Tourism Consumer Behaviour and Insight

This report explores the factors influencing consumer behaviour and attitude in the tourism industry. It discusses the impact of digital technology on consumer trends and the differences between B2B and B2C approaches in tourism. It also covers the stages of consumer decision-making journey and the importance of mapping a path to purchase. The case study focuses on Thomas Cook Group plc, a large travel company headquartered in London, UK.

Tourism Consumer Behaviour
and Insight (L5)

TABLE OF CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................3
LO1..................................................................................................................................................3
P1 Investigating the factors influencing the consumer behaviour and attitude within tourism
industry........................................................................................................................................3
P2 Changes in consumer trends due to the impact of digital technology....................................4
LO2..................................................................................................................................................5
P3 Stages of consumer decision-making journey and mapping path to purchase.......................5
P4 Importance to marketers for mapping a path to purchase.......................................................6
LO3..................................................................................................................................................8
P5 Comparing and contrasting the key differences between B2B and B2C within tourism
industry........................................................................................................................................8
P6 Different approaches to market research and methods of research used for understanding
the decision-making process........................................................................................................8
LO4..................................................................................................................................................9
P7 Evaluating how marketers can influence the different stages of tourism decision-making
process..........................................................................................................................................9
CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................10
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................11

INTRODUCTION
Consumers are considered to be the key part of every business organization surrounding
which all the enterprise related activities are revolved. Thus, it becomes essential to recognise
and effectively understand the factors having potential to affect the buying decisions of the
consumers. This report is in context of Thomas Cook Group plc which is large travel company
founded in 2007 and is headquartered in London, UK. This reports presents about the various
stages of consumers decision-making along with the factors affecting the ultimate decisions. In
addition to this, it states about the importance of mapping process in the consumer decision-
making in the context to tourism. It also covers the presentation of various models and theories
and difference between the B2C and B2B approaches. At last, various factor impacting the user
decision-making process is determined.
LO1
P1 Investigating the factors influencing the consumer behaviour and attitude within tourism
industry
The core thing which is having a major impact over the consumer behaviour is the goods
and services which is being offered. It becomes essential to identify and examine the various
groups involving the factors such as the cultural, social, personal and so forth. Along with this, it
also helps in determining the factors which are having direct impact on the consumer buying
behaviour.
Cultural: The major factor that contributed or have a crucial role in identifying the wants
and behaviour of the clients is the culture. It mainly involves the norms, learned values and
symbols of the society which is basically transmitted through the way of language and symbol
(Chin and et.al., 2018). Pertaining to tourism industry, the culture which is being followed by the
people influence their decision and attitude towards the travel and tourism. For example, the
culture followed in India is completely different from what is followed in other nations. This
factor has a great impact over the consumer behaviour and attitude in the context of tourism
industry.
Social: It refers to the permanent division in the society where members share the same
values and interest. The buying behaviour of the people is affected by the class to which they
belong or to which they aspire. Along with that, the changing trends has also resulted into

affected the needs of the consumers. For example, the Savoy Hotel focus on upper class to offer
their services
Personal: The personal factor, basically the personality affects the consumers behaviour
and perception. This factor influences the types and brand of product which is being purchased,
for instance, a consumer is willing to have a relaxed and exciting holiday with lot of facilities but
at the lower cost which reflects the one of the personality of the consumer.
Psychological factors: The attitude of the consumers towards a particular brand and the
way it affects the consumer behaviour is an important aspect of psychological factors (Kashif,
Zarkada and Ramayah, 2018). It is mainly formed by the experience acquired by people which
has a long-lasting impact over the consumers.
It can be stated from the above that the stated factors are having a significant impact over
the consumer behaviour and attitude as it keeps on changing with change in time and emerging
changes in the business environment. These factors are having the potential to drive changes
within the tourism industry and thus, it becomes essential for the organizations like the Thomas
Cook to take account of it in the business operations.
P2 Changes in consumer trends due to the impact of digital technology
The emergence of the latest technology has resulted into change in the consumers pattern
of consumption. The change in technology and the emergence of digital technology has resulted
into bringing a million of things at the finger tips. In respect to the tourism industry, the easy
available of the view of the various hotels and tourism places has made it easy for the consumers
in effectively evaluating and comparing the choices which is available in the respected field. The
consumers nowadays can access the content all around the globe along with reviewing the
experiences being shared by someone else (Ortiz, 2020). This type of behaviour has resulted into
promotion of the technological advancement and development. The tourism industry has also
upgraded with respect to the implementation of the latest technology and is also having a great
impact over the tourism industry. For instance, once the luggage is picked up and consumer
leave home but there are mainly 2 types of attitude which stands out. One is the trend is to go out
for a holiday but along with staying attached with the world with the help of smartphones with
the fear of missing out what is happening on social networks. The companies are taking
advantage of such trend in order to continuously enhancing the relationship with their customers.

On the other hand, are the those tourist who want to use their vacation in order to
detached with the virtual world. Such tourists are those who disconnects with their smartphones
in order to enjoy the free time and have privacy. Under such conditions, the experiences involves
the higher involvement of the entity's staff with the clients in order to offer greater human
connection (Liang and et.al., 2017). In this way, the digital technology has influenced the
tourism industry pertaining to the change in the consumer trends and pattern of consumption. In
order to effectively meet with the changing trends, Thomas Cook has implemented the use of
internet of things (IoT) technologies which is having a significant impact over the growth and
development of the tourism business as it makes it possible to analyse the preferences of the
customers by considering the places they visit.
LO2
P3 Stages of consumer decision-making journey and mapping path to purchase
The decision taking process pertaining to consumers is the method which is being utilized
by the marketers for the purpose of tracking the decision taking process of the target consumers
from the starting stage to end. A detailed description is given below:
Problem Recognition: This is the stage in which the problem is identified pertaining to
the desire of the customer and along with it helps to determining the aspects which is missing
and undertakes efforts for getting back the normal feeling (Lynch and Barnes, 2020). In case of
Thomas Cook, the main issue is that consumer face delays in getting the required information.
So the organization, identifies this problem and implemented separate department for providing
timely information to the customers.
Information search: This stage keeps on changing and along with that the information
collected from the consumers by the way of recommendation and the past experiences. Also, the
consumer might make the decision considering the pros and cons, therefore, by paying additional
amount or by signing up, the consumer gets the extra benefits and timely products and services
in comparison to the other business organizations.
Evaluation of Alternative: Under this stage, a consumer puts up some question in regard
to seek some alternatives. This is mainly done through the way of reading the reviews and the by
comparing the prices (Hamilton and et.al., 2021). After this, the final product is selected which
best suits the most.

Purchase: At this stage, the customer undertakes the decision pertaining to the purchase
of the goods in which they are involved into. The end decision is dependent upon the emotion,
marketing and experiences.
After Purchase Satisfaction: This is the last stage called the review stage in which and is
considered an important stage as it provide information in regard to the satisfaction of the
customers. The feedback received is studied by Thomas Cook and then changes are made.
Thomas Cook specifically analyses the feedback and make improvement in its product quality.
P4 Importance to marketers for mapping a path to purchase
The stages of purchase is cyclic and changes with time and requirement. Thomas Cook
understands that the today's consumers are more involved into comparison, recommending the
same to others and making the end decisions in respect to the purchase (Cortinas and et.al.,
2019). Along the that, the social networking sites also affects the decision. Thus, Thomas Cook
made a new trend pertaining to the consumer's journey mapping. It involves an insight of the
customer experiences and the knowing the behaviour of people towards the brand. The
significance of this mapping process is stated below:
 The process assists the marketers in regard to developing some experiences which
provides a better and an effective way of evaluating the success of the marketing
campaign. For Thomas Cook, the maps which is being created supports in gaining
understanding about the customer behaviour.
 It also helps in keeping focused on the developing the longer relations with the clients by
collecting the useful information on consumers such as the behaviour, belief along with
demographic information in addition to the perception of the people (Krushali, Jojo and
Manivannan, 2018).
 Purchase mapping results into assists and triggers the customers towards making
purchase through the way of awareness campaign. Along with this, mapping also
supports the marketers in respect to understanding each stage pertaining to decisions
making. Thus, making them attract large group of people towards the brand.
 It also assists the company in creating a business plan as per the desire of the customers.
The attribute and the quality in regard to this mapping process assists in identification of
the touch points which could result into accomplishing the consumer oriented objectives.

 The purchase mapping would help the marketers of Thomas Cook in gaining an
understanding pertaining to the purchase stage which makes the marketing managers in
grabbing more attention on the purchase stage. Through the way of making use of the
consumer insights gathered at the identification stage which requires the greater attention
and in this mapping assist the company in effectively meeting with the needs and
requirements of the customers in better and effective way.
 Along with this, it helps in determining the gap in regard to the objectives of the
organization. It helps in developing a model for its workers for making them work
together in order to improve and enhance the overall presentation of the organization.
There are different theories and models which is being utilized by the marketing team for
the purpose of analysing the decision taking process. One of the model is Simon model of
decision-making which has made key contribution towards effectively gaining an insight into the
decision-making process. According to author, it is a process with distinct stages and as per this
model, there are three stages:1. Intelligence activity: This stage works on with the identification of the issues along with
collection of data on the respected problem (Thakur, 2020). This is what is done by
Thomas Cook as it effectively work on determining the problem so that it can undertake
actions for overcoming the same.2. Design activity: This step majorly deals with the creation of alternative ideas or solution
to the problems. Thomas Cook works on identifying the various solutions to the problems
and undertake various the process of evaluation of each solution in order to determine the
right option.
3. Choice activity: Under this, the selection of the right alternative is done after taking into
consideration the certain defined criterion.
Thus, all these steps are necessarily required to be followed by organization within the
tourism industry in order to effectively react to the decision taking process.

LO3
P5 Comparing and contrasting the key differences between B2B and B2C within tourism
industry
B2B and B2C is considered to be the major marketing approaches for the purpose of
selling the product but are different from each other. B2B is referred to as the commercial
transaction in regard to the purchasing and selling out of the goods and services between the two
business organization. While in B2C the transaction is conducted among the consumers and the
business directly. In respect to the B2C buyers, they are the one who is seeking for the good
price and analyses the market and the prevailing competitiveness before making the end
purchase (Rėklaitis and Pilelienė, 2019). Another important aspect in relation to the tourism
industry is the trust of consumer on the business or the brand. It is still being believed that the
people in reality do not truly trust the online tourism sites for availing the services and making
purchases. On account of this factor, B2C marketing approach effectively works on building of
loyalty among the consumers and the business organization.
B2B marketing relationship is mainly works on relationships and concentrates on the
customer's end decision process (Zhang and Du, 2020). The B2B marketing puts more emphasis
on quality as the major aspect in the business and along with that plays an effective role as the
poor service to the customer will result into wastage of all the marketing efforts being put on in
an organization. The services to the customer undertakes before making sale and involves
connecting with the clients through calls.
P6 Different approaches to market research and methods of research used for understanding the
decision-making process
B2B context
In B2B, the most common approach which is being used is the mixed research approach.
The research methods can be quantitative and qualitative which is dependent upon the type of
outcome being desired by the researcher. The B2B market research is very complex and thus,
various approaches is being applied (Li, 2019). The tele-depth approach is considered as the
most widely used method for the qualitative B2B since the businesses in this marketing carry out
most of their transaction over phone (Kuehnle, 2019). Along with that, the tele-depth interview
is being preferred as it leads to generate and provide better quality data in comparison to the face
to face interviews. Along with that, by making the utilization of the focus group may not serve

the objective of the qualitative research which is because the business is scattered geographically
and are also in competition to one another. Thus, Thomas Cook has made use of the mixed
research approaches in order to effectively analyse the consumer decision-making process
pertaining to the tourism industry.
B2C context
Under the B2C research, the size of the sample is greater than the B2B which results into
making the research less skewed and higher reliability rate (Saran and White, 2018). Apart from
this, B2C is revolved around customers instead of business oriented with the purpose of
understanding the consumer's perspective in the process of purchasing the product or availing the
service. As the B2C is focused on establishing along with long term relations with the consumers
and creating loyal customer base. Thus, under B2C method attractive incentives are offered to
the participants which can be in the form of cash, loyalty cards, coupons and so forth.
There are various factors which are having an effect over the consumer purchases like the
social psychological or personal. As per the marketing manager of Thomas Cook, the behaviour
and attitude of the consumer is strongly affected by the factors for instance, consumer's social
class or subculture. For instance, the needs and preferences of the people who are living in the
Asian continent varies from the people residing in Europe (Prokop and Stejskal, 2017). Thus,
Thomas Cook has to formulate its marketing strategies for selling its products and services as per
the requirement of the customers. Along with that, Thomas Cook is trying to match with the
emerging lifestyle and is proving products and services as per the social status of the people,
involving attitude, personality and perception which also helps in shaping the brand image of the
company.
LO4
P7 Evaluating how marketers can influence the different stages of tourism decision-making
process
This has been already known that the average customers makes use of the pre-defined
stages for undertaking decision related procedures before making the purchase. This path
involves the certain similarity across the company and the target audience but it is important to
realize a specific purchase procedure. This is crucial for the purpose of growing the business and
there are different ways through which the marketer can affect the entire decision process in the
B2C (Buhalis and Sinarta, 2019). In respect to the Thomas Cook, the company identifies the

target customers which helps in affecting the customer behaviour. In order to do this, the
company makes use of both quantitative and qualitative market segment tools and techniques
which helps in effectively assessing the geographic, demographic and other related factors. It
also analyses the behavioural and psychographic factors and the company tries to build the
relation with the customers on the basis of the experiences, perception and usage. Along with
that, it also helps in enhancing the brand loyalty and increasing the ratings.
In addition to this, the organization Thomas Cook is currently using the niche marketing
strategies which supports the company to amplify the strategy instead of wasting the investment
made. Niche marketing helps in analysing the behaviour of the customer in order to provide
service to the untapped market (Panwar and et.al., 2019). On account of B2B, the rapid change in
the trade and commerce has affected the decision made. The business entities in the present time,
is being carried out online instead of physical stores or outlets. Customers are now having option
for door step service which has influenced the consumer behaviour. In addition to this, the
technology change have also led to the rapid growth in the rising market and the usage of
technology in tourism industry has helped Thomas Cook in achieving higher efficiency and
market growth.
Therefore, in this way, marketers work on influencing the decision-making process of the
consumers by identifying the key factors which are having the potential of affecting the decisions
of the consumers.
CONCLUSION
It can be inferred from the above that, in the context of the tourism industry there are
various factors which are having an influence over the consumers and their behaviour. Through
this, it has been identified that the factors like the social, personal, psychological aspects had an
important key role in impacting the behaviour of the consumers. In addition to this, the
emergence of digital technology has also resulted into changing the trends pertaining to the
choice and preferences of the consumers. In Addition to this, analysis of the consumer buying
process helps the organization in effectively formulate the strategy for grabbing larger customer
base. A comparison drawn between the B2B and B2C marketing approaches and the research
methods which can lead to influencing the end decision-making process in respect to the Thomas
Cook organization. At last, the marketers are having the potential to affect the various stages

pertaining to the decision-making by the way of analysing it effectively and undertaking steps for
meeting with the expectations of the end consumers.

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