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Pak. J. Statist.

2012 Vol. 28(5), 645-651


KEY SUCCESS FACTOR IN IMPLEMENTING MARKETING
STRATEGIES IN TOURISM INDUSTRY
Jane Tung
Department of Marketing and Distribution Management, Hsing Wu University,
Taiwan, R.O.C. Email: 084019@mail.hwc.edu.tw
Department of International Business Studies, National Chi Nan University,
Taiwan, R.O.C. Email: s101212903@mail1.ncnu.edu.tw
ABSTRACT
With the highly economic development over the past decades, the national income
has largely increased in Taiwan. Moreover, the citizens have focused on the facilities and
functions of leisure activities after the implementation of two-day weekend. With the
emphasis on leisure tours and the increase of recreational time, tourism has become
popular. In terms of supply, the provision of public facilities and services, the promotion
of local economic development, the enhancement of social interaction, and the solution to
leisure problems are the common affairs and challenges for both local government and
local people. Based on Marketing Strategies, this study utilizes Analytic Hierarchy
Process (AHP) to construct the hierarchic model of Market Definition, Environmental
Analysis, Marketing Mix Strategy, and Internal Marketing to stratify, structuralize, and
quantify the indices of Marketing Strategies. Having the supervisors in the top ten travel
agencies, announced by Consumers Foundation, as the research subjects, the indices and
weight system for Marketing Strategies in tourism industry are established, and the
research outcomes are concluded as below. (1) Market Definition in Marketing Strategies
appears the best importance, where Market Information Collection is better emphasized.
(2) Environmental Analysis in Marketing Strategies shows the second importance, where
Industry Analysis is better emphasized. (3) Marketing Mix Strategy in Marketing
Strategies is the following importance, where Product Strategy is better emphasized.
(4) Internal Marketing in Marketing Strategies reveals the least importance, where
Customer Management is better emphasized.
KEY WORDS
Tourism Industry; Marketing Strategies; Key Success Factor; Customer Management;
Market Positioning.
INTRODUCTION
Tourism industry is considered as the most potential star industry in the 21st century
as well as the most vital industry globally. According to the data in World Tourism
Organization, the production was about 1% of gross domestic product (GDP) globally
(Wang, 2009). About ninety countries in the United Nations presented tourism as the first
or the second business. Tourism industry appeared about 70% of the income in Caribbean
countries. Tourism department was the largest governmental institute with the most
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Key success factor in implementing marketing strategies in tourism industry

strategies in many countries (Kotler, Haider & Rein, 1993). With the highly economic
development in the past decades, the national income has largely increased in Taiwan.
Besides, the citizens have focused more on the facilities and functions of leisure activities
after the implementation of two-day weekend. Because of the emphasis on leisure tours
and the increase of recreational time, tourism has become popular. In regard to supply,
the provision of public facilities and services, the promotion of local economic
development, the enhancement of social interaction, and the solution to leisure problems
have become the common affairs and challenges for local government and local people.
In recent years, tourism has exceeded social welfare and culture and become the new
index for local marketing and village development. In order to satisfy the demands of
national tourism as well as to strive for international tourists, Executive Yuan has
included tourism in one of the national plans.
Cultural industry and tourism industry have been closely integrated in Taiwan.
According to the report of Business Next, more than one hundred festivals are taken place
in Taiwan that averagely two activities are held every week. Such festivals are featured of
the combination of culture, tourism, and entertainment to create enormous economic
benefits (Liu, 2009). The combination of culture and tourism to enhance economic
development has become a trend internationally that the visit of numerous tourists would
result in locally economic benefits. Moreover, tourism presents economic, social, and
cultural functions that people would not ignore or give up the importance. Some countries
or local governments would establish Economic Development Department (e.g., New
Zealand) or Cultural Department (e.g., Greece) to focus on the economic and cultural
benefits. Others might stress on the interactive activities among the citizens to actively
enhance the social flow and cohesion and to passively reduce social declination and
economic depression. Consequently, tourism development has become a primary
research motive.
LITERATURE REVIEW
I. Marketing Strategies
Kotler, Haider & Rein (1993) defined marketing as a social and managerial process,
with which individuals and groups could create, provide, and freely exchange valuable
products and services to satisfy the demands and desires.
Lung (2010) argued that marketing began with exchange behaviors among human
beings that the division and the production and organization methods of human were
changed, resulting in marketing activities. Kotler, Haider & Rein (1993) regarded
exchange as important phenomena and activities in the society corresponding to the
following conditions. (1) Participants should be individuals, groups, or organizations with
more than two people. (2) One party should possess some valuable article which the other
party would expect to have. (3) One party should be willing to give up the valuable
article so as to exchange a valuable article possessed by the other party, in which the
marketing transaction aimed to receive higher reward than what was paid. (4) Both
parties should be able to communicate and provide valuable articles (Tsai, 2010). Jeremy
(2006) indicated that, for media or other products, a successful marketing strategy should
experience in the following process of having right prices and right promotion to
distribute right products to right places. Based on the above marketing 4P, the strategies

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were described as follows. (1) Product Strategy, the basic Core Product for certain
demands of customers (Kotler, Haider & Rein, 1993). Product positioning was
considered as the key decision that it could be concluded as Attribute positioning, Benefit
positioning, Application positioning, User position, Competitor position, and Quality
(Price) positioning. Besides, high-technology and high-image Product positioning was
also covered (Keegan & Green, 1997). (2) Price Strategy could be divided into Pricing
strategy, Price revised strategy, and Price response strategy. (3) Channel Strategy, whose
objective was regarded as creating effectiveness for customers, according to Keegan
(1999). The major effectiveness of channel could be divided into place, time, type, and
information which were the basic sources of competitive advantages and product values.
Channel Strategy therefore was considered as an important part of Marketing Strategies.
(4) Promotion Strategy contained the dimensions of Personal sales, Sales promotion,
Advertising, and Public relationship. Public relationship was a critical marketing tool that
an enterprise had to build relationship not only with customers, suppliers, and
distributors, but also with various interested public (Peter & Olson, 2004). Walker,
Bovd, and Larreche (1995) also proposed five dimensions for Marketing Strategies,
namely (1) Scope, (2) Goals and objectives, (3) Resource deployment, (4) Identification
of a sustainable competitive advantage, and (5) Synergy.
Cravens & Piercy (2006) proposed the triangular architecture for service marketing in
which the golden triangle formed by enterprise, employee, and customer was no longer
restricted in external marketing for external customers (consumers), but the employees were
gradually emphasized. When favorable service quality was delivered among employees,
internal service quality would be enhanced; thus, the interactive marketing between the
employees and external customers (consumers) could further provide good quality service
(Marshall, 1998). External marketing was referred to traditional Marketing Strategies, 4P,
including product, price, place, and promotion; and, Internal marketing referred to
employee service trainings and encouragement of employee-customer contact in order to
satisfy customer demands. Interactive marketing was regarded as the support, which
stressed on the interactive skills between employees and customers.
According to the above data, Marketing Strategies presented the stages of
(1) Environmental Analysis, (2) Market Definition, and Marketing Mix Strategy. With the
integration of triangular architecture, proposed by Cravens & Piercy (2006), and Internal
marketing, proposed by Gronroos (1984), Environmental Analysis contained the indices of
Industry Analysis and Competitiveness Analysis; Market Definition included Market
Information Collection and Market Positioning; Marketing Mix Strategy covered Product
Strategy, Price Strategy, Channel Strategy, and Promotion Strategy; and Internal Marketing
Management Strategy contained Marketing Unit Responsibility, Customer Management,
and Sharing Marketing Vision. Total four dimensions and eleven indices were included.
II. Analytic Hierarchy Process
Key Success Factor (KSF; Critical Success Factors, CSF) has been widely applied
that it presents different names in various research fields or literatures, such as key
success factor, success factor, key result area, limited factor, strategic factor, and strategic
variable.

648

Key success factor in implementing marketing strategies in tourism industry

With hierarchic structure to evaluate the priority of key success factors, Analytic
Hierarchy Process (AHP) was utilized for questionnaire survey and the weights among
indices.
When facing major decisions, decision-makers do not simply consider single factor.
Particularly, when the problem affects widely, the decisions are likely to appear
controversy. Analytic Hierarchy Process is regarded as a flexible decision-making tool that
it could analyze various factors in decision-making and could include quantitative and
qualitative factors to simplify complex and low-structuralized problems with hierarchic
structure. Since the development of AHP, it has been widely applied to various fields, like
public policy, project selection, resource allocation, plan evaluation, and performance
evaluation, that it could be applied to decision-making and analyzing objectives.
RESEARCH METHOD
I. Research framework
Based on the literature review, variables with high significance were listed in the
Analytic Hierarchy Process architecture for discussing Key Success Factor in
implementing Marketing Strategies in tourism industry.
Industry Analysis
Key Success Factor in Tourism industry marketing strategies

Environmental
Analysis

Market
Definition

Competitiveness
Analysis
Market Information
Collection
Market Positioning
Product Strategy

Marketing
Mix Strategy

Price Strategy
Channel Strategy
Promotion Strategy
Marketing Unit
Responsibility

Internal
Marketing

Customer
Management
Sharing Marketing Vision

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II. Questionnaire distribution and retrieval


With random sampling, the questionnaires were distributed and collected on-site. The
supervisors in the top ten travel agencies, announced by Consumers Foundation,
including South East Travel, Phoenix Tours, Hong Thai Travel, Lion Travel, Beneficial
Travel, Life Tour, Cola Tour, Hi-Lite Tours, Skylark Travel, and Ming Tai, were
selected as the research subjects. Those agencies were evaluated (1) pre-tour service,
(2) leader service, (3) local tour guide service, (4) reasonable tour fee, (5) itinerary,
(6) accommodation, and (7) food and beverage, which were further weighted and
averaged. Total 360 questionnaires were distributed. Within the collected 189 copies,
23 invalid ones were deducted that total 166 valid copies were retrieved, with the
retrieval rate 46%.
EMPIRICAL ANALYSIS
I. Factors in the second hierarchy in Analytic Hierarchy Process
After the questionnaire survey, the second evaluation in Analytic Hierarchy Process
for Key Success Factor in Marketing Strategies was acquired. The Analytic Hierarchy
Process matrix formed by the geometric mean of relative importance between paired
factors was calculated that the consistency ratio C.R.= 0.042< 0.1 showed the consistent
decision among experts in the industry. The weight and the priority of the evaluated
factors were ranked as Market Definition, Environmental Analysis, Marketing Mix
Strategy, and Internal Marketing, Table 1.
Table 1: Weight ranking of Key Success Factor in Marketing
Strategies in tourism industry
Weight
Key Success Factor in Marketing Strategies
ranking
in tourism industry
2

Environmental Analysis

0.277

Market Definition

0.312

Marketing Mix Strategy

0.235

Internal Marketing

0.176

II. Evaluation of overall consistency in Analytic Hierarchy Process


Before calculating the weights of all evaluated indices, the Consistency Ratio of the
Hierarchy (C.R.H.) should be counted. The result C.R.H.=0.02148<0.1 presented
acceptable consistency of the overall hierarchic structure. Table 2 displays the overall
consistency, which was ranked as Family resistance, Family planning, and Career
planning.

650

Key success factor in implementing marketing strategies in tourism industry

Table 2: Weights and weight ranking of the overall consistency of


evaluated items in Analytic Hierarchy Process
Evaluated factors in
Evaluated factors in
Global
second hierarchy
third hierarchy
Ranking
priority
(hierarchic weight)
(hierarchic weight)
Industry Analysis
14.72
2
Environmental
Analysis (0.277)
Competitiveness Analysis
9.81
5
Market Information
15.62
1
Market Definition
Collection
(0.312)
Market Positioning
13.69
3
Tourism
Industry
Product Strategy
10.53
4
Marketing
Strategies
Price Strategy
4.93
10
Marketing Mix
Key Success Strategy (0.235)
Channel Strategy
8.44
6
Factor
C.R.=0.021
Promotion Strategy
7.16
7
Marketing Unit
5.37
9
Responsibility
Internal Marketing
Customer Management
6.48
8
(0.176)
Sharing Marketing Vision

3.25

11

CONCLUSION AND SUGGESTION


Summing up the data analyses, the experts considered the ranking of Key Success
Factor in Marketing Strategies in tourism industry as Market Definition, Environmental
Analysis, Marketing Mix Strategy, and Internal Marketing. This study further proposed
practical suggestions for Key Success Factor in Marketing Strategies in tourism industry.
1. Market Definition. It should aim at different target markets, as the markets with
distinct customer sources reveal different promotion. Besides, what can attract the
ethnic groups should be considered as the target marketing for market
discrimination. In regard to the division of target market, tours to south-east Asia
could be arranged for workers or students, as the implementation of two-day
weekend results in short but frequent vacations. Customer-oriented tours
corresponding to their demands could be generalized so that they would expect to
visit again. Sustainable management could therefore be achieved.
2. Environmental Analysis. With diverse requirements, it is rather difficult to have
customers select the same or consistent routes. For this reason, it might not be
easy to have sufficient number of people to form a tour. In order to have enough
people for a tour, travel agencies are likely to look for cooperation with other
agencies with the similar route. When economic boom and tourism are
unfavorable, it is regarded as a product strategy.
3. Marketing Mix Strategy. In such a society where people are experiencing stressful
life, a lot of travel agencies would re-package the touring routes for two-day

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weekend. Tours for specific destinations have become characteristic. In-depth


development of the product makes the product more special that it becomes a new
highlight.
4. Internal Marketing. Most industries do not consider price competition as the best
competition, but a vicious cycle. As a result, the quality, E-promotion, product
differentiation, and customer-orientation could be emphasized for positively
sustainable development vision. Although there is fierce competition in the
touring market and the routes are similar, travel agencies should avoid price
competition and design more self-arranged routes to be the major promotion.
Besides, alliances and associations could be established among travel agencies for
better cooperation and strategies.
REFERENCES
1. Wang, Yuh-chun (2009). A study of strategic plannying of Taiwan tourism
development. The Journal of Chinese Public Administration, 2, 41-60.
2. Liu, Wei-kung (2009). What is cultural creation industry the historical significance
of cultural industry. ARTCO, May.
3. Lung, Chin-lmug (2010). The promotion strategy of the public-operated retail sales
circuit system. The case study of the General Welfare Service Ministry. Management
Review, 3(2), 51-78.
4. Tsai, Meng-hsiu (2010). The Research of Behavior and Marketing Strategy of
Consumer on Television Shopping. Sun Yat-Sen Management Review, 4(3), 106-133.
5. Boyd, H. W. Jr., Walker, O.C. Jr. and Larreche, Jean-Claude (1995). Marketing
management a strategic approach with a global orientation (2nd ed.). Irwin Inc.
6. Cravens, D.W. and Piercy, N.F. (2006). Strategic Marketing. McGraw-Hill
Educations.
7. Gronroos, C. (1984). A Service Quality Model and Its Marketing Implications.
European Journal of Marketing, 18(4), 36-44.
8. Jeremy W. (2006). Blog Marketing. McGraw-Hill Education.
9. Keegan, W.J. and Green, M.C. (1997). Principles of Global Marketing. Englewood
Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall.
10. Keegan, W.J. (1999). Global Marketing Management (5th Ed). Englewood Cliffs, NJ:
Prentice-Hall.
11. Kotler, P., Haider, D.H. and Rein, I. (1993). Marketing Places: Attracting Investment,
Industry, and Tourism to Cities, States, and Nation. New York: The Free, A Division
of Macmillan, Inc.
12. Marshall, G.W., Baker, J. and Finn, D.W. (1998) Exploring internal customer service
quality. Journal of Business & Industrial Marketing, 13(4/5), 381-392.
13. Peter, J. Paul and Olson, Jerry C. (2004). Consumer Behavior and Marketing Strategy.
NY: McGray-Hill College.

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