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Tourism Marketing and Promotion

General overview.

Marketing and promotion are essentially figuring out what message(s) you need to sell a product and how to communicate to potential buyers. To use the famous quote from the 1989 movie Field of Dreams “if you build it they will come” is NOT how tourism works, marketing and promoting is essential to be successful. But, marketing and promoting tourism is very different than other tangible products and services. Destination CVBs are marketing and promoting an entire destination with numerous “products” and services.

Tourism Marketing

The American Marketing Association (2022) indicates “Marketing is the activity, set of institutions, and processes for creating, communicating, delivering, and exchanging offerings that have value for customers, clients, partners, and society at large” (https://www.ama.org/the-definition-of-marketing-what-is-marketing/). There are common elements of marketing used for all products, but tourism marketing is unique. In marketing in general there are the common 4-Ps:

• Product – Whatever is being sold (in tourism it is the experience).
• Price – Cost of the product (in tourism it includes everything you purchase for the experience).
• Place – Where you purchase the product. Also known as how the product is distributed.
• Promotion – How the company or organization communicates the product to the consumer(s).

Marketing tourism is very unique compared to other products. Shoemaker and Shaw (2008) provide four primary ways marketing tourism is different than other products:

• Intangibility – Tourism is an experience, not a physical product (e.g., computer). Tourists will have memories of the experience they may share with others (e.g., family, friends).
• Perishability – The supplier cannot stockpile the product and resell it. For example, an empty seat on an airplane cannot be resold on a different flight. Each plane has a limited number of seats. An airline cannot add a seat unsold on the first plane to the second plane.
• Heterogeneity – The experience is not likely to be the same for consumers. Unlike physical products (e.g., computer), tourism experiences cannot be mass produced.
• Inseparability of production and consumption – Tourism experiences are consumed as they are produced. Other products can be produced in one city, state, etc. and sold in another. In tourism, the consumer (tourist) has to go to the product (i.e., destination). With tangible goods they can be purchased in a store and taken home or shipped to the consumer.

For tourism marketing there are an additional 4-Ps (Morrison et al., 2018):

• Packaging – A way to purchase some, many, all of the tourism product together (often through intermediaries such as Travelocity, Expedia, etc.).
• Programming – Ability of the destination to change themes, delivery of the product, and when the programs are available (e.g., destinations may have a special program around certain holidays).
• People – Tourism focuses on people. Destinations strive to provide a good experience and people are needed who can provide the experience. Although technology is changing some aspects of tourism, people will likely always be required.
• Partnerships – When businesses, organizations, etc. work together or collaborate deliver the tourism experience.

Marketing Orientation

Marketing orientation is essentially a guide for marketers. Morrison et al. (2018) suggest the following orientations

• Production – Focuses on what the product is and how it might fulfill needs and expectations of tourists.
• Sales – Focuses on selling more. So, increasing the volume of travelers, getting day-trip tourists to stay overnight are two examples of selling more.
• Marketing – First the needs and expectations of tourists are identified. Then, marketing tries to find a way to fulfill those needs and expectations.
• Societal – This orientation considers the society and local community and finds sustainable and/or responsible ways to market. This is a perspective or orientation that can minimize the negative social/cultural impacts.

In addition and similar to other topics covered (e.g., planning, development), marketing needs to be adaptable. Remember, tourism is season in many destinations, which might mean different target markets, different programming and events, and other issues to consider. As discussed from several perspectives, marketing needs to be adaptable because of challenges such as the economy, natural disasters, and other challenges.

Market Segmentation

Market segmentation in tourism is a way to group tourists according to characteristics they have in common since they are not exactly alike (Morrison, 2010). Some of the simple ways to segment the tourism market includes by demographics (e.g., age, household income, education, marital status). However, by combining such variables and looking at life cycle tourism marketers can be much more targeted and strategic. Another important consideration is geographic, or where actual and/or potential tourists reside. Another option is purpose of trip (e.g., business or leisure; group, family, individual). Behaviors of travelers can also be used to segment tourists. For example, marketers might segment based on travelers’ motivation or benefit they seek from taking a leisure trip/vacation. Psychographics (e.g., attitudes, interests, opinions) is a valuable segmentation tool which Strategic Business Insights (2009-2023) uses to group travelers into lifestyles (there is a survey you can complete to find out what type of VALS traveler you are) .

An example of segmenting a group of travelers is Shoemaker’s (1989) study that segments based on senior travelers reasons for traveling using cluster analysis, which is a statistical technique to segment a sample into groups based on a set of survey questions (Brochado, 2021). Shoemaker (1989) segmented based on reasons seniors traveled, including rest/relaxation, festivals/special events, experience new things, visit new places, escape daily routine, intellectual, and a number of other items. This study identified that there are sub-markets of the broader senior travel market. For example, Shoemaker (1989) identified three clusters: “Family Travelers” who enjoy spending time with immediate family; “Active Resters” travel to escape daily routine, intellectual enrichment such as visit historical sights, and participate in physical activities; and “Older Set” whose main differentiating characteristics is they are older then the other two groups and enjoy staying at all inclusive resorts, and participating in activities such as visiting historical sites.

When selecting target markets there are several criteria to consider according to Morrison et al. (2018). First, the need to be measurable, meaning you can estimate how many exist in the target market. This is essential because you want your broad or mass marketing to reach a sizable number of potential visitors. Next, the target market(s) need to be accessible, meaning you can reach them with your message. The next criteria is they need to substantial enough to justify the time and money that will be spent. Fourth, the target market(s) need to be defensible or make sense that they are likely to visit. The defensible criteria includes recognizing if they are a separate target market than other target markets or are they enough alike another that they are not truly distinct. Durability of a target market implies they will continue to exist over time and not just be a short-term or one occurrence. The destination also needs to ensure they can compete with other destinations for the target market. Homogeneity of the target market is the criteria that there are enough similarities with the target market. Finally, each target market needs to be compatible with the other target markets, as well or residents or locals to minimize negative social/cultural impacts.

Morrison et al. (2018) also identifies concerns the destination needs to consider when identifying target markets. First, do they have enough income to travel now and in the future and will they potentially spend enough money at the destination to make they a worthwhile target market. The destination also needs to be confident they can be competitive with other destinations marketing to the same or similar target markets. Another important concern is to ensure the investment needed to offer the product(s)/service(s) to attract the target market and to market/promote to them is worthwhile. Finally, does the destination have sufficient financial and other services to design and promote at necessary levels.

Destinations should also consider internal marketing within the destination. This includes to members of a CVB and/or other businesses within the destination system. Other internal stakeholders should be included such as politicians and community leaders, service providers (e.g., police, fire, EMT/healthcare) who are included in the important infrastructure component of a destination system. External marketing should not only done for visitors, but also intermediaries, suppliers, media, and other potential groups who can help with a destination’s efforts.

Branding and Positioning

Branding is applied quite a bit for products and services. However, in tourism it is more complex to brand a destination. Until relatively recently, CVBs would use the full phrase and/or acronym in the name of the organization (e.g., Greater Houston Convention and Visitors Bureau). These long and often similar names for the organizations could make it difficult to differentiate from other destinations. Many CVBs began developing shorter, more attractive names such as Visit Houston and have various logos and other branding to differentiate themselves from competitors.

A key element of branding, logos “can facilitate many DMO marketing activities to establish brand image and identity, particularly relevant before the actual visitor experience” (Blain et al., 2005). Branding is critical for developing a destination’s image because of increased competition among destinations (Jetter & Chen, 2011). Branding and brand identity help a destination position themselves or establish an image as a travel destination.

All brands have a value generated by the name, icon, or other identification, which represent brand equity. Williams (2021) the brand equity concept is complex. For tourism with so many stakeholders involved it is way more complex than single brands. So, destinations need to figure out what represents the overall  tourism product of their destination. Kim and Lee (2018) found that characteristics such as price and work of mouth influence perceptions of perceived quality, brand awareness and image, which then help a destination’s brand equity.

Marketing Plan

Within a destination’s marketing plan should be both strategic and tactical elements (Morrison et al., 2018). Strategic activities are more related to long-term goals, which might include developing relationships and or partnerships with and between tourism related organizations (e.g., CVB, sports commission, hotel association, etc.). These types of strategies help a destination be cohesive and develop long-term value, which can lead to repeat visitation. The relationships and partnerships can help a destination manage the impacts (i.e., economic, environmental, social) as well. The tactical elements are shorter term, but help the destination with long-term goals. Examples include public relations campaigns, social media efforts, and the foci of convention and meeting sales, which can include booking short-term meetings to fill in the gaps for the destination around larger conventions, trade shows, and other large events that are booked and confirmed much further in advance.

The marketing planning process as explained by Morrison et al. (2018) should address the following questions:

• Use situation and or SWOT analysis (i.e., strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, threats). This analysis(es) should consider who current visitors are, what the destination offers. To reflect how all of the modules for this class interact, a destination might identify an opportunity to develop a new attraction. Also consider environmental scanning, which assesses legal (e.g., travel restrictions), technological (e.g., smartphones), accessibility to and within the destination, economic, and macro-level competition for consumers discretionary income.
• Evaluate the entire tourism system components (i.e., attractions, facilities, infrastructure, transportation, hospitality)
• Assess visitor market, including current target markets, as well as potential target markets.
• Compare and contrast the destination with competitor destinations, which can include but not limited to their image and their marketing plan.
• Through out all this process strengths and weaknesses should be clearly identified. Through weaknesses a destination might identify opportunities or things that can be done better.
• Vision and mission statement. The vision statement is very much future oriented. The mission statement is essentially what the organization does and its’ values.
• Establish marketing goals to get to where the destination would like to be, which might include number of visitors, economic impact, visitor satisfaction, and/or various other possible ways to measure if the destination gets there. Remember, most or all CVBs are at least partially funded by the hotel occupancy tax, so hotel tax might be a goal to set.
• Using the segmentation ideas and criteria (e.g., measurable, accessible, etc.) above, the destination needs to identify target markets.
• Create – if destination does not have a positioning approach.
• Change – if positioning has not resulted in the desired image the approach likely needs to be changed.
• Reinforce – perhaps target markets have forgotten or the image they have of the destination is not as strong as it used to be. In this case finding a way to reinforce or remind visitors is needed.
• Establish objectives that the destination can measure, including within target markets. These should be very specific and result from all the analysis performed throughout the marketing planning process.
• By implementing the marketing plan. Typically have sub-marketing plans for each target market because of various potential differences between them. The differences would include the marketing mix or 4-Ps of marketing (i.e., product, place, price, promotion).
• Monitor along the way so the destination can adapt if needed. Remember the objectives are stepping stones toward the longer term goals. So, if objectives are not being achieved something(s) likely need to be adapted.
• Research and statistics. It depends on what the measurable goals (and objectives) are as to how to measure.

Tourism Promotion

Promotion is essentially communicating or making consumers aware of a product, which can be verbal, written, and/or visual. Walker and Walker (2018) provide sequential steps of how promotion affects the buying process labeling each with one word descriptions:

• Provider creates awareness of the product to consumers (awareness).
• Consumer needs to become aware of how the product will fulfill or affect their needs (knowledge)
• Hopefully this knowledge creates a positive disposition for the product (liking).
• Hopefully the positive disposition lead to the consumer preferring the product over those of the competitors (preference).
• Finally, this should increase the probability of the consumer purchasing the product (probability).

Remember, the tourism product is very different and more complex than other products. One, the product is intangible and two it is derived of many aspects (i.e., attractions, accommodations, built facilities, transportation, infrastructure, hospitality).

Since promotion is a communication tool, there is a sender and a receiver. The sender for destinations as a whole are typically the CVB or DMO and the receivers are potential travelers/consumers. Messages/promotions can be sent through a variety of channels (e.g., billboards, television, newspaper, magazines, internet, email newsletters, etc.). However, not all promotions reach the intended recipient(s). Morrison et al. (2018) explains the following issues related to promotions and reaching the intended recipient(s):

• Barriers – ways consumers can block messages, such as Do Not Call Registry and recording television shows to be able to fast forward through commercials.
• Filters – deleting emails from companies and people not known to the recipient.
• Noise – any distraction keeping the recipient(s) from the promotional message.
• Permission – can be explicitly or implicitly. An example of explicitly is subscribing to a CVB e-newsletter. An example of implicitly is the organization pays for a message, such as on Facebook or a television commercial.

Morrison et al. (2018) also suggest even if the intended recipient(s) receives the promotion, it does not mean they hear, understand, and/or believe the message. It is important to send a message that people can understand and is realistic or believable. Ideally, the sender of messages will be able to receive feedback from the recipient(s). For example, number of recipients who click a link to get more information, number of sales of the product, a follow up survey to find out what the recipient(s) thought of the promotion to name a few.

Promotion Goals and Types

There might be various goals a CVB or DMO has for their promotions. One very obvious goal is to get consumers to purchase or book a trip. Other potential goals would be to entice travelers to upgrade to more expensive packages, stay longer, convert day visitors to overnight tourists, and be repeat visitors. In order to potentially achieve these goals it is important to understand the visitor buying process in order to establish goals and to influence purchasing behaviors. Inherently, consumers need information to consider any purchase, including travel. The general consumer decision-making process according to The Sales Optimization Company. (2009-2022) includes the following stages:

• Awareness – consumer becomes aware they need a product, in the case of leisure tourism it could be a weekend getaway, family vacation, a day trip to a community event or other activity in another destination than where they reside, and many other possibilities.
• Research – the consumer will search for information about possible options. A destination should have their promotional materials in multiple sources to be as visible as possible.
• Consideration – the consumer through the research stage may have numerous possibilities to consider.
• Conversion – the purchase decision is made. This could include deciding not the take the trip, perhaps for various reasons (e.g., do not have enough money for the desired trip).
• Re-purchase – consideration if the trip or product fulfilled their need and would buy again, or take a trip to the same destination again.

Morrison et al. (2018) suggest thee are three goals of promotions. You might also consider these strategies to try to modify consumers’ behaviors. The first is inform, which is relevant for the awareness and research stages of the consumer decision-making process. Next is persuade, which is relevant to the consideration and conversion stages of the consumer decision-making process. Last, remind is a strategy to use as consumers contemplate the potential re-purchase stage of the consumer decision-making process.

Promotional Tools

The ‘place’ component of the 4-Ps of marketing provide what Morrison et al. (2018) refer to as ‘the promotional toolbox’. Many references (e.g., Morrison, et al., 2018; Walker & Walker, 2018) regarding promotional tools highlight and explain the following

• Advertising -primary source for promoting to the mass market for leisure travel (e.g., television, magazines, newspapers, billboards, internet (banner ads).
• Personal selling – primarily used to promote a destination for the meetings and events sector where a small number of people decide on the destination and venue, but the event brings many people.
• Merchandising – travelers may purchase souvenirs when they travel. This is a good promotional tool where the traveler pays for it and is a reminder of the trip later one. For example, someone might use a coffee cup from a trip and be reminded of their experience. If it was a good experience it might influence them to consider visiting again. Another example, someone might wear a shirt or hat they purchase from a destination. A friend or even someone they do not know might ask them about their experience. This is free word-of-mouth promotion that a business or organization benefited financially since the tourist paid for it.
• Digital marketing – websites, social media, e-mail, e-newsletters.
• Sales promotion – a form of promotion that is typically separate from the broader advertising that takes place pretty much all of the time. Sales promotion offers an extra incentive to purchase and is more likely for a limited time.
• Public relations – this promotional tool is important because they deal with the media. Think about when large events have been announced for a city, like the Super Bowl or FIFA World Cup. The local news channels might interview someone from the planning committee. A public relations person would handle arranging that and any inquiry from the media.

Planning Promotions

Morrison et al. (2018) suggest there is a “big P” and “little p(s)”. The big P is the overarching promotional plan for the organization, which is derived of the little ps. Examples of little ps will be the convention sales team’s plan, the leisure sales plan, sporting events, any other categories a destination provides or focuses on. Convention sales might be trying to promote a period of time where they currently do not have conventions or meetings and need to fill in the gap. Sporting events might focus on a specific sport.

Promotions Planning Process

Tourism promotions planning process asks the same questions as marketing planning process. Essentially at this stage, you are implementing the marketing plan:

• Where are we now? – this question is guided by identifying target markets and the promotional tools a destination will use to promote to specific target markets. The target markets should include not only different visitor groups, but also travel trade intermediaries, local community, and media/press.
• Where would we like to be? – this question is used to identify or establish measurable objectives (e.g., number of people to click on the promotion icon, number of overnight stays generated). These objectives are specific to the little ps and include goals of the promotion (i.e., inform, persuade, remind).
• This question also identifies the budget for the specific promotion and potential partnerships to pool resources (e.g., funding, talent and knowledge of people).
• This question also helps determine the message idea, which may require research, focus groups, and other forms if feedback to assess consumers’ interest and refine the promotion.
• The message format needs to be created to ensure it is understandable, distinct from competitors, and believable (i.e., destination really can provide what it is promoting).
• In terms of financial resources, there are various measures that help to determine the promotional reach (e.g., cost per contact, cost per inquiry, geographic – how many people in a designated market area you might reach). (There are various others in the PowerPoint we will discuss in more detail, including tradeoffs with specific promotional tools.)

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GHL 2365 - Tourism Copyright © 2024 by Jason Draper is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License , except where otherwise noted.

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The Branding of Tourist Destinations: Theoretical and Empirical Insights

ISBN : 978-1-78769-374-6 , eISBN : 978-1-78769-373-9

Publication date: 4 December 2018

The tourism marketing environment consists of internal and external forces which could impact the organisations’ performance. To be successful, companies must adapt to ongoing trends and developments in their macro- and micro-environments. When organisations scan their marketing environment, they will be in a position to deal with any possible threats from the market and to capitalise on any available opportunities. Therefore, this chapter explains the external environmental factors of tourist destinations, including political, economic, social and technological influences. It also considers their internal environmental factors, including capital structures, resources, capabilities and marketing intermediaries, as it identifies competitive forces from differentiated or low-cost service providers.

• Tourism marketing
• Destination marketing
• Marketing environment
• Competitive forces
• Tourism macro-environment
• Tourism micro-environments
• Environmental scanning

Camilleri, M.A. (2018), "The Marketing Environment of Tourist Destinations", Camilleri, M.A. (Ed.) The Branding of Tourist Destinations: Theoretical and Empirical Insights , Emerald Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 1-14. https://doi.org/10.1108/978-1-78769-373-920181001

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Marketing of Tourism

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Over the last seven decades, marketing thought has matured in several stages. Its concepts developed in earlier stages have not all become obsolete and extinct. Hence, marketing research and practice harbors a variety of such concepts, each having its strengths and weaknesses (Kotler and Keller 2009 ). In a big leap, marketing evolved from a purely sales-oriented and mechanistic concept (flow of goods and services from producer to consumer) to a market-oriented business and research philosophy (Franke and Mazanec 2006 ). The concept was extended to covering all stakeholders and potential partners of a business or company. These are not just people in their role as consumers, but also as employees (internal marketing), job seekers on the labor market, investors, suppliers, or media users shaping public opinion about the company. The concept even got extrapolated to incorporating transactions between any sort of nonprofit organizations and their clients. For example, this “generic concept...

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Mazanec, J.A., Reutterer, T. (2023). Marketing of Tourism. In: Jafari, J., Xiao, H. (eds) Encyclopedia of Tourism. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-01669-6_127-2

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Emotions in tourist experiences: Advancing our conceptual, methodological and empirical understanding

1. introduction.

The tourism industry has long been hailed as the ‘fun’ industry. Tourism is practiced for its hedonic benefits. Tourists choose to spend discretionary disposable income on holidays and travel essentially for the anticipated pleasure they will obtain. In that sense, the value proposition for tourism is significantly based on the emotions. This editorial addresses questions linked to the role of emotions in tourist experiences. The theorization of emotion has received much attention in the contemporary tourism literature and among destination marketers. Emotions, episodes of intense feelings associated with a specific situation or event ( Cohen & Areni, 1991 ), play a key role in understanding tourist behaviour. Studies have focused for example on positive emotional experiences associated with festivals, shopping, theme parks, holidays, heritage sites and adventure tourism, among others, and the links between emotional responses and behavioural outcomes, such as satisfaction and customer loyalty.

At a practical level, tourist destinations around the world emphasize the positive emotional connections they seek to make between visitors and places. For example, Slovenia uses the slogan “I feel s love nia” to convey a sense of warmth, and a deep connection among potential tourists to the country. Other countries highlight the ‘surprising’ component of the tourist experience in their branding strategies. Notable successful country campaigns include “Amazing Thailand” and “Incredible !ndia”, which have been built on associating a sense of positive surprise and delight with tourism visits. Other slogans highlighting positive emotional experiences include “It's more fun in Philippines", "Beautiful Bangladesh" and "Brunei: Abode of peace". These examples further emphasize the importance attached to positive emotional responses associated with tourist experiences.

However, whilst much of what drives tourist behaviour is a search for pleasure, it is a much more complex picture requiring the need for more detailed and theoretically driven research. In this respect, the literature on tourist's emotion has been significantly enriched in recent years. Tourist emotion research has drawn heavily on and applied concepts and measures from the psychology literature. For example, a growing body of studies (e.g. Choi & Choi, 2019 ; Hosany, 2012 ; Jiang, 2019 ) apply cognitive appraisal theories ( Roseman, Spindel, & Jose, 1990 ) to understand the antecedents and consequences of emotions to tourist decisions. In terms of measurement, and despite criticisms (see Hosany & Gilbert, 2010 ), many studies have adapted self-report measures of emotions from psychology and these remain popular in tourism. Emotions influence various stages of the tourist experience ( Prayag, Hosany, & Odeh, 2013 ). At the pre-travel stage, emotions play a fundamental role in activating tourist motivations and inputs in destination choice processes. During the trip, emotions can vary in intensity on a day-to-day basis. In addition, tourists' emotional reactions are fundamental in shaping post-travel evaluations such as satisfaction, destination attachment, perceived overall image and behavioural intentions.

The goal for this special issue is to further expand and enrich the literature on the role of emotions in tourist experiences by soliciting conceptual and methodological contributions that not only support but also challenge and develop our understanding of this important aspect of tourist behaviour. We were delighted to receive a diverse range of submissions, which contribute an array of original approaches and insights. The final collection of papers (n = 8) helps us to better understand the role of emotions across various settings such as casino resorts, theme parks, leisure and senior travellers, brand advertising and brand communication, and visiting friends and relatives (VFR). We were impressed to see that these papers advance conceptual and methodological approaches, in addition to their empirical contributions. The papers address measurement issues as well as identifying antecedents and outcomes of tourist emotional experiences in a range of novel contexts.

2. The papers in this special issue

Whilst most previous research on tourist emotions has focused on positive feelings, such as joy, love and positive surprise, negative emotions are also possible. The paper by Lai, Yang and Hitchcock provides important insights into the basic, excitement, and performance emotions that influence tourists’ satisfaction and dissatisfaction with destination casino resorts. Through the development of a measurement scale consisting of both positive and negative emotions, the overall satisfaction of gaming and non-gaming tourists was determined, contributing to our understanding on how to combine three-factor theory with emotion theory. Arguing that most of the negative emotions generated from gaming will not result in tourist dissatisfaction with destination casino resorts, the authors point us towards further investigations into the effects of negative emotions towards destinations in considering the three-factor theory.

Emotions are complex feeling states that result in psychological and physical changes that influence our behaviour. Our emotions change in response to stimuli and yet most research takes a simple snapshot of these states and reactions at a particular point in time. Stepping beyond the traditional static, cross-sectional approach used to measure emotions. Lin, Nawijn and Biran’s paper seeks to advance our understanding of how motivations are related to tourists' emotions, in a longitudinal study for the first time in tourism research on this subject. Questioning leisure travelers in the Netherlands over a nine-month period, results indicate that motivation does not have a significant impact on tourists' emotions over a relatively long period of time. Determining that travel motivations, or a cluster of travel motivations, do not seem to have significant within-subject or between-subject impacts on tourists' emotions reaffirms the complex relationships between tourists' travel motivation and emotions, providing important managerial implications for destination marketers to consider.

Emotions can also be recalled and associated with particular events in the memory. Since holidays and travel are often intense experiences that linger in the memory, it is important to look beyond the immediate, visceral emotional state to advance our understanding of the role emotions play in future decision making. The paper by Akgün, Senturk, Keskin and Onal provides important empirical insights into the relationships between nostalgic emotions, destination image and tourist behaviour within the particular destination context of Istanbul. Two studies are utilized to help shift debates into an understanding of the importance of post-visit experience on destination image. In the first study, the cognitive image of Istanbul was found to be a multi-dimensional construct composed of attractions, infrastructure, atmosphere, and value variables. In the second study, nostalgic emotion is found to positively relate to affective destination image, and to every component of the cognitive destination image of Istanbul. Conclusions indicate that destination image may partially mediate the relationship between nostalgic emotion and intention to revisit and recommend.

There is a greater need for cross-fertilization of theories and approaches to advance our understanding of the affective relationships between places and people, specifically visitors. Cabanas's paper seeks to better understand the interplay between emotions and space applying theory of sociology and the production and consumption of space, and experience, to experiences at theme parks. It applies symbolic interactionism to a critical literature review of research on experiences of theme parks, such as atmosphere design, experience control, and visitors' engagement and in so doing highlights the need for allowing greater agency amongst visitors to develop their own emotional narratives of their experiences of these experiences settings, which can be overly scripted and staged. Visitors' experiences can be explored from a deeper qualitative perspective, such as symbolic interactionism to draw out meaning-making processes, the situated and mixed emotional register of experience that takes place within theme park spaces, and that goes beyond simple evaluation of satisfaction and repeat behaviors. These novel approaches can add real value to the design of emotional experiences in a range of visitor settings.

Emotions form an important consideration in how destinations position and market themselves. For Lalicic, Huertas, Moreno and Jabreel, understanding the emotional brand communication of 10 of the most popular DMOs in Europe in 2017 according to TripAdvisor was a key objective. Through an analysis of user responses across Facebook and Twitter, this study identifies a matrix of successful and promising values that DMOs should integrate into their social media communication strategies regarding their destination brands. It visualizes a set of values that DMOs should either not include or try to avoid when aiming to successfully engage with their users. It identifies differences between the two social media platforms, providing DMOs with guidelines on how to effectively communicate their brands using specific emotional brand values on social media. In a related paper, Tercia, Teichert and Soehadi apply a generic experience economy framework to better understand advertisements in evoking emotions and communicating specific experience dimensions. Travel experiences are differentiated between passive and active participation, as well as between those with immersion and absorption experiences. Findings suggest that travelers’ emotional response to advertisements has a partially mediating effect on their effectiveness, dependent in part on the specific type of envisioned travel experience.

Finally, two papers examine emotions within specific consumer contexts. Ramer, Zorotovich, Roberson, Flanigan and Gao's study looks at emotions within a specific type of tourism experience, linking together two relatively understudied areas in travel research: the intersections between Visiting Friends and Relatives (VFR) and emotional experiences in the travel context. It does this by questioning the effects of pre-existing family dynamics on the emotional experiences of emerging adults traveling to visit families during the fall break. Findings uncover a significant impact of family dynamics on emotions during VFR trips, with positive emotions following a linear decline during the travel period, and negative emotions following a pattern consistent with the holiday happiness curve. Secondly, Pestana, Parreira and Moutinho's paper provides us with important insights into what motivates the senior tourism market, distinguishing between younger and older seniors. A model explaining the mediation role played by satisfaction in the relationship between motivation, emotion, and behavioural intentions is developed and tested through the application of structural equation modelling. Satisfaction is found to mediate the relationship between motivations and emotions, and behavioural intentions, simultaneously strengthening the positive association between push and pull motivations. Previous experience has a moderating effect. Managerial implications include questioning the usefulness of the model developed in different geographical settings.

3. Concluding remarks

Emotions are ubiquitous in tourist experiences and the papers in this special issue offer novel insights that advances this field of research. Despite much progress, several methodological-theoretical design considerations remain. For example, how best to measure emotions in tourism? A limited number of emerging studies have moved away from self-reports and embrace novel approaches such as Corpus Linguistics ( Rahmani, Gnoth, & Mather, 2019 ) to extract and analyze tourists' emotional experiences. Still, additional research is needed to, for example, directly compare verbal, non-verbal and indirect qualitative emotion measures. In addition, with some exception, tourism research predominantly focuses on positive emotional experiences. Recent evidence however suggests, in non-hedonic contexts, tourists purposely seek negative emotions ( Knobloch, Robertson, & Aitken, 2017 ; Nawijn & Biran, 2019 ). Negative emotions can lead to positive outcomes such as happiness ( Nawijn & Biran, 2019 ) and ethical choice formation ( Malone, McCabe, & Smith, 2014 ). More research is needed to expand our understanding of tourists’ negative emotional experiences in a post Covid-19 era. At the theoretical level, little is known about the interplay and hierarchy of cognitions and emotions in tourist behaviour models. Tourism researchers are encouraged to develop and test competing models. Emotion can be either an independent variable or a mediator between cognitions and outcome variables such as intention to recommend and perceived image evaluation.

We hope that articles in this special issue will encourage tourism scholars move this field of research forward. We would like to express our appreciation to Professors Alan Fyall, Brian Garrod and Youcheng Wang for the opportunity to guest edit this special issue in Journal of Destination Marketing & Management. Last but not least, we would like to thank the reviewers for providing constructive feedback during the review process. The authors and special issue guest editors appreciate their efforts for providing timely reviews.

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