Internet tourism marketing: Potential and constraints

The Internet has increasingly become a popular medium for marketing. This paper attempted to investigate the potential of the Internet for tourism marketing and the current constraints on the full realisation of such potential. Through an examination of the advantages of the Internet as a marketing tool and the characteristics of the tourism industry, the paper found that the Internet was ideal for marketing tourism. It then analysed the main Internet applications in tourism marketing and explored the key factors that were attributable to the current low level of travel sales on the Internet. The paper concluded with a brief discussion of the major strategic issues in the implementation of Internet tourism marketing.