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Grassroots Branding with Twitter: Amazing Florida

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Information and Communication Technologies in Tourism 2013

Abstract

Social networks sites (SNS) and online communications have revolutionized the way people interact with each other, and these changes have important marketing implications in a number of commercial contexts. In tourism and hospitality context, SNS communications can be considered as electronic word-of-mouth about people’s travel experiences. When SNS data is taken into consideration by destination marketing organizations for branding purposes, the visitors to the destination can be regarded as agents of that destination’s branding effort, and the branding approach as “grassroots” branding. This empirical study explores a suitability of using publicly accessible data from Twitter for gaining visitors’ perceptions about Florida. It examines what positive affective states are associated with the destination and to which destination attributes these affective states are related most closely. Potentially, the study can contribute to developing a non-obtrusive, low-cost, and time-efficient approach to tap into visitors’ experiences and affective states expressed through tweeting.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Tourism, Recreation and Sport Management, Eric Friedheim Tourism Institute, University of Florida, Florida, USA

    Svetlana Stepchenkova & Hany Kim

  2. Department of Earth System Science and Policy, John D. Odegard School of Aerospace Sciences, University of North Dakota, Grand Forks, USA

    Andrei Kirilenko

Authors
  1. Svetlana Stepchenkova
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  2. Andrei Kirilenko
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  3. Hany Kim
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Svetlana Stepchenkova .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. , Faculty of Communication Sciences, Università della Svizzera italiana, Via Giuseppe Buffi 13, Lugano, 6904, Switzerland

    Lorenzo Cantoni

  2. , College of Merchandising,, University of North Texas, Union Circle 1155, Denton, 76203-1100, Texas, USA

    Zheng (Phil) Xiang

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Stepchenkova, S., Kirilenko, A., Kim, H. (2013). Grassroots Branding with Twitter: Amazing Florida. In: Cantoni, L., Xiang, Z. (eds) Information and Communication Technologies in Tourism 2013. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-36309-2_13

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