The relationship between brand strength and tourism intensity: empirical evidence from the EU capital cities

Author(s):  
Josip Mikulić ◽  
Katarina Miličević ◽  
Damir Krešić

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to analyze the relationship between brand strength and tourism intensity indices and to determine to what extent the implementation of the branding process can have an impact on building a destination’s brand strength and tourism economic performance in the European Union capital cities. Design/methodology/approach – For the purpose of this study, secondary data on brand strength and tourism intensity for a sample of 20 European capital cities were used. Correlation analysis between brand strength and tourism intensity was then performed by using a cross-section analysis design. Findings – The findings of this research show that destination brand strength is indeed significantly and positively related to tourism intensity. Originality/value – This paper concludes that destination branding process is an important factor for creating and maintaining competitive advantages among capital cities on the mature and saturated European tourism market.

Author(s):  
Fatemeh Shafaei ◽  
Badaruddin Mohamed

Purpose – The aim of this paper is to present a model in which the relationship between Muslims’ involvement with traveling to Islamic destinations and Islamic destination brand equity is investigated. Design/methodology/approach – Based on the existing theoretical and empirical research on involvement and brand equity in tourism marketing and the literature on Muslim tourists’ needs and culture, a conceptual model for Muslim tourists is developed. The model investigates the relationships between Muslims’ psychological motivations for traveling to Islamic destinations and the evaluation of destination Islamic brand. Findings – The study shows that the more Muslims are involved in traveling to Islamic destinations, the more likely they evaluate the key dimensions of destination Islamic brand. This is demonstrated by the influence of Muslims’ involvement on their awareness of Islamic destinations, their image of the Islamic destination attributes, the perceived quality of Islamic offerings, the perceived Islamic value and their loyalty toward Islamic destinations. Practical implications – The study evaluates the Islamic brand equity in the context of Islamic tourism destinations and in relation to Muslims’ interests in traveling to Islamic countries. The study contributes to better understand the Islamic destinations and how to maximize the benefits of their Islamic attributes. It is suggested that Islamic attributes should be highlighted more for Muslim tourists interested in traveling to Islamic countries. Investigating the concepts analyzed will help tourism destinations to integrate marketing and promotional campaigns and build a more powerful Islamic brand in Muslim markets. Originality/value – The relationship between involvement and brand equity has not been yet explored adequately, especially in the context of Islamic branding. This study adds to the previous studies in which the link between personal involvement with a specific destination and destination brand equity was explored. The role of Islamic values in this relationship is highlighted. The study contributes to destination branding studies by being one of the primary works, which applies the concept of brand equity to Islamic destinations.


2017 ◽  
Vol 24 (5) ◽  
pp. 1309-1336 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sarang Joshi ◽  
Manoj Kharat ◽  
Rakesh Raut ◽  
Sachin Kamble ◽  
Sheetal Kamble

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to examine the relationships between supplier development practices (SDPs) and supplier-buyer relationship practices from the supplier’s perspective (SBRSP), and seek to understand how specific SDPs may impact a buyer’s operational performance as well as supplier-buyer relationship practices. Design/methodology/approach The authors conducted a survey of 512 respondents from the different manufacturing firms in India and applied structural equation modelling to test a structural model that proposes the impacts of various efforts of SDPs on a buyer’s performance as well as SBRSP. Findings The study concludes that SDPs and SBRSP together improve the relationship between a buyer and supplier, and this improved relationship leads to competitive advantages (CAs) followed by profitability. Results indicate that supplier perspective of buyer-supplier relationship can be improved under the condition of SDPs and SBRSP together. SDPs are driven by productive measure and competitive pressure, whereas customer uncertainty is found to be statistically insignificant. Research limitations/implications The study was carried out in North Maharashtra Industrial Zone of India, where the auto sector and machine/components manufacturing firms have been established for a considerable period of time. Results of the study are limited to manufacturing organizations predominantly focussing on the automobile sector and machine/components manufacturing firms. Practical implications This study provides significant insights into the specific impact of various SDPs and SBRSP for both academics and practitioners. SDPs along with SBRSP practices lead to improvement in the relationship leading to CAs. SBRSP suggests that trust, long-term commitments and the supplier’s perspective are important practices for relationship improvement. Originality/value The current study attempts to identify what are the success factors for the supplier-buyer relationship from the supplier’s perspective and SDPs and how the supplier-buyer relationship can be improved under the condition of SDPs and SBRSP. Hence, the aim is to develop a more thorough understanding of the outcomes of a supplier-buyer relationship improvement from both buyer’s and supplier’s perspective, under the conditions of supplier development to achieve CAs leading to profitability. Furthermore, the study analyses the effect of the improved supplier-buyer relationship for achieving CAs leading to profitability.


2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Alejandro Germán Frank ◽  
Guilherme Brittes Benitez ◽  
Mateus Ferreira Lima ◽  
João Augusto Bonzanini Bernardi

PurposeOpen innovation breadth (OIB) considers the diversity of external collaboration partners for innovation. The authors investigate the moderating effect of OIB on the relationship between industrial innovation activities (innovation inputs) and industrial innovation results (innovation outputs).Design/methodology/approachThis study is based on secondary data from the Brazilian innovation survey, representing more than 30,000 innovative companies across 55 industrial sectors.FindingsThis study’s results show that OIB has different moderating effects regarding the several innovation input–output relationships. While OIB benefits some relationships, others are hampered by the diversity of collaboration partners.Originality/valueFew studies have addressed OIB at the macro level. Using the perspective of transaction cost economics (TCE), the authors discuss the contributions and limitations of OIB at the industry level.


2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Mariane Lemos Lourenço ◽  
Mara Rosalia Ribeiro Silva ◽  
Rafael Santana Galvão Oliveira

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to analyze the relationship between empathy and social responsibility (SR) practices in a university organization in Brazil during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. Design/methodology/approach The research was qualitative, using case study methodology. The case study was about the Brazilian organization Ânima Educação, which is the greatest among the five largest publicly traded education companies in Brazil. Secondary data collection and content analysis was carried out. Findings As emotional response toward the problems caused by the pandemic, the company's leadership adopted an empathic behavior, allowing traces of its empathic culture to emerge. Empathy was expressed through the implementation of SR practices aimed at workers (policy of not firing in the first two months of the pandemic), at students (provision of technological apparatus, online classes, physical/psychological assistance and negotiation of late fees) and at the society (assistance to the elderly). Originality/value It was concluded that empathy can be taken as the emotional motivator for companies to engage in SR practices, especially in extreme circumstances in society, as the economic and health challenges that the world is experiencing with the COVID-19 pandemic nowadays. SR practices, in turn, can foster even more empathy in organizations, mobilizing leaders and their respective groups in the creation and implementation of new practices, thus demonstrating that the relationship between empathy and SR practices is a “two-way street.”


2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Augusto Dalmoro Costa ◽  
Aurora Carneiro Zen ◽  
Everson dos Santos Spindler

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to investigate the relationship between family succession, professionalization and internationalization in family businesses within the Brazilian context.Design/methodology/approachThe paper presents a multiple-case study method with three Brazilian family businesses that have at least two generations of the owning family involved in the business and an international presence of at least three years. In-depth interviews and secondary data were undertaken with family and non-family members of each case.FindingsThe authors' results show that a family business can boost its internationalization by introducing both succession planning and professionalization on international activities. As family members tend to be more risk-averse and focused on keeping the family business within the family, professionalization is a way of improving the firm's ability to expand internationally. This process tends to lead to lower performance by the firm for the first few months or the first year after the investment, but afterward, international performance tends to grow exponentially.Originality/valueOnly a few studies have been concerned on the relationship of these three dimensions. Thus, the research takes into account that professionalization and succession lead family businesses to improve their internationalization strategies.


Author(s):  
Tolga Aksoy ◽  
Feride Gonel

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to give a good overview of the relationship between industrial growth and industrial pollution in Turkey. The question is to what extent dirty industries have been affected by the regulations on the control of environmental degradation. Design/methodology/approach – The approach for this study uses all regulations which serve for protecting human and its environment from danger arising from dirty industries in Turkey. After presenting brief explanations on green industry, next sessions explain and compare the situations of the Turkish dirty industries and its relationship with related regulations in the European Union (EU). Findings – The authors offer three solutions. First, clean consumption should be stimulated in Turkish society. Second, Turkish Government should conduct more joint projects with the EU. Third, EU funds should be directed to cleaner production technologies to subsidize dirty industries during the negotiation process. Originality/value – Green industry can be assessed as a steep road to build a sustainable future. For a long time, the unsustainability of current forms of industrial production has been discussed in Turkey. As a solution some argue that if governments support, industries can finance their own transformation more rapidly. However, these arguments do not mean that industries voluntarily accept these changes.


2015 ◽  
Vol 27 (5) ◽  
pp. 714-738 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jorge Pereira-Moliner ◽  
Xavier Font ◽  
Juan José Tarí ◽  
Jose F. Molina-Azorin ◽  
Maria D. Lopez-Gamero ◽  
...  

Purpose – This paper aims to analyse the influence of environmental proactivity on cost and differentiation competitive advantages, and to explore the double relationship between environmental proactivity and business performance. Design/methodology/approach – The population consists of all three- to five-star hotels in Spain. A sample of 350 hotels was classified according to environmental proactivity and performance levels, employing a two-step cluster analysis. Significant differences between groups were examined. Findings – The results show two types of environmental behaviour (reactive and proactive), with proactive hotels developing significantly better on both cost and differentiation competitive advantage and achieving significantly higher performance levels. Hotels which achieve above average business performance levels are significantly more environmentally proactive. Research limitations/implications – The present paper demonstrates that environmental management is related to competitive advantages and business performance. Environmental management systems are more developed in higher category, chain-affiliated and larger hotels. This could be due to having more resources to develop their environmental capability. The environmental proactivity scale employed in this study is presented as a reference measure for hotel managers to benchmark their current practices and implement environmental improvements. Originality/value – First, measuring environmental proactivity using four managerial systems (operative, information, strategic and technical) is innovative and provides a more detailed approach to measuring environmental proactivity. Second, demonstrating a double association between environmental proactivity and performance provides fresh insights into the relationship between these variables.


Author(s):  
Angelica Carina de Andrade Farias Lima ◽  
Amanda Raquel da França Filgueiras D Amorim

The objective of this research was to identify the relationship between Internal Social Responsibility (RSI) and Internal Organizational Reputation (ROI). It also aims at checking if they are considered sources of competitive advantages for companies. The research used a theoretical basis developed by Pena et al. (2005) for the analysis of RSI through the analysis of 9 indicators, the same used by the Ethos Institute, and Lerner’s (2006) proposal to identify the employees’ perception of the degree of agreement with the ROI, based on the perception of 8 attributes related to company. The research was carried out in the company Antares Comunicação through questionnaires applied to the employees and semi-structured interview conducted with the manager of the Social Responsibility program. The results of the research show a high degree of agreement, an average of 5.5 in relation to the RSI actions developed by the company, as well as an average of 4.9 for the attributes related to ROI. He found through Pearson’s correlation analysis, there is a significant, linear and positive relationship between RSI and ROI. Therefore, according to the Resource Based View (VBR), the two variables, Internal Social Responsibility and Internal Organizational Reputation can be considered sources of competitive advantage for the company.


2018 ◽  
Vol 60 (2) ◽  
pp. 530-542
Author(s):  
Samsir Samsir

Purpose The purpose of this study is to investigate the influence of leadership orientation on competitive advantage with innovation as a mediating (intervening) variable. Design/methodology/approach Quantitative methods (Creswell, 2010) are used as the study design. It is an explanatory research with the purpose of explaining the phenomenon or pattern of correlation between concepts (Kothary, 2004). SMEs (small and medium entrepreneurs) of typical food products of Riau domiciled in Kepulauan Meranti Regency are the focus of this study; the sample size included 258 respondents. Findings There is a significant effect of leadership orientation on innovation. Higher leadership orientation will result in higher innovation. There is a significant effect of innovation on competitive advantage. Higher innovation will result in higher competitive advantage. Innovation as a mediation variable in the relationship between leadership orientation and competitive advantage indicates that higher leadership orientation will cause a higher competitive advantage, if the mediated innovation is also higher. Originality/value The originality of this research lies in innovation as a mediating (intervening) variable and a complement of a previous study by including the indicator that measures the variables of the research so that research results can be completed and detailed.


2016 ◽  
Vol 71 (4) ◽  
pp. 245-258 ◽  
Author(s):  
Arja Lemmetyinen ◽  
Darko Dimitrovski ◽  
Lenita Nieminen ◽  
Tuomas Pohjola

Purpose The aim of this study is to examine cruise destination branding as a new resource for a region to promote an area as a differentiated cruise destination. The authors specifically study how the perceived brand awareness of a destination moderates the relation between cruisers’ motivation and destination satisfaction and word-of-mouth (WoM). Design/methodology/approach A statistical model was adapted from relevant literature and applied in the context of cruise destination branding. The model was tested by measuring Cronbach’s alpha coefficients and the fit of the model through confirmative factor analysis. Hierarchical regression analysis and moderated regression analysis were also conducted. The sample consisted of British cruisers (n = 182) visiting the city of Pori in Finland. Findings The findings suggest that factors that impel people to take cruises (social recognition, self-esteem, discovery, socialization, convenience and value) have a significant impact on satisfaction with the destination, whereas brand awareness is recognized as a moderator in the relation between social recognition and destination satisfaction and WoM. Research findings provide a framework to discuss and analyze the cruise tourism business in a holistic way. Whereas the earlier studies have focused on onboard experiences, in this study, the focus of attention is on the onshore experiences of the cruisers. Research limitations/implications The study is focused on one Baltic Sea cruise destination, the British Cruise Company and a limited segment of senior British passengers. Practical implications By measuring cruisers’ internal travel motives and their perceptions of the brand awareness of the port-of-call during the cruise, or the destination, the results offer destination marketing organizations valuable information to develop their offerings to meet the needs of future travelers and visitors. Originality/value The study contributes to the cruise destination literature by linking the perceived brand awareness of a destination to motivational factors of the tourist and further to destination satisfaction and WoM behavior specifically in the context of onshore experiences.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document