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Distination Marketing by Web 2.0
In tourism industries, social media is an effective channel to attract travellers and promote the tourism product and services by engaging with customers. The brand of tourist destinations can be built through the marketing campaigns on social media by engaging with customers. For example, the “Snow at First Sight” campaign launched by the State of Colorado aimed at a brand awareness of Colorado as a winter destination. The campaign used social media platforms, for examples, Facebook and Twitter, to promote this competition, and requested the participates to share experiences, pictures and videos on social medias. As a result, Colorado enhanced the image of winter destination and a campaign worth was about $2.9 million.

The tourism organisation can earn a brand royalty from interactive marketing campaigns on social media with engaging passive communication tactics. For example, “Moms” advisors of the Walt Disney World are responsibilities for offer suggestions and reply answers about the family trips at the Walt Disney World. Due to its characteristic of experts in Disney, the “Moms” was chosen to represent the campaign. The social networking such as Facebook can be used as a platform for providing a detailed information about the marketing campaign, as well as real-time online communication with customers. Korean Airline Tour created and maintained a relationship with customers by using Facebook for individual communication purposes.

Travel 2.0 refers a model of Web 2.0 on tourism industries which provided virtual travel communities. Travel 2.0 model allow user to create their own contents and exchange their words through globally interactive features on websites. The users also can contribute their experiences, images and suggestions regarding their trips on online travel communities. For example, TripAdvisor is an online travel community which is enable user to rate and share autonomously their reviews and feedbacks on hotels and tourist destinations. Non pre-associate users can interact socially and discuss through discussion forums on Tripadvior. Social media, especially Travel 2.0 website, plays a crucial role in decision-making behaviours of travellers. The user-generated contents on social media tools have a significant impact on travellers’ choices and organisation preferences. The travel 2.0 emerged a radical change in receiving information methods of travellers from business-to-customer marketing into peer-to-peer reviews. The user-generated contents become a vital tool for helping a number of travellers manage their international travels for the first time visiting. The travellers tend to trust and rely on peer-to-peer reviews and virtual communications on social media rather than the information provided by travel supplier. In addition, An autonomous review feature on social media would help traveller reduce risks and uncertainties before purchasing stages. Social media is also a channel for customer complaints and negative feedbacks which can damage images of organisations and destinations. For example, a major of UK travellers read customer reviews before booking hotels and the bookings of hotels receiving negative feedbacks would be refrained by half of customers. Therefore, the organisations should develop strategic plans to handle and manage the negative feedbacks on social media. Although the user-generated content and rating system on social media are out of business controls, the businesses can monitor those conversations and participate in communities to enhance a customer loyalty and maintain customer relationships.