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Your destination’s ‘Experience-scape” – influencing visitor intention and return

We’ve all heard that the trends in regional tourism offerings are all about experiences once they are there. Though how can we layer the experience during the decision-making time, to help them choose our destination, increase chances of them returning, & recommending it to others?

It’s winter in Australia, school holidays have finished, and it’s a good time to reflect on what’s going through our future visitors’ minds, as they dream of their next getaway. If we get to know the behavioural intentions of our visitors – this will help with keeping these customers in our tourism businesses, providing positive brand connotations, and increasing the use of tourism services in our destination. Looking ahead to upcoming seasons in tourism – how can we prepare, to catch the attention of new, & returning visitors? 

What are visitors searching for? I like to call it the destination “experience-scape”  …  the extent to which the social aspect of the destination’s servicescape influences behavioural responses to the destination experience. Your destination itself has a distinct social servicescape. How can you tap into your destination’s personality, and promote this to a potential like-minded visitor?

Positive behavioural reflections means more chances of tourists revisiting the same places, & recommending to others. As obvious as it sounds – this is extremely important for destinations.

The model of Servicescape, originally coined by Bitner (1992), can be used by destinations to increase behavioural reflections and encourage tourists to revisit and recommend the same places. Here are some ways that can easily be applied to regional tourism destinations:

1.   Creating a positive emotional experience:

In providing positive brand connotations, and increasing the use of destination services – it’s important to create a positive emotional experience for tourists by designing the physical surroundings and making room for host – visitor interaction.

2.   Fostering familiarity in the Visitor Journey:

Visitors’ behavioural intentions are influenced by their subjective familiarity assessment of destination attributes

When visitors feel that they are familiar with a tourist destination, they are more confident in their decision-making to visit destinations. Therefore, DMOs need to consider the differences in tourist destination familiarity between revisiting and first-time tourists and adopt different marketing strategies for different types of tourists.

Here’s  few ideas for the first-time visitor: – get into the mind of the visitor, and help them convert from their trip research, to actually deciding upon your destination & booking. 

  • Help them plan their journey – provide details of various types of transportation even down to where EV charging points are along the way as well as at the destination. Where can they get a tyre changed quickly?
  • What are some interesting sights to see along the way? Create an itinerary for them to follow to your destination.

3. Stimulating inspiration:

If the visitor arrives at your destination already with a sense of place … a sense of belonging, and a familiarity – this is all part of layering the experience, to provide an authentic holiday from beginning to end, and with amazing recollections of an easy memorable trip, giving more chances of recommending your destination to others.

Traveling to tourist destinations allows visitors to feel that they are in a different time and space, which helps them to enjoy a new lifestyle with new and better possibilities of life activities in tourist destinations.

4. Creating an authentic experience:

The visitor is looking for more than just a product or service, and something more than just memories

  • to have experienced Authenticity
  • to have enhanced their own wellbeing
  • value adding experiences – turning into ‘transformation experiences’
  • making the visitor a ‘better person’, feeling at one with the destination, and part of the local community, taking the role of a destination steward.
  • the experience guides the visitor on a path of change from their normal daily life

 

Destination NSW in their NSW First Guide, gives some great tips for creating a great experience in regards to the Servicescape:

• Add value to the visitor experience

• Understand your customer and make a connection

• Attract advance bookings

• Keep it simple and build on your strengths

• Connect your customers with your expert staff

• Look for opportunities to share stories

• Find ways to add sensory experiences, such as smell, sound, feel, touch & taste

Let’s apply this into a regional tourism setting, what are the most important concepts to remember?

  • Here are some ideas of extending the experience in a regional tourism setting to ensure positive behavioural reflections of our visitors:
  • authentic local experiences
  • storytelling – such as ‘meet the agritourism maker’, go behind the scenes and immerse themselves into local culture
  • a ‘VIP’  or ‘behind the scenes‘ sentiment for the visitor
  • interacting with and feeling part of the local culture
  • sustainability initiatives to give the visitor the feeling of giving back to the destination

Rural destinations can use the idea of the Experience-scape to increase behavioural reflections by creating a positive emotional experience, fostering familiarity, stimulating inspiration, and creating an authentic experience. By doing so, there are more chances of tourists revisiting the same places and recommending them to others.

The visitor’s evaluation of the total experience in the destination, in terms of emotions is important.  It’s the sum of all collective actions – all the way from booking, travelling to, their stay, their local experiences & then the return journey.  

Author of Article

Katrina Denoux (MSc) feels lucky to be able to combine her two loves, travel & education as an Ambassador for Regional Tourism Australia, and her role as Learning Teaching & Innovation Manager at the International College of Management Sydney, furthering the international & domestic student experience in tourism, hospitality & event degrees & employability in Australia. She specialises in the experience economy, wellness tourism, & sustainability; as an academic professor & speaker on the international insights circuit.

Katrina is also a tourism practitioner & registered health provider with an experiential accommodation business, Villa Tropez, with award-wining heritage, nature-led venues in Europe and Australia, & has been in the wellbeing & sustainability tourism space as a leader for 20 years.

References

Bitner, Mary Jo. Servicescapes: The Impact of Physical Surroundings on Customers and Employees.Journal of MarketingVol. 56, No. 2 (Apr., 1992), pp. 57-71 (15 pages)Published By: Sage Publications, Inc. https://doi.org/10.2307/1252042

Destination NSW. NSW First Guide: Develop your Tourism Business https://www.destinationnsw.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/nsw-first-guide-develop-your-tourism-business.pdf

Ingvild H. Blomstervik, Nina K. Prebensen, Ana Cláudia Campos & Patrícia Pinto (2021) Novelty in tourism experiences: the influence of physical staging and human interaction on behavioural intentions, Current Issues in Tourism, 24:20, 2921-2938, DOI: 10.1080/13683500.2020.1854197

Kemal Gurkan Kucukergin, Selma Meydan Uygur. Are emotions contagious? Developing a destination social servicescape model,Journal of Destination Marketing & Management, Volume 14, 2019, 100386, ISSN 2212-571X, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jdmm.2019.100386.

Line, Nathaniel & Hanks, Lydia & Mcginley, Sean. (2018). When birds flock together: an identification of the destination social servicescape. Journal of Travel & Tourism Marketing. 35. 1-13. 10.1080/10548408.2018.1445065

Xue J, Zhou Z, Majeed S, Chen R, Zhou N. Stimulating Tourist Inspiration by Tourist Experience: The Moderating Role of Destination Familiarity. Front Psychol. 2022 Jul 1;13:895136. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2022.895136. PMID: 35846648; PM