Tourist destination brand equity and internal stakeholders

Abstract

Successful destination branding strategies require the commitment and mobilization of internal stakeholders in order to reinforce the communication of the brand message to the tourist market. To this purpose, the literature suggests that adopting an inclusive and participative approach to the branding process can increase and maintain the stakeholders’ willingness to share the brand mission. However, the results of such sharing and involvement strategies in terms of internal brand equity creation are still under research. In order to fill such a gap, the article proposes to build on the established consumer-based brand equity model for assessing the internal stakeholder-based brand equity of tourist destinations. The model, comprising four dimensions – brand awareness, image, commitment, and satisfaction/loyalty – is then applied to the analysis of South Tyrol’s (Italy) regional branding strategy, through a survey of internal brand users. Findings confirm the importance of a participative approach to the branding process in order to enhance its overall internal equity. Findings also show a relevant information gap regarding brand performance that impacts the stakeholders’ commitment. This confirms the link between the internal and external performance of destination brands. Moreover, significant differences in the levels of brand awareness, commitment, and satisfaction among different categories of stakeholders suggest that the brand authorities should enact targeted internal communication efforts.

A model of tourism destination brand equity: The case of wine tourism destinations in Spain

“…The first is those that adopt the company's perspective and apply one of the most-cited brand definitions from the American Marketing Academy to the tourism research area; under this type of definition, a destination brand is "A name, symbol, logo, word mark or other graphic that both identifies and differentiates the place" (Ritchie & Ritchie, 1998, p. 103); Definitions in the second category adopt the consumer's perspective and use the term "destination image" to analyze destination brands from the receiver's perspective (e.g., Cai, 2002;Hankinson, 2004;Prebensen, 2007). The second perspective distinguishes the authors who consider the destination brand as an addition to the destination product, in which identification and differentiation are the main purposes of the destination brand (Sartori, Mottironi, & Corigliano, 2012), from the researchers who emphasize the experiences (Buhalis, 2000) and acknowledge the importance of the emotional component of the destination brand and the emotional connection between the visitor and the destination beyond the functional values of the brand (Quintal, Phau, & Polczynski, 2014). Previous studies have recognized the complexity of destination branding compared with product branding and corporate branding (Quintal et al, 2014) because of the involvement of many stakeholders (Morgan, Pritchard, & Piggott, 2002); a large number of products, services, and resources; and even different economic sectors (Buhalis, 2000;Murphy, Pritchard, & Smith, 2000).…”

Host Perceptions of Rural Tour Marketing to Sustainable Tourism in Central Eastern Europe. The Case Study of Istria, Croatia

“…Coordination of activities is necessary to implement the marketing plan and the communication message of the area and its distinctive characteristics in order to safeguard commitment, avoid conflicting actions from within the place itself as well as the procedure of doing the same things and duplicating actions (Kavaratzis and Ashworth, 2008;Sartori, Mottironi and Antonioli, 2012). Networks reinforce the bonding -it is associated with cooperations inside the enterprises of the community-while the word 'bridging' is associated with external cooperations, as is for example the coordination of activities between entrepreneurs in a region as well as the contribution of an external cooperation such as an advisor from another country or a private sector stakeholder who has experience in the related issues (Jones in McGehee et al, 2010: 489).…”

Policies and Tourism Branding

“…Upaya ini harus tetap melibatkan semua pihak yang berkepentingan (Sartori et al, 2012), dalam suatu formasi ideal dan interaktif (Kavaratzis & Kalandides, 2015), dan menggunakan pendekatan terintegrasi secara total (Crockett & Wood, 1999).…”