Egyptian crises and destination brand image: the resurrection of the mummy

Previous research has shown that a country's perceived image during and after the crisis affects tourism, yet the impact of communications on the holistic destination brand image in a sustained crisis remains limited. Based on a case study of Egypt of the Arab spring and the Covid-19 pandemic, this study investigates the effectiveness of strategies to alter one destination's image. Due to the recurring recoveries in Egyptian tourism, we believe that strengthening the resilience of the destination brand image during a prolonged crisis can offer valuable insights to practitioners and academics. The researchers conducted a media content analysis and a sentiment analysis of 3662 online and social media publications to gauge the alignment between Egypt's projected and perceived destination brand image. While the tourism literature has primarily focused on crisis communication and strategies to alter a negative destination brand image, few studies have examined strategies that focus on building an enduring, resilient destination brand. This study offers a normative and exploratory model of Adaptable Destination Strategies during crises (ADS). The ADS model contributes to existing literature and destination management organizations by suggesting an integrated strategy toolkit for extended destination brand image governance grounded in diversification, collaboration, communication, and consistency. © 2023 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.

Is nothing like before? COVID-19–evoked changes to tourism destination social media communication

The outbreak of COVID-19 has boosted the significance of social media for tourism destinations. Therefore, this study investigates how and to what extent the pandemic has changed tourism destination communication on social media and consumers' social media engagement. Using data collected from 1136 Facebook posts by 85 Austrian tourism destinations, the authors compared three different phases of the COVID-19 pandemic (i.e. pre-COVID, lockdown, post-lockdown). Results show that 1) the use of linguistic text features of social media content has changed (i.e. more expressions of uncertainty, confidence, emotionality, more first-person storytellers, greater text length, and less specificity);2) consumers’ social media engagement, measured as likes, shares, and comments, has increased;and 3) textual features explain changes in social media engagement rates only to a limited degree. Based on these findings, the study provides recommendations for destinations on how to design effective social media content during crises. © 2022 Elsevier Ltd

Destination Brand Communication during COVID-19 Pandemic - The Case of Iceland

The existing literature indicates that the COVID-19 pandemic has been disastrous for tourism across the globe and much of the focus now is on tourism recovery. WTTC estimates that destinations would take an average of 21.3 months to recover from a pandemic. Various market reports and research on the impact of COVID-19 on tourism have issued bleak forecasts regarding the future of global tourism but Iceland has disregarded this prediction. The European island nation has received much acclaim for its ability to control the spread of the virus without the need for an aggressive lockdown. Iceland holds the distinction of becoming the first European country to open its doors to tourists amid the outbreak when a vast majority of destinations worldwide are still on lockdown. The country has decided to allow tourists from the Schengen area to visit from June 15, 2020 and proposes to allow other tourists to visit from July 1, 2020. In the current scenario, where the state of public health is a barometer of destination attractiveness, a COVID free environment would be alluring to tourists who had postponed their travel plans due to the crisis. The Iceland DMO (Destination Marketing Organization) provides prospective tourists with general travel-related information, links to government notifications and also has an official website for Iceland and COVID-19. It has also established its social media presence on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, YouTube and Pinterest. We propose to evaluate the brand communication strategy of Iceland tourism using the PESO (Paid, Earned, Owned and Shared) framework. This evaluation will yield insights into platforms and types of media employed by the DMO with the intention of addressing the concerns of tourists. The strategies implemented by Iceland may be adopted by other destination DMOs to restart their tourism industry. © 2021 Publishing India Group. All rights reserved.