Persuasive Research on Ways Europe Could Improve the Use of the Main E-Tourism Platforms

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Persuasive Research on Ways Europe Could Improve the Use of the Main E-Tourism Platforms
Introduction
Information technologies have been instrumental in changing the way people plan for their travel and consequently influencing the trends in the tourism industry. According to Sara Ficarreli (49), the significant changes in the industry which are attributed to technology are evident in fields of commerce, promotional marketing, and consumer relations. The platforms presented by Web 2.0 such as Travel 2.0 provide companies operating in the industry with opportunities to improve and increase their interactions with users in a much-defined way (Ficarelli, 49). Europe is set to benefit tremendously from the integration of the World Wide Web into the tourism industry. This persuasive essay provides the reasons why Europe should adopt e-tourism and examine the ways through which the region could employ information technologies to improve the industry. To achieve this, the paper examines the different observations made by Sara Ficarreli in the article “Effects of web technologies on tourism industry in some Southern European Countries” and Maria Juul in the report "Tourism and the European Union: Recent trends and policy developments."
Comparison of the Two Articles
Hook: In the report "Tourism and the European Union: Recent trends and policy developments," Maria Juul observed that information technology provides the interactive center for players in the tourism industry to promote their products and services, consequently improving the sector.
Main Point 1:
Consumers of tourism are increasingly turning to digital technologies necessitating the need for players in the sector to shift their strategy of promotion to the Internet.
Analysis
Maria Juul (10) identified independent travel and digitalization as part of the critical trends that define the modern tourism industry. Tourism consumers, particularly the younger tourists prefer using digital technologies, especially social media platforms for the purpose of accessing travel products and services. The author observed that the Internet has greatly promoted independent travel and self-organized holidays by shifting “the balance of power from providers of tourism services to consumers” (12). A study carried out to establish the preferences of European tourism consumers found out that 67 per cent of the subjects surveyed used the digital platforms to organize for their holiday tours (Juul, 12). About 55 per cent of the participants utilized recommendations by relatives and colleagues as a source of information to plan for their travels (Juul, 12). In a nutshell, Europe should seek to improve its e-tourism industry to benefit from the growing market of mobile device and Internet users. The continual improvement of the Internet speed opens up more possibilities of mobile device use in accessing tourism services.
In the article “Effects of web technologies on tourism industry in some Southern European Countries,” Sara Ficarelli supported the need for tourism sector to incorporate information technology in various operations. The author highlighted the following;
Main Point 2:
The latest advancements of te...