|
Jeong and Shin
3
individuals use STTs. Users’ active participation allows STTs
to provide more applicable and relevant information, which
in turn facilitates in searching for travel information effi-
ciently. Thus, a higher level of interactivity leads to more
positive perceptions of information technologies (Berthon,
Pitt, and Watson 1996). Moreover, STTs’ interactivity allows
smart tourism destinations to collect dynamic tourist data,
helping destination marketers design and offer more tailored
services.
Personalized services satisfy tourists’ needs and maxi-
mize their travel experience as well as their satisfaction with
smart tourism destinations (Madu and Madu 2002; No and
Kim 2015). Studies of personalized services demonstrate the
positive influence of personalization on satisfaction by
reducing the time spent on information search (Schaupp and
Bélanger 2005; Ball, Coelho, and Vilares 2006). Both inter-
activity and personalization allow STTs to provide constantly
the most relevant and appropriate information to tourists,
thereby enhancing and maximizing tourists’ travel experi-
ence. Traffic-routing apps, for example, provide tourists with
the most efficient route so that the tourists can reduce driving
time, have less stress from traffic congestion, and eventually
improve their experience at smart tourism destinations.
Considering the significance of tourist experience and
demand for information technology, hospitality and tourism
entities at smart tourism destinations are becoming more
active and dynamic in providing STTs in collaboration with
tourists to generate more meaningful travel experiences
(Buonincontri and Micera 2016). To satisfy the needs of
tourists, smart tourism destinations should be prepared to
stage experiences, which requires providing memorable con-
sumption experiences (Oh, Fiore, and Jeoung 2007).
Providing personalized services at smart tourism destina-
tions is one effective way to meet tourists’ needs and maxi-
mize touristic experiences, because personalized services
allow destinations to customize the information to offer. By
virtue of STTs, smart tourism destinations are capable of
gathering tourist information easily, interacting and commu-
nicating with tourists spontaneously, and tailoring services to
satisfy the needs of each tourist.
Tourists’ Memorable Experience
A memorable experience, in this study, refers to a pleasant
and unforgettable experience at smart tourism destinations
that is remembered and recalled positively (Loureiro 2014;
Oh, Fiore, and Jeoung 2007). The experiential nature of the
tourism industry offers each tourist a distinctive experience
through his or her own interactions with and feelings about
STTs. Even though each tourist may engage in similar activi-
ties at the same destination, the memorability of his or her
experiences is not the same but leads to a different evaluation
of his or her experience (J.-H. Kim 2018). The adoption and
use of STTs might affect the memorability of tourist experi-
ence by allowing tourists to access relevant information
about their travel activities or to interact with tourism
resources available at the smart tourism destination. For
example, if a tourist can access historical information about
a heritage site and interact with the resources provided by
STTs, the degree of immersion and engagement into the
smart tourism destinations would increase, which in turn
enhances the memorability of the tourist’s experience.
All key STT attributes enable smart tourism destinations
to provide tourists with memorable experiences in various
ways. First, STTs are key enablers at smart tourism destina-
tions by making tourists directly communicate and interact
with other tourism stakeholders in efficient ways. The IoTs
provide a network connection to anything at any time and in
any place via real-time interactions (Buhalis and Amaranggana
2014). Second, mobile communication technology allows
tourists to easily access information about tourism destina-
tions (Y. Wang et al. 2016). Hence, it enhances the tourist
experience by providing relevant information (e.g., history of
the city provided via city guide applications and real-time
traffic information). STTs have been assisting the tourism
industry in developing effective marketing strategies to attract
customers to smart tourism destinations and offer tourist
experiences that are unique to the smart tourism destination.
Based on the relationships addressed in previous studies
above, this study proposes the following hypotheses:
Do'stlaringiz bilan baham: |
