Driving Destination-Based Brand Equity: The Role of Tourists’ Interaction in Social-Media Destination Brand Communities

Tourists increasingly rely on social-media destination brand communities to search for destination-related information, as well as share their memorable experiences with their like-minded peers. Although empirical research has examined the antecedents and consequences of tourists’participation in social-media destination brand communities, understanding of how the two-way interactions, namely tourist-tourist interaction (TTI) and marketer-tourist interaction (MTI), in driving tourists’ destination brand equity (DBE) is still limited. Highlighting the importance of this topical area, this chapter seeks to identify research gaps by providing an overview of research related to tourists’ interaction in social-media destination brand communities, followed by highlighting the contemporary issues and challenges in this area. A conceptual model is proposed to enhance the understanding of the importance of the synergistic effects of TTI and MTI in driving tourists’ perceptions of destination brands. A suggested methodology- including sample qualification and measures-is identified for empirically investigating the conceptual model.