Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
The number one priority in the implementation phase is to encourage understanding and
adoption of the brand. There is one brand but it is multifaceted and a composite of stories;
it is built on experiences and memories and there are many partners who will deliver those
brand experiences. The entire brand strategizing effort can be wasted by one rude taxi driver,
unhelpful receptionist or unfriendly resident who ignores a lost tourist asking for directions.
Since destinations are really in the business of experience management, a place's stories,
ambience and 'feeling' are inseparable from the place itself so DMOs need to consider how
they bring the brand to life when visitors arrive. Most of our focus in this chapter has been
on bringing people to a place and many destinations do engender loyal and repeat visits.
But many more people are in search of new and unique experiences and so will never return,
yet they can generate word-of-mouth about a destination - good or bad - and bad news travels
faster and further in social media. It is these stories told by tourists, students, residents and
businesspeople of a destination, which will add or subtract the real equity to a destination's
reputation. If the destination experience is memorable and delivers or exceeds the brand
promise then positive testimonies will reinforce and enhance a destination's reputation.
Of course, if the opposite happens, then equity fl ows away from the brand and the reservoir
of goodwill is slowly drained. Despite all the marketing opportunities which exist today,
word-of-mouth is still the most powerful form of communication and the digital revolution
is accentuating its importance.
Digital channels have created an irrevocable change in consumer-brand relationships, evident
in the proactive role customers take in shaping the dialogue with the brand and ultimately its
reputation (Constantinides and Fountain 2008). This is also transforming how destinations
perform online, with participation, openness, conversations, community and connectedness
the key words characterizing this digitally-inspired revolution (Spannerworks 2007). As this
conversation culture replaces our information culture (Leonhard 2009) much of the social
networking sites' content provides a wealth of 'independent' peer-produced dynamic content.
Today 'the wisdom of the crowd is embodied in a wiki' and customers are 'lifecasting' their brand
experiences on sites such as Wikitravel, TripAdvisor and IgoUgo (Munro and Richards 2012). In
this way, every person who has something positive to say about a destination - its culture, the
welcome of its people and the quality of its environment and infrastructure - becomes an
ambassador for a destination's brand promise.
The brand promise can be endorsed and affi rmed in so many ways - through the cuisine of
a place, in the use of public art and fl agship building projects, at information points, through
signage and simply in the cleanliness and safety of a place. A place's culture and history offer the
most potential for unique experiences and yet many destinations place so little value on it that
they demolish their heritage to make way for sports stadia, shopping malls and the increasingly
ubiquitous and anonymous skyscrapers, which are in fact a major turn-off for tourists in search
of the 'real' or 'authentic' place (Leiper and Park 2010). Authenticity has become a hugely
controversial concept amongst tourism scholars. Some argue that today's emphasis on the post-
modern, the hyper-mediated, the global rather than the local, all suggest the redundancy of
authenticity.Yet for any destination, heritage and traditions is a vital ingredient of a sense of place;
for many destinations it is the well-spring of their reputation and identity premium (Hornskov
2012). Effectively and sympathetically communicated through marketing activities, tradition is
the ingredient which distinguishes the bland from the unique. This should not be a static
tradition, but one which is being constantly performed, engaged, renewed, reinterpreted
and augmented by new narratives which respond to and are engaged with making new
socio-cultural forms (Morgan 2012).
