Tourism is a dynamic part of our economy. The global hospitality and tourism industry, which blends the lodging, food, attractions, cultural and travel industries, is the world's largest industry with $4.5 trillion in expenditures generating 212 million jobs. The World Tourism Organization (WTO) currently projects that by the year 2010, 338 million people will be employed in the industry that will grow to $8.4 trillion in expenditures.
The main objective of the book is for dynamic market forces such as global competition, changing customer expectations, and new communication technology – combined with career challenges due to ongoing industry consolidation and corporate restructuring – mandate continuous learning and the sharing of ideas. The book will facilitate this need by providing strategic information and clear insights to the world-wide hospitality and tourism issues as well as the role of IT in these industries. It aims to be the leading source of information for all those interested in Tourism and Hospitality Management, Approaches, and Trends as well as to cover the emerging research topics which are going to define the future of IT and cultural and creativity development in the 21st century.
The book’s strategy aims to be the reference edition for all those interested on the strategic role of information technologies towards the achievement of a long term competitive advantage in the hospitality and tourism industry (with main emphasis to be paid on practical aspects) as well as to be the reference edition for all those (policy makers, government officers, academics and practitioners) interested in understanding applications of IT for tourism and hospitality management and for people thirsty to know on how to address challenges for IT and tourism and hospitality in the 21st century.
Global Hospitality and Tourism Management Technologies is organized into 14 chapters which provide insight on global hospitality and tourism management as a whole.
Chapter 1 (Virtual tourism: functions, profit modes and practices in China) focuses on functions and profit models as well discussions on the application of virtual tourism in China. Although the research on virtual tourism made great progress in China, there is still a gap compared with international research on virtual tourism. With the promotion of virtual reality technology and the development of tourism industries, virtual tourism will effectively meet the needs of tourists
Chapter 2 (A Study on Tourist Management in China Based on Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) Technology) indicates that with the help of high technology, improving the scenic RFID smart queuing system will be the main function of queue management module. Following the development of mass tourism, more and more scenic spots began to face the problem of queue management; Fairness and effectiveness of queue management will directly affect the visitors’ experience in the scenic area.
Chapter 3 (Key Issues in the Implementation of Electronic Customer Relationship Management in the Australian Hospitality and Tourism Sector) proposes that the hospitality and tourism sector is one of fastest growing sectors in Australia and in the world. In order to become more efficient and effective in delivering products and services to customers via the use of ICT, hospitality and tourism organizations have to rethink the ways in which they build relationships with their customers by initiating electronic customer relationship management (eCRM) projects. Inappropriate eCRM decision-making and implementation can result in multi-million dollar losses, which can translate into a loss of competitiveness.
Chapter 4 (Advanced technologies and tourism behaviour: the case of pervasive environments) provides an overview of the most advanced technologies for tourism sector, with emphasis on pervasive environments, which represent innovative systems based on an efficient integration of virtual reality and affective world. The aim is to show how tourism industry might exploit the current advances in Information and Communication Technologies (ICT), such as virtual reality, web-based technologies, mobile devices, etc., to catch tourists’ attention and gain competitive advantages over competitors. In particular, these technologies are capable of promoting touristic destination in a global perspective and affect potential tourist decision-making process, by investigating the main characteristics and possible integrations.
Chapter 5 (Factors of Spatial Distribution of Recreation areas in Peri-urban Beijing) aims to identify the factors which will influence the spatial distribution of peri-urban recreation areas, by analyzing the collected data from questionnaires, online survey, documentation and field investigations. In order to achieve sound information, relevant data from different management departments, owners and land-use types involved in the case study area is collected.
Chapter 6 (Two Tickets for Paradise: Gaming and Tourism) begins by identifying linkage points between advergames, tourism and three major mass communication theories/approaches—media dependency theory , uncertainty reduction theory, and uses and gratifications theory . These will serve as examples of how advergames and hospitality can be integrated into theories and models attempting to explain the impact of information technologies. They will also provide a springboard for considering the nature of advergames with regards to tourism.
Chapter 7 (The role of architecture on tourism industry; the problem of (mis)use of building technology and language of heritage) argues that power of tourism industry has reached, under the pressure of global economics, to a capacity to turn even daily architecture into instruments of touristic show. In this context, technology is utilized as an instrument to produce such iconography only as a surface articulation. Thus, architecture becomes a commodity of touristic consumption in this current socio-economic and cultural context.
Chapter 8 (Emerging Trends in Tourism Industry in Oman) touches base on the trends found in the tourism Industry in Oman. It is also the main source of income generation for countries like Mauritius, Spain etc. Oman being the second largest country in the Middle East possessing wealth of natural resources has every thing to offer to the tourists. It has a long coastline with pristine beaches, beautiful mountains, and world’s best deserts with rolling sand dunes.
Chapter 9 (Sales Force Technology for the Hospitality Industry) highlights where the changes in the hotel sales business are occuring, why they are occuring, and what they mean to both buyers and sellers. The intent of this overview is to inform hotel owners and investors who are considering such an investment as to the benefits that can potentially be derived from SFA. Furthermore, our intent is to provide hospitality educators insights as to how SFA is changing the workplace of both meeting planners and hotel sales professionals so they can provide their students a realistic view of the software aids they may need to master to be successful in their careers.
Chapter 10 (Tourism revitalization of historic district in perspective of tourist experience: A case study of San-Fang Qi-Xiang in Fuzhou City, China) discusses the new thought of tourism revitalization in historic district in perspective of tourist experience. Firstly, based on the deep analysis of tourist experience’s essential elements in historic districts, 6E experience mode is established to summarize the tourist experience, which includes Estheticism and nostalgia, Education and culture, Entertainment and leisure, Exchange and communication and Emotion sublimation. Meanwhile, how to build up and enhance every single experience of 6E model in tourism revitalization of historic district is also explained. Secondly, the application of 6E model is demonstrated elaborately in the case of Conceptual Planning of Tourism Development in San-Fang Qi-Xiang Historic District in Fuzhou City. Considering the hierarchy and comprehensibility of tourist experience and combined with site environment analysis, San-Fang Qi-Xiang historic district is divided into four function divisions: Nanhou old street mall, Warmth and leisure lane, Antai water-front zone and Residential blocks for minority customization.
Chapter 11 (A classification of mobile tourism applications) introduces mobile technology and discusses its emergence in the tourism industry. As has been the case with other Information Communication Technologies (ICTs), tourism has manifested as one of the most well suited sectors to mobile technology and mobile applications. In contrast to other ICTs in the tourism domain however, mobile applications are capable of enhancing the tourist experience at the destination, creating a paradigm shift in how information is accessed and digested, and transactions performed. Nonetheless, little is known concerning how mobile technologies are changing the landscape of tourism and tourist behaviour and the content offered by tourism applications.
Chapter 12 (Personal Tour: a multi-agent recommender system of travel packages) describes the Personal Tour, a multi-agent recommender system designed to help users to find best travel packages according to their preferences. Personal Tour is based on the collaboration of multiple agents exchanging information stored in their local knowledge bases. Based on the paradigm of the Distributed Artificial Intelligence, a user recommendation request is divided into partial recommendations handled by different agents, each one maintaining incomplete information that may be useful to compose a recommendation.
Chapter 13 (Management of World Heritage Sites: An Integrated Sustainable Marketing Approach) seeks to use an integrated sustainable marketing paradigm to determine if a predetermined set of important indicators from the model are visibly implemented by the world heritage sites (WHS). More specifically, the aim is to suggest add-ons to the heritage conservation principles so that a holistic and integrated sustainable paradigm of heritage tourism can be devised. In the recent decades, the global/world form of heritage has received unprecedented attention in heritage tourism, more so because it brings with it a celebrity UNESCO status to the heritage site.
Chapter 14 (Research Review of OWOM: Chinese Cases) defines OWOM (Online Word-of-Mouth) and discusses the connotation, communication process and communication effect, and practical application, and put forward some managerial suggestions. As online shopping is regarded as a fashion in china, online word-of-mouth has significant influences on shopping and therefore becomes an important internet communication tool.
Patricia Ordóñez de Pablos
Robert Tennyson
Jingyuan Zhao