E-Tourism in Europe The E-CRM and ITCs adoption issues: how to retain customers?

LABIDI Myriam

Date de création :	01.06.2005
Date de dépôt :	28.06.2005
Niveau :	BAC + 5

E-Tourism in Europe

E-Tourism in

Europe

The E-CRM and ITCs adoption issues:

how to retain customers?

LABIDI Myriam

ESC Toulouse

Master in Marketing, Communication and Management

April 2005

Introduction

1!The General Context

1.1 Economic importance of the sector 1.2 Weight of the SMEs in the sector 1.3 Online Travel sales in Europe 1.4 Internet users profile

2! The Travel industry specific features and the Information and Communication Technologies impact

2.1 The Travel industry value chain.

2.2 Providing the overall travel experience

2.3 The impact of the Information and Communication technologies 2.4 Trends and challenges of the EU e-tourism market

3! The Internet features and its e-CRM benefits

3.1 The CRM definition and the Nykamp consulting group model 3.2 Internet features and its e-CRM benefits

3.2.1 Interactivity: the proactive e-consumer

3.2.2 Flexibility: getting a wide and updated range of information

3.2.3 Accessibility: everywhere and at any time improving service quality

4! E-marketing: decreasing customer uncertainty

4.1 An intangible product

4.2 A fragmented product

4.3 The e-customised offer

4.4 Electronic ticketing and ticketless travel

5! E-marketing: providing a reliable and useful customer database

.1 The marketing research perspective

.2 The Customer databases management practises .3 Market targeting

6! CONCLUSION

6.1 Focus on the SM Es: the tricky adoption of ICTs and E-business solutions 6.2 The perceived barriers to the adoption of e-CRM solutions

6.3 The step by step implementation of e-business methods

INTRODUCTION:

E-tourism offers the potential to make information and booking facilities available to large numbers of consumers at relatively low cost. It enables the tourism sector to make large-scale savings on the production and distribution of print and other traditional activities such as call centers and information centers. It also provides a tool for communication and relationship development with the end-consumers as well as tourism suppliers and market intermediaries.

Tourism can be viewed as very different from most other sectors of e-commerce as the consumer goes and collects the product at the point of production which is the destination. Consequently, the tourism avoids the need to deliver products around the world.

The factors described above result in the taking of a larger and larger share of e-commerce globally. As a result, the Internet can be considered as the last revolution in the distribution of tourism information and sales. Internet is even becoming the primary channel for business to business communication. It offers the suppliers the potential to by-pass intermediaries in the value chain and thus increases their revenue base. Consequently, new business models must be developed by travel and tourism companies in order to manage their relationships with intermediaries and final customers. It is obvious that the application of e-business methods in Customer Relations Management (e-CRM) provides such an opportunity.

E-CRM can be defined as the translation of existing techniques for finding customers in the electronic environment. It provides products and services customized to the needs of the customers. It helps to retain customers loyalty and attend the needs for information and support in the use of the tourism products. Many eCRM techniques are already employed by businesses using non-electronic methods. Intelligent agent technologies, the linking of call centers to web sites, and the use of data warehousing techniques to perform detailed analysis of customer needs are among the new opportunities offered by the Internet and other advanced ICTs.

E-CRM and ICTs adoption are key to the e-tourism growth. Considering the fierce market competition it is a competitive advantage and it must be seen as a new business model which enhance a customer centric culture within destination organization.

The aim of this paper is to deal with tthe issues related to the E-CRM and ICTs adoption in the e-tourism industry. In order to achieve that goal, we are going to examine the benefits of e-CRM, its potential and the barriers identified.