Characteristics of tourism industry

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transportation, and tourist attractions; 2) travel agents and tour operators; and 3) destination marketing organization like National Tourism Office in each country (Tsao, 2001). Since the purpose of this study is to figure out how Taiwan promotes its tourism brand and how these promotions are coordinated across countries, the main focus would be on the third sector, that is, the destination marketing organization of Taiwan—Taiwan Tourism Bureau.

2.1.2 Characteristics of tourism industry

When people choose a destination, actually they are purchasing a “product.”

However, this product cannot be seen, touched, or felt as making the purchase decision. This intangibility of tourism product at the time of purchase evaluation and consumption makes it an experience product (Cai, Feng, and Breiter, 2004). Similarly, Tsao (2001) suggested that what tourism provides is more like a service than a

product and indicated that tourism industry contains the characteristics of service industry, including intangibility, inseparability (production and consumption must exist at the same time), heterogeneity (variability of service quality), and

perish-ability (products cannot be stored).

Other than the characteristics of service industry aforementioned, tourism industry also possesses its own uniqueness. Many researchers have pointed out the complexity of destination products and stakeholders involved as the distinction of tourism industry (e.g., Buhalis, 2000; Morgan et al., 2002). Just like what is

mentioned before, tourism industry is a multidimensional and comprehensive industry.

It is a composite product consisting of different components, including

accommodation, tourist attractions, arts, entertainment and cultural venues, and the natural environment (Morgan et al., 2002). Furthermore, Buhalis (2000) categorized all the components involved in tourist destination as six As—attractions,

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accessibilities, amenities, available packages, activities, and ancillary services³. Therefore, a destination can be regarded as a combination of all products, services and ultimately experiences provided locally.

Due to the complexity of destination product, destination marketers have little control over destination marketing because too many stakeholders are involved, including governments, tourism agencies, environmental groups, trade association, and local residents as well as tourists (Morgan et al., 2002). Similarly, Buahlis (2000) proposed a dynamic wheel of tourism stakeholders as illustrated in Figure 2.1.

Figure 2.1 The Dynamic Wheel of Tourism Stakeholders Source: Buhalis (2000)

With both characteristics in service industry as well as the uniqueness in tourism

3 Attractions (natural, man-made, artificial, purpose built, heritage, special events) Accessibility (transportation system comprising of routes, terminals and vehicles) Amenities (accommodation and catering facilities, retailing, other tourist services) Available packages (pre-arranged packages by intermediaries and principals)

Activities (all activities available at the destination and what consumers will do during their visit) Ancillary services (services used by tourists such as banks, telecommunications, post, newsagents, hospitals, etc.)

Interests and Benefits Host Population

Tour Operators

Tourists

Public Sector and Government Tourism

Enterprises and SMTEs

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industry itself, tourism destination marketing faces several challenges. First of all, the intangibility of tourism products manifests the importance of destination image, especially for the first-time-visitors, who rely totally on second sources to make destination choices. Indeed, it is widely acknowledged by academics and practitioners that destination image does influence people’s perceptions and behaviors related to destination choices (e.g., Kolter et al., 1993). Therefore, Strategic image management (SIM) has been used by many countries to maximize the effectiveness of marketing efforts and also to make sure the images selected and presented are in the strongest possible way (Day et al., 2001). In addition, Gunn (1972) classified images into two types—organic and induced images. Organic images are formed from sources like television, books, school lessons or fiends’ experiences, which are not related to the official tourism information while induced images are derived from the exposure to the destination marketers’ promotion efforts such as travel brochures or

advertisements. In this study, the focus is on induced images created by Taiwan Tourism Bureau.

Another challenge destination marketers have to deal with is the politics- and image-related problems result from the complexity of tourism products as well as the number of stakeholders (Buahlis, 2000; Morgan et al., 2002). It is suggested that destination marketing must satisfy the needs of all stakeholders in terms of supply and demand side. On the supply side, Gunn (2002) indicated that collaboration is essential for successful tourism planning and development, especially the collaboration

between public and private organizations. On the demand side, destination marketers have to take into account the heterogeneity of different target groups and design messages based on the core value of the destination but also related to each segments.

Both the cooperation of public and private sectors and the creation of a uniform, consistent message pose challenges for destination marketers.

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Faced with the characteristics of tourism industry derived from service sector and from tourism itself, IMC seems to be an effective way to solve these problems.

According to McArthur and Griffin (1997), different product types demand different communication tools and techniques, and thus the emphasis given by different sectors on the utilization of IMC also vary accordingly. Among all the sectors, IMC seems to be more important within the service context, in which the need to create a consistent and uniform image due to the intangibility of service sector can be accomplished by IMC (e.g., Duncan, 2005; Grove, Carlson, and Dorsch, 2007). On one hand, IMC provides a mechanism that can heighten the tangibility of the service products by coordinating various promotion disciplines (e.g. advertising, direct marketing, sales promotions, etc.) to maintain a clear and consistent message (Nowak and Phelps, 1994). On the other hand, the databases IMC stresses can also help target the

consumers more effectively and foster customer intimacy (Nowak and Phelps, 1994;

Schultz, Tannenbaum, and Lauterborn, 1993).

Therefore, it could be inferred that IMC also serve as an effective means to manage and market tourism destination, in which the need to create consistent image as in service sector and to deal with complex stakeholder relationships specifically in tourism marketing may be better addressed by IMC.