Tourism as a growing force in a receding economy: The Oporto City case
Event Title
7th Annual Winter Global Business Conference
Year (definitive publication)
2019
Language
English
Country
France
More Information
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Abstract
The rising interest in the Tourism Industry and its economic impact is well documented in the increasing number of publications in news and scientific literature. In Portugal, the overall importance of the sector in the economy has driven several researchers to try and understand better tourism mechanisms and dynamics. Throughout the period of economic and financial crisis the country faced, marked by a strong recession in several economic sectors, tourism appeared to be an exception, growing at twice the rate of all the other sectors of the national economy. Such behaviour has also contributed to the recovery of other European economies. To keep the growth rate and maintain Portugal as a first-choice destination, a thorough analysis of the factors influencing tourists' choices and their degree of satisfaction with the visit is required. In this work, a data-driven market segmentation analysis was applied to international tourists visiting the World Heritage City of Oporto based on 19 town characteristics: 6 related to infrastructures, 5 to local human and natural features, 5 to mobility and accessibility, 2 to signage and tourist information, and 2 to city cleanliness and safety. Data were collected via questionnaire using convenience sampling. A total of 1047 valid cases were obtained from international tourists visiting Oporto. A segmentation analysis allowed to identify distinct clusters associated with tourist’s demographic, socio-economic, and traveller profiles. The results provide relevant insights for tourism, stressing important factors to increase tourists’ odds of returning and recommending a given destination.
Acknowledgements
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Keywords
Keywords: World Heritage Tourism,Satisfaction-Based Segmentation,Data driven,Cluster Analysis