booking, ticketing, hotel booking and various other services. These aspects are a good sign for the immense growth and improvement of the world travel and tourism industry and as a result the travel and tourism industry is becoming one of the most significant, emerging and growing sector in service industry.
Media is supporting a lot to encourage the common people towards the travel and tourism and the adaptation of the various kinds of services related to the travel and tourism industry such as hotels, spa, drafting and all.
Conclusion
We have seen in the above discussion and implications that the increased and potential growth of the travel and tourism and their effect can easily be derived by the increased viability and growth of the Australian GDP and employment status which is 4.2 and 4.7 percent respectively.
To encourage this aspect of growth and development of the travel and tourism industry among the consumers there is a great need of some kind of effective and value added sources of communication and media that could help in better and significant understanding of the utility of the travel and tourism as the potential source of the refreshment, entertainment and adventure.
For the better growth and opportunities it is very essential to adopt new kind of media and information technologies such as internet, e-commerce, m-commerce and web portals. These are the potential and emerging sources of media that could help in further improvement of the travel and tourism condition and future aspects in Australia. If we see the historical facts and current trends of growth, it indicates the immense and potential future growth opportunities for the travel and tourism in Australia.
But to explore in exponential way there is a great need of sources of media and communication for the better and integrated marketing to grab the market share. This will also help travel and tourism industry gain competitive advantage and achieve sustainable development with the help of the emerging methods of the media sources and integrated communication technologies.
References
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Australian Tourism Report- State of the Industry Report, Aug 2008, accessed from
http://www.ret.gov.au/tourism/Documents/Tourism%20Policiy/RET%20state%20of%20aust%20tourism%20industry%20v3.pdf [accessed on 02 Apr 2012]
Beeton, S. & Graetz, B. (2001) ‘Small business – small minded? Training attitudes and needs of
the tourism and hospitality industry’. International Journal of Tourism Research, 1, p. 105-113.
Braun, P. (2004) ‘Regional Innovation and Tourism Networks: the nexus between ICT diffusion
and change in Australia’. Information Technology & Tourism, 5 (1), p. 13-24.
Blumler, J.G. & Guvercih, M. (2000). Rethinking the study of political communication. In
J. Curram & M.Gurevitch (Eds.) Mass media and society. (2000). Arnold publishers, London
Coffman, J. (2002, May 20). Public communication campaign evaluation: An environmental scan of challenges, criticisms, practice, & opportunities, pp.1‐12
Czinkota, M.R. & Ronkainen, I.A. (2001). International Marketing. (6th edition), Orlando:Harcourt College Publishers.
Duncan, T. (2002), IMC- Using Advertising and Promotion to build brands, New York, McGraw-Hill.
Eccles, G.(1995), Marketing, Sustainable Development and International Tourism, Internatinoal Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management, Vol. 7, p. 20-26
F. Kluckhohn and F. Strodtbeck in Communicating across Cultures edited by Stella Ting‐Toomey (New York: Guilford Press, 1999, pp. 59–66)
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