Gamified mobile experiences: smart technologies for tourism destinations
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is twofold: to present gamified mobile experiences as valid tools for DMOs to enrich the experience of tourists, and to present the benefits provided to DMOs by analytics tools integrated on gamified mobile experiences.
Design/methodology/approach
Staff from three DMOs have generated a gamified mobile experience using a custom authoring tool designed and developed to fulfil their requirements. This gamified experience has targeted families with children visiting Basque Country during off-peak season. The experience has been validated over a period of seven weeks within a pilot project promoted by the local tourist information offices of the DMOs. Data directly provided by tourists and data gathered from analytic tools integrated on the gamified mobile experience have been analysed to fulfil the research objectives presented on the paper.
Findings
Both DMOs and tourists can benefit from gamified mobile experiences. The integration of analytics tools to gain insights into the behaviour of tourists can be a relevant information source for DMOs.
Research limitations/implications
The pilot project has targeted a niche tourism market, families with children visiting Basque Country, and has been running during off-peak season. Further studies focusing on other tourist types and different tourism season and destination types will be required to strengthen the validation of the research objectives presented on this paper.
Practical implications
The paper promotes both the development of gamified mobile experiences and the inclusion of analytics tools for DMOs to obtain relevant information about tourists and the mobile experiences.
Originality/value
A gamified mobile experience is generated by DMOs, validated on the basis of experience of real tourists. The analytics tools inside the gamified mobile experience provide DMOs with relevant information.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
The authors would like to thank the Basque Government and the Provincial Council of Bizkaia for partially funding this project. The authors would also like to thank the staff at Basquetour and the tourist offices of Zarautz and Getaria for their help and participation in the validation, especially Idurre Ostolaza, who is head of the Innovation & Sustainability Unit in Basquetour, Basque Tourism Agency (Basque Government).
Citation
Garcia, A., Linaza, M.T., Gutierrez, A. and Garcia, E. (2019), "Gamified mobile experiences: smart technologies for tourism destinations", Tourism Review, Vol. 74 No. 1, pp. 30-49. https://doi.org/10.1108/TR-08-2017-0131
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2018, Emerald Publishing Limited