International Tourism Marketing Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 4000 words

International Tourism Marketing - Essay Example The international businesses are important for many countries as it helps in giving a boost to their economies and these businesses create an attractive and competitive environment (Bennett and Blythe, 2002). The international businesses play an important role in the international trade and the increasing number of international businesses create globalized environment that need more effective analytical tools (Bowman, 2007). Hence, international businesses need to take various factors into account when designing strategies for international marketing. In recent times, the social networks have changed the ways the organizations are doing business activities. According to Molina et al. (2010), social media is the online community in which people from different backgrounds and objectives come together on one platform to share the interests and activities. Similarly, Mansfield et al. (2005) in their research indicated that the travel and tourism industry is growing by leaps and bounds a nd the industry is expected to produce exceptional results in the long-run. The tourism industry is the main revenue earner in countries such as UK, USA, Canada, Malaysia, UAE, Saudi Arabia and other European countries (Gretzel, 2008; Gursoy and McCleary, 2004; Srikaya and Woodside, 2005). Background of the study The tourism industry has been growing at an exceptional rate and it is expected that it will continue to expand more in the future. The most important aspect that the tourists consider when deciding about their travel destinations are the information gathering process. The tourists use variety of sources to gather sufficient information. As Gursoy and McCleary (2004) have stated that tourist information is the most valuable concept and the two vital aspects that are given utmost consideration are the image that the tourists have about the destination and the selection mechanism that the tourists to make their final destination choice. According to Chitango (2011), people ar e relying more on social media to make selection about their travel destinations and they are using these social networking mediums as a source of information gathering mechanism. It has been stated by Santos (2011) that the tourism industry will have to rely on the social media advertisements in the future so that they can attract the customers. The travellers are now shifting from traditional advertisement mediums such as advertisements, newspaper ads, billboards and others to YouTube, Facebook, Twitter and other online blogs to make their travel destinations choices (El-Goharay, 2010). The primary purpose of the paper is to help the travel and tourism industry develop an understanding about the changing marketing trends in terms of social media and what needs to be done to respond to the customer’s needs and demands. The paper will develop the strategies that the industry can implement to attract the tourists to their countries and make it their final destination choice. P roblem Statement The researchers wanted to understand impact of social media on the