Destination Image Analysis for Tarragona Cultural Heritage

Abstract

The tourism consumer’s purchase decision process is, to a great extent, conditioned by the image that tourist has of the different destinations that make up his or her choice set. In a highly competitive international tourist market, those responsible for destinations’ promotion and development policies seek differentiation strategies so that they may position the destinations in the most suitable market segments, in order to improve their attractiveness and increase or consolidate the economic benefits that tourism activity generates in their destination. To this end, the main objective of this paper is to develop an empirical analysis of the factors that determine the image formation of Tarragona city. Our work is based on the use of structured and unstructured techniques to identify the factors that determine Tarragona’s tourist image. In addition to being able to ascertain Tarragona’s global tourist image, we consider that the heterogeneity of its visitors requires a more detailed study that enables us to segment a visitor typology. The results suggest the need to intensify the efforts of Tarragona’s tourism policy to improve the product design and destination promotion, to the aim of positioning the city as an important cultural heritage destination.