Evaluation, Synthesis and Formulation of Proposals for the Use of ...

«Evaluation, Synthesis and Formulation of Proposals for the Use of ICTin the Tourism Sector»The above underline the importance of e-CRM applications for the enhancement of personalizedservices and the provision of dynamic packaging, in a sense imitating the philosophy of traditionaltravel agents.The benefits resulting from the development, exploitation and use of such applications aresignificantly larger in the presence of integrated destination management infrastructures, at both thenational and the enterprise levels. This combination can allow more efficient management of thedemand for electronic services and better understanding of the market needs, for better promotionand increased competitiveness.Countries that stand out in the development and exploitation of software applications for themanagement of customer relationships are Sweden, with the SkiStar solution for ski centres, Francewith the voyages-sncf.com tourist portal, Canada with the bonjourquebec.com portal, and Ireland withits national tourism organization, Tourism Ireland, which uses an on-line CRM system. For example, inthe SkiStar solution, the key components are the grouping of destinations and the operation of a CRMsystem. The end users of this solution have personalized access to the operator’s site and create theirpersonal profiles, since the application assigns a unique ID to each one of them. The entireinformation collected is then gathered and centrally managed in the CRM system. Bonjourquebec.comand Voyages-sncf.com are examples of portals that give particular emphasis to the use of CRMmethods. Their operators consider the use of CRM as an element of strategic importance.The use of modern e-marketing methodsThe role of e-marketing in the context of a strategy for the promotion of tourist destinations isdecisive. Modern e-marketing practices take advantage of the aforementioned e-CRM applications aswell as of traditional methods for the development of a personalized and user-friendly environment.Furthermore, these modern practices are increasingly applied in other communication channels.A characteristic example is the exploitation of bi-directional communication channels such as Blogsand Podcasting, both as targets for promotion purposes and as sources of objective opinions andinformation (feedback process). A worthwhile mentioning trend is the use of viral marketing that takesadvantage of the rapid growth of social and collaboration networks, for the promotion and marketingof tourist destinations.This conceptual framework also includes the search engine optimization techniques for theimprovement of tourist websites ranking in search results, and the use of sponsored links. Cutting-Version 1Month: December Year: 200716