The Importance of Relational Marketing in Health and Wellness Tourism: A Study Applied to the Northern Euroregion of Portugal and Galicia

Abstract

Increased competition and the constant need for companies to differentiate make markets more competitive and consumers more demanding when making purchasing decisions. Consequently, companies recognized the importance of marketing and economics, which has gradually replaced its transactional practices, focused essentially on a single transaction, with relational practices, in which the customer is considered an integral part of the process. Creating long and profitable relationships has become a business priority and the use of tools such as customer relationship marketing (CRM) has become crucial. With the increasing importance of health and wellness tourism, thermalism has become a very competitive product wanted by tourists who need treatments that are not available in their country due to lack of availability or because they are quite expensive. Since tourism is integrated in the services sector, a set of relational marketing strategies can be applied to establish and maintain relationships with tourists. Therefore, it is important to understand how relational marketing can improve health and wellness tourism. Based on a combination of theoretical and practical research, this chapter explores the dynamic system and mechanism of innovation and development of relational marketing strategies in specific contexts of tourism (i.e. health and wellness tourism) considering cross-border (i.e. Northern Euroregion of Portugal and Galicia). From an interdisciplinary perspective, the chapter presents insights for marketing and tourism (health and well-being) and for the economic development of territories (i.e. cross-border regions).

Citation

Marques, D.O., Sousa, B.B. and Pedreiro, A.T. (2024), "The Importance of Relational Marketing in Health and Wellness Tourism: A Study Applied to the Northern Euroregion of Portugal and Galicia", Hunjra, A.I. and Sharma, A. (Ed.) The Emerald Handbook of Tourism Economics and Sustainable Development (Building the Future of Tourism), Emerald Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 233-249. https://doi.org/10.1108/978-1-83753-708-220241012