Start Date
6-1-2011 2:30 PM
End Date
6-1-2011 3:45 PM
Track
1. Track 1 – Formal Paper Presentation
Subject Area
Information Technology
Faculty Member
Youcheng Wang raywang@mail.ucf.edu
Abstract
This study attempts to apply the ICTRT model proposed by Li and Wang (2010) to American context and assess the effectiveness of American Destination Marketing Organizations’ (DMOs’) websites from functional perspective, i.e., information, communication, transaction, relationship and technical merit. The objectives of the research are achieved by content analysis of all fifty official state tourism websites regarding the five functions by expert valuators. The results manifested State Tourism Offices’ (STOs’) inability to effectively adopt and manage information technology to support more sophisticated operations. Most STOs focused mainly on the information dimension. Applications at both the transaction and relationship dimensions are not being widely deployed. Suggestions and implications are provided and discussed.
Keywords
website evaluation; American State Tourism Offices; ICTRT model; destination marketing
Is Your Official State Tourism Website Effective? A Functional Perspective
This study attempts to apply the ICTRT model proposed by Li and Wang (2010) to American context and assess the effectiveness of American Destination Marketing Organizations’ (DMOs’) websites from functional perspective, i.e., information, communication, transaction, relationship and technical merit. The objectives of the research are achieved by content analysis of all fifty official state tourism websites regarding the five functions by expert valuators. The results manifested State Tourism Offices’ (STOs’) inability to effectively adopt and manage information technology to support more sophisticated operations. Most STOs focused mainly on the information dimension. Applications at both the transaction and relationship dimensions are not being widely deployed. Suggestions and implications are provided and discussed.