Impact Of Social Media And Tourism

In todays society it is evident that social media is having a massive impact on how businesses promote themselves and just as new technologies are being developed, “Advances in the internet and social media are changing the many ways that information about leisure travel and its experiences are disseminated” (Munar, A. & Steen Jacobsen, J. 2014, p.46). This essay will discuss how businesses within the tourism and leisure industry should use social media as part of their business strategies to positively impact their marketing and attraction of tourists.
“Organisations have now been applying technologies based on the internet, world wide web and wireless communications to transform their businesses for over 20 years since the creation of the first website” (Chaffey, D. 2015, p.4). “With the dramatic change in the media landscape in recent years, firms have embraced social media as a means to engage with their customers” (Kumar et al. 2016, p.7). It is highly imperative that businesses monitor any new and emerging trends so that they can identify how they may impact their marketing strategies and it is important that they have a business strategy in place that will …show more content…
Electronic word-of-mouth, through social media sites such as Facebook and twitter can have huge influences on businesses in the travel industry where consumers/ tourists can leave reviews and pass on their thoughts about products and services. Research has shown that this type of word of mouth can generate a larger interest in products and service than many of the traditional methods of marketing (Bickart and Schindler 2001). Research conducted about word of mouth by Janesn et al. (2009) placed specific concentration on Twitter and found that almost one fifth of all tweets contain the name of a brand or details about a company’s product or