CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
1.1 BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY
Tourism is essentially a service
industry created to satisfy the need arising from movement of tourists within
national or cross international boundaries.
Hunziker and Krapt (1941) defined
tourism as “the sum of the phenomena and relationship arising from the travel
and stay of non-residents, in so far as they do not lead to permanent residence
and not connected with any earning”.
The tourism society of England (1976)
also defined tourism as the temporary short-term movement of people to
destination outside the place where they normally live and work and their
activities during the stay at each destination it include movement for all
purpose.
According to Hon Jake Obetsebi
Lamptey, minister of tourism, Ghana, tourism is the fastest growing industry in
the world today; there is no body that can doubt the power of tourism for
generation of economic growth employment and alleviation of poverty especially
in the urban areas and the preservation of the environment.
In Nigeria, tourism as an activity
commenced since the pre-colonial era. The country has a vast landmass of
923,768 km2b and a diverse population of warm, hospitable people of
over 120 Million.
Tourism and its development have moved
on a fast track after years of neglect. This change has made it possible by the
renowned interest of the private sector in pumping the much required funds into
the lucrative yet lease explored sector of the Nigeria economy. Obadan (1982).
Tourism
is a fragmented and geographically unique sector; embrace a passive set of
business and personal relationship between firm and organization such as
national and regional destination marketing organization, tourism office, hotel
attraction, transport, tour travel agent and restaurant.
Social networking can be seen as the
use of a dedicated web site to communicate informally with other members of the
sites, by posting messages, photographs etc. Akehurst (2009).
Social networking site have taken
tourism and travel booking experience to a new level not previously witnessed.
For example, social networking site have allowed tourism to communicate with
not only the tourism operator but also tourists who have recently experienced services
from the operator whom they are considering booking travel with. This has
allowed the tourist an opportunity to gather first – hand information. Tourism
in the past has used many different intermediaries in the delivery of tourism
product starting with travel agent. Akehurst, (2009).
Werthner and Rocci (2004) Ranked
tourism as an industry that is at the forefront of internet and social
communication in order to deliver an experience and make sales, the use of
website has been found to be effective as people have access to them 24hours a
day round the world.
Social media has made a huge impact on
essentially every major industry across the world and the business of travel
and hospitality has reaped the rewards perhaps as well as any other commercial
venture. Boyd, (2007). Travel and tourism depends heavily on the use of
word-of-mouth to spread opinions and recommendations, and social platform such
as Twitter and Facebook.
According to Buhalis (1998), 92
percent of customers said that they trust earned media which includes
recommendation from friends and family members, more than any other form of
advertisement.
Moreover, a recent study showed that
more than half (52 percent) of respondents changed their travel plans after
researching their trip using social media. A heavy 82 percent of traveler’s use
their smart phones whilst abroad, and 52 percent of Facebook users said that
their friends holidays photos had inspired their vacation choice. Abreu,(2010).
Social media is affecting the travel
and tourism industry in a very positive manner. Exquisite destinations are now
made famous by friends and family, giving tourism agencies more clients owing
to free advertisement of these unexplored destinations.
Nigeria is endowed with a number of tourism
based and cultured tourism attractions which are characterized by fascinating
scenic lands cape, wide variety of wild life on their natural habitats. But,
these identified tourism attractions are not known by many tourists because of
lack of effective information system for publicizing the scenery, wildlife and
cultural attractions to visitors or tourist hence this research.
1.2 STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM
The use of electricity as also
militate people to have access to social media, many people from rural areas do
not have good electricity which can enable them to see different tourist
attraction and book travel. In most cases, incorrect information are posted on
the profile, marketing efforts will not be aimed at the right audience or
tourism. Problem of network has been a major challenging to the use of social
networking. Today’s network is more
complex than ever before, the impact that the multitude of devices applications
and performance can be startling increased congestion, slow application response
time, the will prevent tourist to get quick decisions.
1.3 OBJECTIVE OF THE STUDY
The main objective of this study is
impact of social networking on tourism development.
The specific objective includes:
i.
Identify different social network work and
it application in hospitality and tourism business.
ii.
Determine the social economic impact of
socio-networking application in hospitality and tourism business operation.
iii.
Identify the challenges of social-network
exploration in tourism and hospitality business development.
iv. To determine the most effective strategy for social networking application in hospitality & tourism industry.
1.4 RESEARCH QUESTIONS
i.
What are the different social networking
systems in the tourism industry?
ii.
What are the impact of socio-networking
application in the hospitality industry?
iii.
What are the challenges of social-networking
application in hospitality and tourism industry?
iv.
What are the most effective strategy for
social networking application in hospitality and tourism industry?
Department | Mass Communication |
Project ID Code | MAS0058 |
Chapters | 5 Chapters |
No of Pages | 30 pages |
Methodology | Null |
Reference | YES |
Format | Microsoft Word |
Price | ₦4000, $15 |
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Contact Us On | +2349067372103 |
Contact Us On | +2349094562208 |
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