REVIEW OF RELATED STUDIES

INTERNATIONAL

Marketing Intelligence & Planning Future research directions in tourism marketing

According to Rodoula (2010) as the global population ages and travelling becomes
cheaper and quicker than it is today and tourism will continue to be a cornerstone of the global
economy. The increased emphasis on sustainability and lifestyle decisions will also heavily
influence tourism and the way it is marketed in the future. This special journal issue has included
some of the most cutting edge research on developments happening in tourism marketing
research. However, it is also important to point out the research areas that still need to be
addressed in order to have a more global and refined understanding of where tourism research is
heading and what academics, practitioners and policy analysts can do in order to better
understand tourism marketing. The aim of this paper is to highlight some fertile research areas
and stress how interdisciplinary research is required related to tourism.

Mobile Tourist Guide Application supporting a smart city initiative: a Brazilian case study

This study has employed an exploratory case study approach to gain more knowledge
about a smart city initiative and a mobile tourist guide in Brazil. The city of Natal was selected
for this case study since it was one of the host cities during the FIFA World Cup 2014. The
collected data for this research came from government (e.g. Natal Smart City plan), academic
sources (e.g. Metropole Digital Institute (IMD)), and tourists information from the mobile
tourist guide application.

The smart city initiative of Natal, and the mobile tourist guide (named Find Natal)
responsible for collecting, processing, sharing, storing and analyzing the tourist behavior were
detailed in the paper. The Smart City Consortium in Natal is developing an interoperable and
distributed infrastructure that is advancing the state-of-the-art in information and communication
technologies (ICT) for planning and managing smart cities. The IMD implemented an
application, which aims to enhance the travelers experience through software programs
designed to leverage the infrastructure mechanisms behind the city. The data gathered by the
application was analyzed to show how it was used during the 2014 FIFA World Cup.
Determination of the opinions of students on Tourism impact using Mobile Applications

Since Smartphones has become popular, we have been introduced to a huge volume of
mobile applications. Every day, we are able to find a new mobile application for different
purposes. With these applications, we can edit our photos or contact people on social networks.
The main aim of this study is to determine the students opinions on Tourism impact using
Mobile Applications. In line with this aim, the authors developed a 5-point Likert-type scale
consisting of 20 positive statements. The scale was administered to 352 distance learning
students during the 2014-2015 spring terms at Near East University. Data were analyzed with
IBM SPSS 22. The results showed that students prefer Trip Advisor application to find historical
places and they select places to visit after they read user comments. Students also revealed that
booking.com are more reliable than other applications. Besides, students prefer to download
maps applications and they use GPS when they travel the cities (Elsevier, 2015)

Marketing Efforts Related to Social Media Channels and Mobile

Application Usage in Tourism: Case Study in Istanbul

Many companies are following and adapting the technological developments in

communication area, with high percentage usage ratios of web page and mobile applications
based services, even as linking them on the social media channels. Besides, internet usage and
social media has been appeared out as an important channel in every sector. Tourism sector is
one of the top sectors in this sense and it is adapting these new social media channel and
technological communication tools. Almost, every tourism companies in Turkey are updating
themselves for catching the new wave. Impressively, internet framework covering the mobile
communication is very powerful in Turkey relative to other emerging economies. Moreover,
there are not sufficient data which examine the social media effect on the marketing power in
Turkey. But, it has become a necessity to analyze social medias role in the manner of marketing
and the effects on sales in tourism sector. Another question also appears: Which social media
channel is preferred for the marketing efforts in Turkey or which channels are used by companies
for CRM based efforts? Mainly, research, tries to examine the social media and electronic
communication effect on marketing in tourism sector. Research method is based on qualitative
method and data will be collected from hotel managers. Hotels will be selected from Istanbul
Hotels in Turkey. The research will describe the framework of social media and electronic
communication usage for the marketing purpose of tourism sector in Turkey that gives
acceleration to tourism companies in the manner of benchmarking and road mapping for their
future efforts.

Mobile Wearable Apps for Tourism

According to UX Trends (2016) over 40 percent of Americans already use wearable

gadgets or consider buying some. Although the industry is currently dominated by healthcare,
tourism and hospitality can certainly follow the trend to positive customer feedback and great
sales. The Triposo travel belt helps users find tourist attractions and navigates them through
unfamiliar cities. The belt connects to a smart phone via Bluetooth or Wi-Fi; having downloaded
the Triposo application, the app was downloaded by 4 million users and generated approximately
5 million in revenue. During the 2015 EyeForTravel Mobile Innovation Conference, the sabres
Tripcase was honored Best Mobile Travel app. Designed exclusively for smartwatches, the
software enables smartphone generated notifications (including flights alerts and other travel
information), as well as click to call option. In 2014, the app managed over 30 million trips and
was adopted by 100 thousand travel agents

Technology changes the landscape of every industry. In order to stay afloat, businesses
including tourism and hospitality companies are bound to take new approaches and develop
customized apps for mobile devices and the web.
Shaping travelers attitude toward travel mobile applications

This study provided meaningful implications for practitioners who utilize mobile
applications as their communication channel with customers in the hospitality and tourism
industry. For example, using graphic and simple icons helps users make free of efforts from
reading and writing in text.

Utilitarian motivation is the most important factor in shaping the attitude in using travel mobile
applications. However, hedonic motivation plays a role as an important catalyst for utilitarian
motivation. Self-identity has a positive direct effect on attitude and an indirect effect through
perceived enjoyment. There were differences in these relationships by the years of using similar
technologies, general mobile application (Jin Young Im , Murat Hancer ,2014)

Mobile application for the timeshare industry: The influence of technology experience,
usefulness, and attitude on behavioral intentions

This study is to examine consumer perceptions toward the adoption of mobile technology
within the vacation ownership/timeshare segment of the hospitality industry. Despite the
proliferation of mobile applications in the greater hospitality and tourism industry, few timeshare
companies use this technology. However, customers have expressed strong intentions to use
technology. Therefore, this study examines consumers attitudes toward and experiences with
mobile applications and then through the use of a prototype, examines consumers intentions to
use a mobile application. The relationships between attitude, experience and usefulness are
explored in relation to intention to use. Manuel Rivera, Amy Gregory, Liza Cobos , (2015)
"Mobile application for the timeshare industry: The influence of technology experience,
usefulness, and attitude on behavioral intentions", Journal of Hospitality and Tourism
Technology
TILES: classifying contextual information for mobile tourism applications

The design of contextaware mobile applications can be improved through a clear and in
depth understanding of context and how it can be used to meet users' requirements. Using
tourism as a case application, this paper aims to address the lack of understanding of context and
tourists' goals. this is achieved through a literature review of existing research and focus groups
to gather information needs for tasks commonly executed by tourists.

This paper proposes the TILES (temporal, identity, location, environmental and social)
model to define and classify five main contextual types, and properties associated with each type
for tourismrelated applications. The TILES model (with 32 factors) derived from the analysis of
the literature review is refined through inputs from two focus groups to incorporate an additional
ten factors.

Enhancing the Tourism Experience through Mobile Augmented Reality: Challenges and
Prospects

This paper discusses the use of Augmented Reality (AR) applications for the needs of
tourism. It describes the technology's evolution from pilot applications into commercial mobile
applications. We address the technical aspects of mobile AR application development,
emphasizing the technologies that render the delivery of augmented reality content possible and
experientially superior. We examine the state of the art, providing an analysis concerning the
development and the objectives of each application. Acknowledging the various technological
limitations hindering AR's substantial end-user adoption, the paper proposes a model for
developing AR mobile applications for the field of tourism, aiming to release AR's full potential
within the field.

The present paper offers an overview of the use of AR mobile applications, tailored
specifically to the needs of tourists and tourism professionals. In the following sections we
discuss in detail the current state of the art of information systems and mobile applications that
use AR for tourism purposes, in order to highlight the benefits offered to tourists. Finally, the
paper proposes an archetypal framework for the development of mobile AR applications for the
field of tourism, aiming to release the technology's full potential within this particular field.
An innovative mobile electronic tourist guide application

Mobile tourism represents a relatively new trend in the field of tourism and involves the
use of mobile devices as electronic tourist guides. While much of the underlying technology is
already available, there are still open challenges with respect to design, usability, portability,
functionality and implementation aspects. Most existing mobile tourism solutions either
represent of-the-shelf applications with rigidly defined content or involve portable devices with
networking capabilities that access tourist content with the requirement of constant airtime, i.e.,
continuous wireless network coverage. This paper presents the design and implementation issues
of a mobile tourism research prototype, which brings together the main assets of the two
aforementioned approaches. Namely, it enables the creation of portable tourist applications with
rich content that matches user preferences. The users may download these personalized
applications (optimized for their specific devices model) either directly to their mobile device or
first to a PC and then to a mobile terminal (through infrared or bluetooth). Thereafter, network
coverage is not further required as the applications execute in standalone mode and may be
updated when the user returns online. The dynamically created tourist applications also
incorporate a push model, wherein new tourist content is forwarded to the mobile terminal
with minimal user intervention as soon as it is added or updated by the administrator. Our
prototype has been developed on the top of Java 2 Micro Edition (J2ME) which offers an ideal
platform for the development of full-fledged, interactive and portable applications tailored for
resource-constrained mobile devices. The paper presents our development experiences with
J2ME and highlights its main advantages and shortcomings in relation to the implementation of
such kind of applications. Finally, an empirical evaluation of user experience with the mobile
application prototype is presented.
Consumers acceptance of information, communications and Mobile technology in Tourism

The impact of information and communications technology (ICT) in tourism (e-tourism)

has altered the ways tourism services are accessed and consumed. Ubiquitous and highly
innovative ICTs provide different channels for consumers to use tourism services; thus, studies
on e-tourism are numerous and fragmented. Different factors account for how consumers
embrace these channels. The purpose of this study is to review studies on consumers acceptance
or adoption of e-tourism in order to group the studies, synthesize the theories, models and
frameworks used and identify the antecedents influencing consumers e-tourism acceptance and
usage. A total of 71 studies from 2005 to 2016 (inclusive) from both tourism-based and non-
tourism-based journals were selected, synthesized, and included. Based on their contexts,
similarity and relevance, the 71 studies were segregated into three distinct groups. This study
found that research among the groups is uneven. Implications and research directions are
suggested.
Review of Related Literature

Mobile Applications in the hospitality Industry

According to Texas Tech University (2012) Cell phones have become one of the most
important electronic devices of the modern world. With their evolution into smart phones, the
biggest change is that consumers are able to connect to the internet at anytime and anywhere.
The number of smart phone users also increases dramatically every year. In the second quarter of
2010, 25 percent of all cell phone users in the USA owned smart phones and approximately 45
percent of cell phone users will have a smart phone by 2015 (Elkin, 2011). Smartphones have
brought many changes to the hospitality industry. Approximately 40 percent of leisure travelers
in the USA research travel information using their phones (Adobe Scene Inc., 2011). To respond
to these current trends, hospitality companies have offered mobile applications to customers
allowing them to purchase products and services using smartphones. However, studies about
mobile applications and smartphones in the hospitality industry are scarce.

Taxonomy of mobile applications in Tourism

The rapid growth in the use of the smart phones and respective mobile applications has
created new ways for the tourism industry to connect with their visitors while travelling. This
paper proposes taxonomy of mobile apps in tourism from two perspectives: taxonomy on what
services travel related apps provide to the user and taxonomy based on the development trends as
well as gaps in the mobile app landscape. Understanding the opportunities currently provided by
apps is also critical from the marketing perspective
Mobile Marketing and Advertising Strategies in Tourism and Hospitality Industry

Mobile marketing and advertising using mobile devices becomes an important factor in
creating of marketing strategies. Without a mobile marketing and mobile advertising strategy,
tourism and hotel businesses will miss out this growing consumer trend. This study investigates
mobile marketing and advertising strategies as a marketing channel used for promoting tourism
and hotel products and services. An increasing number of tourist destinations use new technology
and solutions to promote their tourism products and services.

This paper defines the role of mobile marketing as new strategies for promoting tourism products
and services: it examines their advantages and disadvantages, the impact of mobile marketing on
the tourism supply and demand, as well as the estimated future development of this channel.
Furthermore, the paper analyzes mobile applications as a new tool to promoting ad advertising
tourism and hotel products and services. Since the amount of mobile devices constantly
increasing, mobile applications can be a key point to sending immediate developing mobile
marketing strategies in tourism and hospitality industry. Mobile marketing still has growth
potential as technological development never stops and that will completely change the
traditional and conventional types of advertising.
Mobile Application Driven Consumer Engagement

The growing popularity of mobile technologies and applications, lead many companies to
develop relations with consumers through mobile applications. Therefore, it is important to
understand how to design applications based on consumer preferences. This research seeks to
understand which features of mobile applications stimulate consumer engagement and lead to
continuous use of mobile applications. This study used an online questionnaire to collect data
from 246 respondents. The data was analyzed making use of Structural Equations Modeling
(SEM). The results indicate that perception of such features as design solutions and information
quality will result in higher engagement leading to continuous usage of mobile applications.
Moreover, consumer engagement positively influenced users intention to continuous usage of
mobile applications. Inconsistent with expectation, consumer interaction and functionality
features are not found to be positively related to consumer engagement with mobile applications.

Mobile Application Driven Consumer Engagement, Telematics and Informatics (2017)

Shaping travelers attitude toward travel mobile applications

This study provided meaningful implications for practitioners who utilize mobile
applications as their communication channel with customers in the hospitality and tourism
industry. For example, using graphic and simple icons helps users make free of efforts from
reading and writing in text.

Utilitarian motivation is the most important factor in shaping the attitude in using travel mobile
applications. However, hedonic motivation plays a role as an important catalyst for utilitarian
motivation. Self-identity has a positive direct effect on attitude and an indirect effect through
perceived enjoyment. There were differences in these relationships by the years of using similar
technologies, general mobile application
Context-Based Adaptation of Mobile Applications in Tourism

Mobile guides (based on PDAs, smart phones, or mobile phones) play an increasingly
important role in tourism, giving tourists ubiquitous access to relevant information especially
during their trip. Due to a more difficult access to mobile applications in a ubiquitous usage
environment, based on time constraints, lighting conditions, bandwidth, etc., user acceptance of
mobile applications strongly depends on the application adaptation to the concrete usage context.
This article presents a framework for mobile applications in tourism, enabling a flexible
implementation of adaptive, context-aware tourism applications. The framework especially
provides approaches for user interface adaptation, content adaptation (recommendation), and
interaction modality adaptation. The framework has been prototypically instantiated and
evaluated in two different application scenarios, a city guide for the city of Innsbruck and a
skiing guide for the ski resort DolomitiSuperski. Both application scenarios showed high usage
rates and customer satisfaction and proved the applicability and effectiveness of the presented
approach for developing adaptive mobile tourism applications.

Tourism and mobile technology

According to Barry Brown (2014) while tourism presents considerable potential for the
use of new mobile technologies, we currently have little understanding of how tourists organize
their activities or of the problems they face. This paper presents an ethnographic study of city
tourists practices that draws out a number of implications for designing tourist technology. We
describe how tourists work together in groups, collaborate around maps and guidebooks, and
both pre- and post-visit places. Implications are drawn for three types of tourist technology:
systems that explicitly support how tourists coordinate, electronic guidebooks and maps, and
electronic tour guide applications. We discuss applications of these findings, including
the Travelblog, which supports building travel-based web pages while on holiday.
A Framework of a Personalized Location-based Traveler Recommendation System in
Mobile Application

In this era of evolving technology, there are various channels and platforms through
which travelers can find tour information and share their tour experience. These include tourism
websites, social network sites, blogs, forums, and various search engines such as Google, Yahoo,
etc. However, information found in this way is not filtered based on travelers preferences.
Hence, travelers face an information overflow problem.. There is also increasing demand for
more information on local area attractions, such as local food, shopping spots, places of interest
and so on during the tour. The goal of this research is to propose a suitable recommendation
method for use in a Personalized Location-based Traveler Recommender System (PLTRS) to
provide personalized tourism information to its users. A comparative study of available
recommender systems and location-based services (LBS) is conducted to explore the different
approaches to recommender systems and LBS technology. The effectiveness of the system based
on the proposed framework is tested using various scenarios which might be faced by users

Tourists can find tourism information on blogs, forums, websites of points of interest etc.
However, information overflow can occur on the internet as there is still a lack of focus on the
use of recommender technology in the tourism field, especially in the area of personalized
information. In the tourism industry, mobile tourism is emerging during a trip; tourists need to be
able to obtain tour information in a timely manner whenever there are any changes in their
planned trip. Personalized recommendation of tour information is vital for mobile users, as the
screen size is small and demands a nice presentation of relevant information or the PLTRS
mobile application to succeed, it must be able to provide tourism information based on the users
preferences and current location
Near field communication technology in tourism

Technological progress and tourism have been gone hand in hand for years. The use of
mobile devices such as smart phones and tablet computers has increased at a phenomenal rate in
recent years. With the increase in the number of mobile devices more and more devices will be
supporting Near-Field Communication (NFC), which is a short range and wireless technology for
data transfer without physical touch. NFC technology will open up new opportunities for various
stakeholders in tourism from destination level to tourism researchers. In this article earlier
research on NFC technology is reviewed and categorized into four different topics: business
models and ecosystems, software and applications, security and hardware, and threats and issues.
Current and potential applications of NFC in tourism are also reviewed using existing case
studies. Also managerial contributions of the study are presented.

Smart Tourism Destinations

The rapid development of technologies introduces smartness to all organizations and

communities. The Smart Tourism Destinations (STD) concept emerges from the development of
Smart Cities. With technology being embedded on all organizations and entities, destinations will
exploit synergies between ubiquitous sensing technology and their social components to support
the enrichment of tourist experiences. By applying smartness concept to address travelers needs
before, during and after their trip, destinations could increase their competitiveness level. This
paper aims to take advantage from the development of Smart Cities by conceptualizing
framework for Smart Tourism Destinations through exploring tourism applications in destination
and addressing both opportunities and challenges it possessed.