The Impact of Tourism Events on Destination Selection: The Mediating Role of Social Media

Document Type : Original Article

Authors

1 Assistant Prof., Department of Business Management, Faculty of Management, University of Tehran, Tehran, Iran.

2 Ph.D., Department of Organizational Entrepreneurship, Faculty of Entrepreneurship, University of Tehran, Tehran, Iran.

3 Ph.D., Department of Business Management, Faculty of Economics, Management & Accounting, Yazd University, Yazd, Iran.

Abstract

Objective
Tourism is one of the most critical and growing industries worldwide, considered as one of the global trends that has combined economic, social and cultural affairs. Tourism is one of the fastest-growing sectors of the global economy, aimed at meeting the different wants of consumers based on human needs and the desire to travel. Also, increasing competition in national and international markets has made firms develop a competitive advantage by increasing information sharing. Therefore, rapid environmental change is one of the most critical challenges facing tourism enterprises, which has forced them to innovate. Given its rich history and culture, Iran can organize various events and take advantage of the golden opportunity to reap economic and cultural benefits. The tourism industry highly relies on various initiatives, such as events, gatherings, and ceremonies. On the one hand, choosing any destination depends on such activities. On the other hand, various novel tools and techniques are designed to realize this issue through social media platforms worldwide. Such social media platforms are widely used in Iran, especially in the tourism sector. This study aims to investigate the effect of tourism events on destination selection through the mediating role of social media.
 
Research Methodology
The present study is applied in terms of purpose and descriptive correlational in terms of method. The statistical population includes those domestic tourists who have travelled to Yazd, Isfahan and Shiraz in the springs of 2018 and 2019. Based on Cochran's formula, the number of samples was determined to be 240. Data were collected through a questionnaire and statistically analyzed using pls3 software. The authors used a questionnaire that included 24 closed questions to collect the data. Twelve questions of tourism events (Getz and Page, 2019), four questions of social media (Yoo et al., 2017), and four questions of destination selection (Wang et al., 2017) with a 5-point scale Likert (1- strongly disagree, 2- disagree, 3- I have no opinion, 4- agree and 5- completely agree) have been used to measure the variables of the conceptual model. This research has investigated the relationships between variables using PLS3 software and structural equation modelling. The reason for using this software is the lack of need for normal distribution compared to other existing software (Klein, 2015). In this study, tourism events are deemed as the independent variable, destination selection as the dependent variable and social media are considered as the mediating variable. To ensure the accuracy of the research results, the technical characteristics of the questionnaire were evaluated in two parts: validity and reliability using different criteria. The validity of the questionnaire has been evaluated and confirmed through content and structure validity. To evaluate the instrument's content validity, the opinions of experts aware of the subject have been taken into account. Besides, to measure the validity of the structure, the model of structural equations of convergent and divergent validity has been used. To determine the convergent validity, the average variance extracted index (AVE) was used, and for divergent measurement, the root mean of the index of the average variance extracted was used.
 
Findings
The analysis of Smart PLS 3 software showed that cultural, sports, scientific and religious events have a positive and significant effect on destination selection with the mediating role of social media. More specifically, cultural events such as the ones held in local and urban areas of Yazd, Isfahan and Shiraz could affect destination selection by both national and international tourists. Besides, these cities hold regular sports events during springs which could affect destination selection, if promoted on social media platforms. In addition to these two types of events, scientific events, such as tourism-related conferences and workshops, are held in these cities, which attracts tourists from all around the world. Finally, as many Zoroastrians have historically lived in Yazd and Shiraz, and Isfahan has been a major city for Muslims, many religious events are held in those cities. Based on our findings, such events could also be promoted through social media platforms to host more tourists.
 
Discussion & Conclusion
Due to the increasing demand of tourists worldwide to travel to various touristic destinations, using social media tools to introduce such attractions and attract tourists is essential. Social media platforms can allow tourists to enter the desired location virtually through web tools before deciding to travel to a specific point, and check the feasibility of the travel by studying and viewing the available multimedia information. Besides, according to the benefits of a destination selection and based on their understanding of the advantages and disadvantages of such trips, they could easily make efficient and effective decisions in this regard. It is noteworthy that by promoting various cultural, sports, scientific and religious events on social media platforms, and through designing and implementing relevant social media advertising strategies, one could take advantage of such platforms to improve the socio-economic development of various touristic destinations. Finally, it is crystal clear that increasing the number of such events could synergize this impact, as one could prepare more interesting content to help potential tourists choose a specific destination for their journeys. The present study faced limitations that point to future research, although the hypotheses are theory-based and the research results reinforce theoretical expectations. First, this research is limited to domestic tourists in Shiraz, Yazd and Isfahan. Another significant limitation is that this study focuses only on the effects of tourism events on destination selection and ignores the impact of foreign tourists. The sampling unit of this research is domestic tourists who have chosen their destination through social media. In addition, the research hypotheses were tested with a questionnaire that provided only cross-sectional data, and no longitudinal data were collected to observe changes in tourism events, destination selection, and social media. Therefore, future research should examine the effects of foreign tourists on destination selection in Iran.

Keywords

References

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Media Management Review
Volume 1, Issue 1
2022
Pages 30-52

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