Tourism Destination Marketing by Travel Vlogs
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Abstract
Travel vlogs are popular among younger generations nowadays. However, tourist behaviors facilitated by travel vlogs are still unknown. Two parts were undertaken in this study to examine how travel vlogs influence tourist behaviors and to explore the value of travel vlogs in destination marketing. Study 1 adopted the Attention-Interest-Desire-Action (AIDA) principle as the theoretical underpinning to uncover how the mechanism of travel vlogs influence the travel decisions of younger tourists (i.e., Generation Y). In addition, Destination Marketing Organization (DMO) promotional videos were compared with travel vlogs regarding the proposed mechanism. Study 2 examined the effect of destination competitiveness levels on willingness to pay (WTP) between two video types (i.e., travel vlog and DMO promotional video). A convenience sample of 205 North Americans who mostly belonged to Generation Y was collected via an online experiment. Study findings provide theoretical implications to the literature and practical implications to DMOs regarding marketing strategies.