Gyeongsang National University in Korea, and Jae-Ik Shin, Instructor, Department
of Business Administration, Gyeongsang National University in
Korea
The tourism industry is experiencing a tremendous growth with an everincreasing
pressure from a variety of types of competition. The change of
tourism market in Asia and the ever-increasing competitive nature of the
tourism industry require tourist destinations to develop an effective marketing
plan and strategy. This article identifies the relationship between destination
cues of Asian countries and Korean tourist images of destinations, the
differences of Korean tourist images on revisiting and recommend intention
for destinations, and the differences of demographic factors on destination
cues and Korean tourist images and revisiting/recommend intention for destinations.
According to the tourism view of World Tourism Organisation, in 2020, it
was forecast that by 2020 the number of international tourist arrivals to the
Asian world would reach 1.5 billion, with 4% growth in each five year period
between 1995 and 2020.
Tourism, as the business of attracting tourists and catering to their
needs, has rapidly grown into the world’s largest industry, surpassing autos,
steel, electronics, and agriculture (MacIntosh, Goeldner, and Ritchie, 1995).
In recent years tourism has become one of the fastest growing sectors of the
world economy and is widely recognised for its contribution to regional and
national economic development (Seddigh and Theocharous, 2002).
Travel agents have come under increasing pressure from a variety
of types of competition. Tour operators are increasingly trying to sell directly
to their end clients to cut out the profit margin of the travel agents. In
addition, the increasing availability of tourism information on the Internet,
coupled with direct booking and payment facilities, has been touted by some