The Use of the Internet as a New Marketing Tool to Promote New Tourist Destinations in Asia
The development of the Internet during the 1990s has provided a new electronic infrastructure which facilitate new means of communication and information exchange, which was enhanced by the continuing rise of the number of Internet users world-wide. Speed
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Introduction The development of the Internet during the 1990s has provided a new electronic infrastructure which facilitate new means of communication and information exchange, which was enhanced by the continuing rise of the number of Internet users world-wide. Speed, efficiency and cheapness are some of the many reasons that lead to the fast development of the Internet Technology. The tourism industry is one of many industries that are highly dependent on information by means of promotion in different media. During the 1990s, the tourism industry has seen increasing demand for new tourist destinations (new products) which created an opportunity for new comers. Asia was one of the regions which responded to this new demand by combining the need for the new product and the use of information technology (Internet) to access global market. National Tourism Organisations (NTOs) in Asian countries, such as Korea, Japan, Singapore and Malaysia have been adopting the Internet as a new marketing tool to promote and sell new products to a wide range of consumers on the Internet. As a case study, the focus will be on the Web site of Korean National Tourism Organisation (KNTO). By covering the development of the Tourism Information Database which was developed during the early 1990s, the KNTO web site (Korea Tour Homepage) which was created September 1996 and look at KNTO plans for the next millennium. The remainder of the paper is structured in three main parts. The first part presents the literature review on Destination Management Systems. The second part introduces the development of the Tourism Information System in the Korea National Tourism Organisation as a case study. Finally, the analysis of NTO's web site in Asia countries will be conducted. D. Buhalis et al. (eds.), Information and Communication Technologies in Tourism 1999 © Springer-Verlag/Wein 1999
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Literature Review Destination Management Systems (DMSs) is essentially a marketing tool promoting tourism products in particular destination, which might be a nation, region, town or other recognisable geographical entity. A DMS can have up to three components: a. A product database (of attractions, accommodation, travel information etc.); b. A customer database (or who have used, the database), and c. A booking and reservation system (Baker et aI, 1996). Destination Management Systems were introduced in the early 1990s through airline reservation system (CRS) known as the Global Destination System (GDS). It included a range of travel and leisure services and permitted reservations to be made for hotels, car rentals, cruises, railways, tours, theatres and sporting events such as Sabre. There are two main disadvantages of using CRS's as the backbone for GDS's are based on (outdated computer architecture that restrict information display and entail manipulation through complex codes and search commands) making it unsuitable for low-volume, leisure and rural tourism suppliers. Several destinations around the world including New Zealand, Canada, Australia, Denmar
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