Chapter 3 A Model of Virtual Destination Branding

Abstract

As more destinations jump on the bandwagon of branding, their marketing organizations increasingly employ the Internet as a convenient medium for promotion. This chapter argues that instead of extending their brand communications to the Web by simply digitizing the logos, taglines, and other elements, destinations can build brands virtually in an internet-mediated environment where virtual experience takes place. The study examines how branding can be achieved through building virtualized destination image. It adopts the concepts of telepresence, virtual experience, and integrated informational response and explains how online and offline communication stimuli can affect various components of virtualized image. This expands and modifies the conventional image constructs by specifying information sources as antecedents through telepresence and integrated behavioral responses as consequences. The relationships between the image, its antecedents, and consequences, and among the image constructs are illustrated through 14 propositions. The chapter concludes with a discussion of the net community in which residents and other stakeholders of communities actively participate in virtually building a strong destination brand.

Citation

Yongho Hyun, M. and Cai, L.A. (2009), "Chapter 3 A Model of Virtual Destination Branding", Cai, L.A., Gartner, W.C. and María Munar, A. (Ed.) Tourism Branding: Communities in Action (Bridging Tourism Theory and Practice, Vol. 1), Emerald Group Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 37-50. https://doi.org/10.1108/S2042-1443(2009)0000001005