Media and its effects on Tourism

The importance of media has now reached at a point when life cannot progress without it. Media has become increasingly important in different spheres of life. The media has the capability to turn on and clarify today’s values and civilizations of different countries. The media also contributes directly in activating different kinds of tourist attractions. It plays an important role in the growth development and promotion of tourism and helps to create a better awareness and the clear knowledge that caters to the requirements of the tourists. The main aim of the following research is to critically analyse the effect that media plays on the tourism and the aviation companies of the world. The report also aims to evaluate the different ethical, legal as well as the moral impacts of the media on tourism and aviation companies.   

The growth of the tourism industry especially helps to cater the needs of the aviation industry. The aviation industry has also undergone a sea change with the presence of large number of aviation companies and the introduction of super cheap flights to different destinations worldwide. The following report aims to highlight the worldwide media and tourism and also critically analyze the different factors that lead to the recent boom in both the industries as a result of media activities. The report will discuss the importance of media on the two different industries. The report has been constructed on the basis of an inclusive critical review on the subject and a number of books, journals and books have been referenced to get to the actual result.

The recent up rise in the tourism industry can be all but attributed to the media. The information is generally accessed using the following and education on the different attractions of tourism in the modern world is available generally through the internet and other social media sites which are considered to be the most important contemporary channels of modern media. Internet has been for a long time one of the major components of technology and travelling. The research on tourism and has revealed that in modern times media plays a great role in tourism as because most of the tour advertisements and information on tours are shared and transferred through the social networking sites. The use of the social networking sites are useful as because they help the tourism organizations to save money of costly advertisements and also reach out to a large number of people. The main benefits of media usage are the presentation of a greatly improved customer service, responding to a number of different customer needs, presenting the real world brands beyond the reach of the customers. The Information and Communication Agency of Sri Lanka (ICTA) which is a permanent entity of the government of the country has laid down laws and specifications for hardware as well as software to be used for interacting on the digital space. For example, the law mentions the ecommerce users should use reliable forms of ecommerce gadgets like smart phones of good brands.  The introduction of online bookings, e-tickets is being used frequently which makes media more important to the industry.

Media and its impact on Aviation

The media has the capability to play a crucial role in putting different kinds of tourist destinations into the Global tourist map. This social media advertisement helps to boost the local economy and transform the tourism sector. The travellers generally decide upon a particular place of visit by means of watching advertisement on promotions in different kinds of social media. Similarly the growth of aviation sector has also been linked heavily to the role of social media. The aviation companies operate different kinds of websites which helps them to promote their brands easily to the people. Study shows that the desire of the people to travel at cheap cost has led to the rise of the low cost Airlines (Lee, Lowry and Delconte 2015). The promotion and the branding of the low cost airlines estimated to challenge the premium airlines in the coming years.

The aviation industry is one of the most important industries of the world and media has a critical impact over its success. Most of the Western and some specific Asian airline companies have dominated the airspace of the world for a long time. A large number of different flights operate between different places every day and an estimated amount of 28 million flights and over 15 billion passengers. Most of the airline companies have started using different social media platforms to communicate with their customers and also to promote themselves. For example, they encourage customers to give feedback and share their flying experiences, even if negative. The aviation companies encourage their customers to express opinion about different aspects ranging right from the conduct of the on-board staff to the food served on-board. Similarly, aviation companies post pictures of pictures, videos as well as pieces of information on which the customers comment. These customers’ comment in turn form the basis of future strategies. Thus, it is evident from the discussion that media can directly affect the core strategic decisions in the aviation industry. Social media reveals many of the transformative opportunities within the social industry. The industry has been using different social networking sites to simplify the customer contacts and different customer responses. Presently, the entire world is evolving towards technological know-how with continuous improvements in ICTA developments in many industries. Airline/Aviation industry has driven a massive growth in all over the world due to ICTA development which has influenced recently. 

The tourism companies have grabbed this opportunity and have come up with different kinds of online activities to promote their brands and make them attractive to the tourists. Majority of the travellers are now booking hotels and other needs through online websites. The social media does provides the complete the new opportunity for interaction with the different kinds of potential customers (Mariani et al. 2014). For example, tourists now prefer availing planned travel packages which are available on the official websites of the tourism firms. The tourists also integrate allied products like travel insurance and forex services to gain more profitable deals. The marketing experts of the travelling agencies convince these potential customers to become clients.

Role of Internet

According to different kind of statistics, there are different types of aspects that has impacts on the ways of thinking much more than the mass media alone. The information and advices which are provided on a daily basis are mostly ignored. However, the mass media influences the people as it is accessible to a majority of the people. The mass media generally includes the likes of the internet media, television media, blogs, message, boards as well as different types of video. It can also include the likes of the journals and the magazines that re a source of print media. The majority of the social media travel and studies are done through the perspectives of the suppliers. On the other hand, the recent articles or media researches focus more on the perspective of the consumers. Therefore the difference in both can be apparently seen as because the choice of the media has shifted from the suppliers perspectives to the consumer’s perspective. This new choice has helped in the apparent growth of media in tourism.

The research on the following subject has led to a number of different conclusions which includes;

1. Consumers- or travelers-centric research: Recent articles published in top tourism journals tend to examine more consumers- or travelers-centric issues. This finding indicates that there is still ample room for research about suppliers’ perspective such as in communication, management, and market research.
2. Lack of theory development: The reviewed articles generally did not make a considerable effort to develop new theories or even apply relevant theories to explain focal phenomena in social media. In addition, several studies tended to be driven by data or methods or merely tried to connect constructs that were well established in other disciplines. Therefore, future studies need to put more effort in theory development or introducing new theories from other disciplines in order to build substantive knowledge accumulation in tourism.
3. Beyond information search: While past studies emphasized the important role of social media in information search in hospitality and tourism, recent studies seek out more diverse issues such as virtual destination behaviors, various social media uses, and eDestination marketing. Future studies can identify other considerable roles of social media in tourism or build a conceptual map integrating different research streams.
4. Fairly balanced quantitative and qualitative methods: Social media research in tourism surprisingly presented that more than 40% of articles used qualitative methods, which are often used for knowledge generation. However, there has been no attempt to apply mixed paradigm or mixed methods; therefore, future studies can employ mixed approaches.

The application of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) provides a secure data protection and privacy of individuals all across Europe. The address is made based on the export of personal data that are outside the EU and EEA areas (Cheng and Edwards 2015). Therefore, for United Kingdom, the application of the GDPR is an important regulation that needs to be followed while trying to provide effective guidance in terms of tourism in the aviation industry. As seen earlier, the impact of media on aviation industry is high mainly because of the transformative opportunities provided in the social industry. Therefore, it is necessary that laws and standards regulated by the Government be followed so that tourism industry can develop within the market.

According to Lee, Lowry and Delconte (2015), one of the applications of the GDPR is that data can be processed as well as understand the data that can be stored. The GDPR is legally binding in aviation and tourism centre as it is a regulation and not a directive. Therefore, the application of the GDPR can be considered as an effective manner in which provisions and principles related to the rights of data can be stored. The effectiveness of the media has ensured that a large number of flights can be regulated without having the fear of being legally accused of not following protocols (Mariani et al. 2015). The reason for the protection of data in the aviation industry is that it can maintain the privacy of the customers that commence business with the aviation organisations.

Relevant Themes related to media

In this regard an example can be given that may highlight the importance of the application of the GDPR. Due to the system of the data protection aviation industries have often managed to identify people that may have suffered a bad experience while travelling. This has helped the aviation organisations to understand the application of the GDPR and ensure that privacy of the customers take place. As stated by Nezakati et al. (2015) Article 25 of the data protection by design and by default provides a detailed analysis of the development of business processes and the manner in which every service provided by the aviation organisations can be protected.

At the same time it is seen that the impact of internet in the modern world has been high mainly due to the desire for the people to rely heavily on social media. One of the advantages that can be gained from the internet is that aviation industries can convince people to remain loyal to a particular airline. As pointed out by Yen and Teng (2015) censorship on the media reports provided in the internet also needs to be maintained for the public view. For example, any celebrities travelling by the aviation may wish to keep the information confidential. Hence, it is necessary that the internet maintains the privacy of the people by considering the ethical implications in the business.

Therefore it can be said that in order to continue with the effective marketing of the aviation industry it is necessary that such laws related to the development of customers as well as maintaining the standard rules set up by GDPR be imposed heavily.

Ethics is considered as important in any field mainly because it provides opportunities for development of policies and practises. According to Wong and Brooks (2015), without ethical considerations it can be difficult for organisations to continue with gaining acceptance in a society. However, in the case of aviation industries as well as media, it is necessary that the ethical considerations be maintained based on the analysis of the media as well as the analysis of the tourism industry. For example, the tourism companies have to ensure the consumers that their details would not be disclosed to any third party. One of the considerations that need to be made in the ethical issue is that every person irrespective of gender and race need to be allowed to avail the services provided by the tourism industry.

Legal Issues related to media and Tourism

Along with this, another consideration that needs to be made is the fact that private social media accounts need to be made based on the profile of the people. For example, personal life of the people needs to be maintained so that media interference can be reduced. As stated by Scott and Trimarchi (2017) for the media, this particular ethical conduct is important as the personal lives of the people are not a concern as long as no public disturbance is caused in the region of their existence. Based on this, it can be said that the recruitment of people in the tourism industry as well as the media industry need to be considered that can help in maintaining the effectiveness of the tourism industry in the market.

The recruitment of the people needs to be maintained in terms of ethical considerations such as race, colour as well as discrimination in terms of culture. As pointed out by Helmreich and Merritt (2017) the recruitment of the people needs to be made based on the effectiveness of the talents as well as the potential shown by the candidates. Every organisation need to understand the ethical factors that are required for the development of a proper society. Hence, in the words of Appana and Abbott (2016) the ethical considerations in the media and tourism industry need to be concerned with the development of the people and the privacy that is maintained for the development of the people. Therefore, the manner in which every people need to continue with the ethical considerations can be made as an important factor for the development of a society.

The development of ethics as well as legal issues can be considered as an effective factor for the progress of a society as well as organisations. In the case of the aviation industries, the social media need to be based on the ethical considerations in terms of privacy of information as well as identify the method of data protection. The media industry needs to understand the exposure it can create in a social environment so that effectiveness of the society can be determined.

Conclusion

The following report thus provides a clear idea of the role of media in the development of tourism activities. The thorough analysis of the report will help the readers to get a clear idea of different channels of media and their role in the development as well as their negative problems in social media. The role of the media in the development of tourism and aviation industry that has been provided here gives a clear overview of the two industries and establishes the importance of media channels especially the social media channels in the growth of networking and communication through the means of tourism and aviation.

References:

Appana, S. and Abbott, M., 2016. Unsteady Progress: Reform of the Aviation Industry in Fiji. Journal of Transport Economics and Policy (JTEP), 50(2), pp.189-204.

Cheng, M. and Edwards, D., 2015. Social media in tourism: a visual analytic approach. Current Issues in Tourism, 18(11), pp.1080-1087.

Helmreich, R.L. and Merritt, A.C., 2017. Culture at work in aviation and medicine: National, organizational and professional influences. Routledge.

Lee, M., Lowry, L.L. and Delconte, J.D., 2015. Social media in tourism research: A literature review.

Mariani, M.M., Buhalis, D., Longhi, C. and Vitouladiti, O., 2014. Managing change in tourism destinations: Key issues and current trends. Journal of Destination Marketing & Management, 2(4), pp.269-272.

Nezakati, H., Amidi, A., Jusoh, Y.Y., Moghadas, S., Aziz, Y.A. and Sohrabinezhadtalemi, R., 2015. Review of social media potential on knowledge sharing and collaboration in tourism industry. Procedia-social and behavioral sciences, 172, pp.120-125.

Scott, B.I. and Trimarchi, A., 2017. The Digital Aviation Industry: A Balancing Act Between Cybersecurity and European Consumer Protection. Air and Space Law, 42(4), pp.443-462.

Wong, S. and Brooks, N., 2015. Evolving risk-based security: A review of current issues and emerging trends impacting security screening in the aviation industry. Journal of Air Transport Management, 48, pp.60-64.

Yen, C.H. and Teng, H.Y., 2015. Celebrity involvement, perceived value, and behavioral intentions in popular media-induced tourism. Journal of Hospitality & Tourism Research, 39(2), pp.225-244.