GREAT ZIMBABWE UNIVERSITY

MUNHUMUTAPA SCHOOL OF COMMERCE

SCHOOL OF HOSPITALITY, TOURISM AND CULTURE

DIGITAL TOURISM MARKETING STRATEGIES, IMPACTS,

CHALLENGES
AND OPPORTUNITIES IN MASVINGO, ZIMBABWE

BY

BLESSING MAKUYANA

REGISTRATION NUMBER: M192023

This dissertation is submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements of the

Bachelor of Commerce in Hospitality, Tourism and Culture Honours Degree at
Great Zimbabwe University

Masvingo, Zimbabwe

NOVEMBER 2022
 APPROVAL FORM

The undersigned certify that he had supervised the student Blessing Makuyana (M192023) research
project entitled, ‘Digital tourism marketing strategies, impacts, challenges and opportunities in
Masvingo, Zimbabwe’ submitted in Partial fulfilment of the requirements of the Bachelor of Commerce
Honours Degree in Hospitality, Tourism and Culture at Great Zimbabwe University.

Supervisor Date Signed

…………………… ……………………

i
RELEASE FORM

Name of Student: Blessing Makuyana (M192023)

Project Title: Digital tourism marketing strategies, impacts, challenges and

opportunities in Masvingo, Zimbabwe.

Degree Title: Bachelor of Commerce Honours Degree in Hospitality, Tourism and

Culture

Year Degree Granted: 2019

Permission is hereby granted to the Great Zimbabwe University library to reproduce single copies of this
project and lend or sell such copies for private scholarly or scientific purposes only. The author does not
reserve other publication rights, and the project may not be extensively extracted, be printed or
otherwise reproduced without the authors’ permission.

Signed: …………………….
B. Makuyana (M192023)

Date Signed: ……/……/……

Permanent Address: House No. 4717, Rujeko B,

Masvingo, Zimbabwe

ii
 DECLARATION

I, Blessing Makuyana M192023 do hereby declare that the research project entitled, Digital tourism
marketing strategies, impacts, challenges and opportunities in Masvingo urban, is my original work and
has not been presented for examination in any other university. This research project has not been
submitted for assessment to another university or for any other qualification. This project may not be
reproduced without the prior authority of the author or Great Zimbabwe University.

SIGNATURE DATE SIGNED

………………………… ……......….……..……

iii
DEDICATION
This study is dedicated to my Mom who patiently bore the long period of loneliness and financial
struggles during the period of my study.

iv
 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I would like to acknowledge the support, guidance and assistance extended to me in carrying out this
study. First and foremost, I am very grateful to my supervisor Dr. Phanos Matura for his expert advice,
guidance, support and patience through-out this research journey. It was through his guidance and
mentorship prowess that this project was successfully completed. I also want to thank the heads of
tourism departments, and the local tourism organizations for giving me the permission to carry out this
research in their institutions. The co-operation I got from all the informants cannot go without
mentioning. Without them, data collection was bound to fail. Special thanks also goes to all the
hospitality, tourism and culture lecturers for cheering best wishes upon this research journey. I also
extend my gratitude to the lady who is behind all my shines and successes Stella Chirimadondo, Mom
you are the best not forgetting my brothers, Temptation, Kuziva, Hamid, Benevolent and my sister
Tatenda who stood by me and tolerated me when most of the quality family time was gobbled by
commitments along the winding journey of this study. Last but not least, I would like to thank Great
Zimbabwe University for sponsoring my studies.

Lord, I would have not sailed through without your providence!

v
 ABSTRACT

This study sought to explore digital tourism marketing strategies, impacts, challenges and opportunities in
Masvingo urban, Zimbabwe. The study adopted the interpretivist philosophy underpinned by a
descriptive qualitative research design. Face to face, interviews were held with ten (10) study participants
from both the public and private sectors of the tourism industry in Masvingo. The participants were
purposively selected from government ministries and department, information centre, lodges and hotels
in Masvingo urban. Data were thematically analysed. The study revealed that Facebook, Twitter,
WhatsApp, email were common digital tools and strategies used by tourism industry organisations and
they do have a positive impact on performance in Masvingo. Lack of ICT infrastructure, limited internet
coverage, and lack of knowledge are some of the challenges affecting the use of digital tourism marketing
in Masvingo. The study revealed that digital tourism marketing opportunities exist in several ways and
these can be exploited by players in the tourism industry. In conclusion, digital tourism marketing is
important and the study recommends the tourism industry players to intensify the adoption and use of
digital tourism marketing for the growth and development of the tourism industry in Masvingo,
Zimbabwe.

vi
TABLE OF CONTENTS

APPROVAL FORM............................................................................................................................................................i
DECLARATION.............................................................................................................................................................. iii
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS...............................................................................................................................................v
ABSTRACT......................................................................................................................................................................vi
LIST OF TABLES..............................................................................................................................................................x
LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS............................................................................................................................................xi
CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION TO THE STUDY...................................................................................................1
1.0 Introduction..................................................................................................................................... 1
1.2 Background of the Study..................................................................................................................1
1.3 Problem Statement..........................................................................................................................2
1.4 Main Purpose of the Study...............................................................................................................2
1.5 Research Questions.....................................................................................................................3
1.6 Research Objectives.........................................................................................................................3
1.7 Significance of the Study..................................................................................................................3
1.8 Methodology....................................................................................................................................4
1.9 Delimitation..................................................................................................................................... 4
1.10 Limitations..................................................................................................................................... 4
1.11 Definition of Terms........................................................................................................................ 4
1.11.1 Tourism................................................................................................................................... 4
1.11.2 Digital Marketing..................................................................................................................... 4
1.11.3 Digital tourism marketing........................................................................................................5
1.12 Organization of the Chapters.........................................................................................................5
1.12.1 Chapter One............................................................................................................................ 5
1.12.2 Chapter Two............................................................................................................................ 5
1.12.3 Chapter Three..........................................................................................................................5
1.12.4 Chapter Four........................................................................................................................... 5
1.12.5 Chapter Five............................................................................................................................ 6
1.13 Chapter Summary.......................................................................................................................... 6
CHAPTER TWO: LITERATURE REVIEW.....................................................................................................................7
2.1 Introduction..................................................................................................................................... 7
2.2 Digital marketing from global to regional level................................................................................7
2.3 Digital tourism marketing strategies................................................................................................9
2.3.1 Websites.................................................................................................................................. 10

vii
 2.3.2 Mobile travel applications...........................................................................................................10
2.4 Digital Marketing and Tourism.......................................................................................................11
2.5 Digital Tourism Marketing Channels..............................................................................................12
2.5.1 Social Media Marketing...........................................................................................................12
2.5.2 Messenger marketing..............................................................................................................14
2.5.3 Travel blogging........................................................................................................................ 14
2.5.4 Digital storytelling................................................................................................................... 15
2.5.6 Mobile marketing.................................................................................................................... 15
2.6 Digital Tourism Marketing Strategies.............................................................................................16
2.6.1 Social Media Marketing...........................................................................................................16
2.6.2 Search Engine Optimization.................................................................................................... 16
2.6.3 Content Marketing.................................................................................................................. 17
2.7 Importance of Digital Tourism Marketing......................................................................................18
2.8 Impacts of Digital Tourism Marketing............................................................................................19
2.9 Digital Tourism Marketing Challenges............................................................................................20
2.9.1 Other Challenges include;........................................................................................................... 22
2.10 Digital Tourism Marketing Opportunities.....................................................................................23
2.11 Chapter Summary........................................................................................................................ 23
CHAPTER THREE: METHODOLOGY........................................................................................................................25
3.0 Introduction................................................................................................................................... 25
3.1 Research Philosophy...................................................................................................................... 25
3.2 Research Design............................................................................................................................. 25
3.3 Research Approach........................................................................................................................ 26
3.4 Study Area......................................................................................................................................26
3.5 Study Population............................................................................................................................27
3.6 Sampling Frame............................................................................................................................. 27
3.7 Sampling........................................................................................................................................ 27
3.8 Sample Size.................................................................................................................................... 28
3.9 Data Collection Procedures............................................................................................................28
3.9.1 Research instruments..............................................................................................................28
3.9.1.1 Interviews.............................................................................................................................29
3.10 Data Analysis................................................................................................................................30
3.11 Validity and Reliability..................................................................................................................30
3.12 Ethical Considerations..................................................................................................................31

viii
 3.13 Chapter Summary........................................................................................................................ 33
CHAPTER FOUR: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSIONS...................................................................................................34
4.0 Introduction................................................................................................................................... 34
4.1 Demographic Information..............................................................................................................34
4.3 Chapter Summary.......................................................................................................................... 41
CHAPTER FIVE: SUMMARY, CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS........................................................42
5.0. Introduction.................................................................................................................................. 42
5.1. Restatement of objectives............................................................................................................ 42
5.2. Achievement of the research objectives.......................................................................................42
Digital tourism marketing strategies used in the tourism industry in Masvingo Urban.......................42
5.3 Conclusions.................................................................................................................................... 43
5.4 Recommendations......................................................................................................................... 44
APPENDICIES................................................................................................................................................................51
Appendix A: Ethical Clearance from Great Zimbabwe University........................................................51
Appendix B: Letter for seeking authority to conduct research to the local organizations...................52
Appendix C: Interview Guide............................................................................................................... 53

ix
 LIST OF TABLES

TABLE 1.0: Demographic characteristics of study respondents...........................................................41

TABLE 2.0: Impact of digital marketing strategies on the performance of tourism industry………...44

x
 LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

AR Augmented Reality

COVID-19 Coronavirus-2019

E-MAIL Electronic Mail

GISP Government Internet Service Provider

ICT Information and Communications Technology

ITU International Telecommunication Union

MECTH Ministry of Environment, Climate, Tourism and Hospitality

SMM Social Media Marketing

SEO Search Engine Optimization

TV Television

UNWTO United Nations World Tourism Organization

VR Virtual Reality

ZTA Zimbabwe Tourism Authority

xi
CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION TO THE STUDY

1.0 Introduction
This chapter introduces the study on digital tourism marketing, strategies, impacts, challenges and
opportunities in Masvingo urban. This chapter focuses on background of the study, statement of the
research problem, main purpose of the study, research questions, research objectives, significance of the
study, the research methodology, delimitation and limitations of the study, as well as definition of terms
and ends with the chapter summary.

1.2 Background of the Study

Digital tourism marketing plays an important role in driving the growth and development of the global
tourism industry. Digital tourism marketing which refers to; actions performed on online environments to
attract visitors to a specific place. Hotels, cities, countries, attractions and other places and places related
to leisure and business trips applying basic online strategies or specific techniques designed to increase
the number of visitors (Antevenio 2019). The world-over tourists are directly connected to information
that allows them to search and find the best deals, offering access to various sites, comparing
destinations, hotels or flights, but most notably the opportunity to get to know the views and experiences
of those in these destinations through different social networks or forums. Digital tourism marketing
allows travel agencies and hotels to advertise at a minimal cost and attract current and new customers by
promoting services and interacting with those who spend time online. This opportunity has led to
increased speeds in communications and services because the digital generation is eager to make
spontaneous decisions and make last minute reservations, which has led to the development of facilities
such as online booking applications and electronic check-in processes. (Soava, 2017).

Lately, much more tourism services suppliers understood that digital marketing strategies helps their
businesses to become visible, and subsequently, an advancement of social networks like Facebook,
Twitter, Google Plus came to the forefront (Gretzel 2018). However digital marketing tourism has
remained a challenge particularly in developing countries like Africa. Some governments developed
capacity building facilities and improved their network infrastructure as a way to extend and develop
their digital tourism marketing strategies. Digital tourism marketing has reached another level with the
emergence of social media. In the changing environment of the service industry, tourism seems to receive
the most attention from customers, stakeholders and other sectors through social media in Africa (Kim,
2017).

1
The accelerated use of digital tourism marketing strategies in Zimbabwe saw the designing of the national
portal ( www.zim.gov.zw ) which is hosted by the Zimbabwe Government Internet Service Provider
(GISP) whose experience in Internet services dates back to 1997 (Chaterera 2012). According to Maumbe
(2011), these developments came about as a result of growing pressure on the tourism sector to serve
citizens electronically following explosive growth in Internet usage and rapid development of electronic
commerce in the country since the 1990s. The government was therefore forced to implement
Information Communication and Technology based systems in several departments and ministries
(Maumbe 2011). Production of digital systems received a boost in Zimbabwe with the launch of the
electronic government programme in 2011. According to Chaterera (2014), this programme aimed at
enhancing access to and delivery of tourism and other services to benefit the citizens, while driving
towards effective governance and increased transparency and accountability.

Digital tourism marketing is an emerging and growing branch of marketing. In Zimbabwe, the current
research profile is not adequate in terms of articulating the digital tourism marketing strategies, impacts,
challenges and opportunities. In the absence of adequate information, the decisions and policies regarding
digital tourism marketing remain assumptions based and a product of guesswork and gut feeling. Given
the fact that businesses now operate in the digital environment, it is imperatively important for more
studies to be carried out to promote an in-depth understanding of this topical area. Therefore, this study
sought to examine the digital tourism marketing strategies, impacts, challenges and opportunities in
Masvingo urban, Zimbabwe. .

1.3 Problem Statement

Digital tourism marketing plays a significantly dominant role in the growth and development of the
tourism industry. However, there exist limited information on the digital tourism marketing strategies,
impacts, challenges and opportunities in Masvingo, Zimbabwe. This is probably caused by the fact that
researchers have paid less attention to the area given that it is relatively new. The other cause of
insufficient information is that there is overreliance on information from distant literature generated
outside Zimbabwe and even outside Africa. The lack of information results in poor and uninformed
decision making that is based on assumptions to the detriment of digital tourism marketing in Zimbabwe.
Given the importance of digital tourism marketing to the growth and development of the tourism industry
especially in the post COVID-19 era, it is important that decisions be made based on sound empirical
evidence. Therefore, this study examines digital tourism marketing strategies, impacts, challenges and
opportunities in Masvingo urban, Zimbabwe. .

2
1.4 Main Purpose of the Study
The purpose of this study was to examine digital tourism marketing strategies, impacts, challenges and
opportunities in Masvingo urban, Zimbabwe to foster an in-depth understanding of digital tourism
marketing for informed decision making for the growth and development of the tourism industry in
Zimbabwe.

1.5 Research Questions

 What digital tourism marketing strategies are being used in the tourism industry in Masvingo
urban?
 What has been the impact of digital tourism marketing strategies on the performance of the
tourism industry?
 What challenges are affecting the use of digital tourism marketing in Masvingo?
 Which digital tourism marketing opportunities can be exploited by tourism industry operators in
Masvingo urban?

1.6 Research Objectives

 To identify the digital tourism marketing strategies in Masvingo Urban, Zimbabwe
 To examine the impacts of digital tourism marketing in Masvingo urban
 To identify the challenges associated with digital tourism marketing in Masvingo urban.
 To identify the digital tourism marketing opportunities that can be exploited by the tourism
industry .

1.7 Significance of the Study

To the tourism industry

The study contributes digital tourism marketing intelligence regarding the strategies, impacts, challenges
and opportunities that may aid informed decision making for the growth and development of the tourism
industry in Zimbabwe.

To academia

The study contributes to literature on digital tourism marketing and may be used as a reference for future
studies.

To the government

The study addresses information gaps regarding digital tourism marketing and help in crafting and review
of policies that promote digital tourism marketing in Zimbabwe.

3
1.8 Methodology
1.9 Delimitation
This study focuses on digital tourism marketing strategies in Masvingo urban, Zimbabwe. Key issues
under spotlight include the strategies, which are being used in the tourism industry; impacts of tourism
strategies on the performance of tourism industry, challenges affecting the use of digital tourism
marketing, digital tourism opportunities that can be exploited by tourism operators; as well as
recommendations regarding an improvement on the use of digital tourism marketing in Masvingo urban.
The study was carried out in three months from September to November 2023

1.10 Limitations
In an effort to carry out this study, the researcher came across a lot of challenges. The researcher being a
student, one of the biggest challenges he faced was time. The time given was very limited in carrying out
the research. More so, ignorance by the respondents also imposed a threat. Some people are ignorant to
activities that seem not to benefit them, either emotionally, physically or financially. Fear of political
victimization by the respondents was also a challenge. Since the research involved some questions which
may involve the government, thus some people avoided interviews fearing to be investigated on their
political background leading to loss of potential information. Due to this challenge of fear, the solution
was to produce our ethical letter from the university with some information on how the data was going to
be kept.

1.11 Definition of Terms

1.11.1 Tourism
Tourism is defined as the social, cultural and economic phenomenon which entails the movement of
people to countries or places outside their usual environment for personal or business or professional
purposes (UNWTO, 2008). Mathieson and Wall (1982) also created a good working definition of tourism
as the temporary movement of people to destinations outside their normal places of work and residence,
the activities undertaken during their stay in those destinations, and the facilities created to cater to their
needs. Therefore, this study adopts the definition of tourism by Mathieson and Wall (1982), as it was the
most accepted by the international association of scientific experts in tourism.

1.11.2 Digital Marketing

Digital marketing refers to the utilization of electronic media by the marketers to promote products or
services into the market with the main objective of attracting customers, allowing them to interact with
the brand through digital media (Yasmin et al., 2015). Chaffey (2012) defines digital marketing as the
application of the Internet and similar digital technologies in conjunction with traditional
communications to achieve marketing objectives. Digital marketing is also referred to as marketing
4
online whether via websites, online adverts, emails, interactive television, or mobiles (Chaffey and Smith,
2008). Therefore, digital marketing can also be understood as the process of promoting and selling
products and services by leveraging the Internet tools and digital tourism marketing strategies, such as
SEO, Email marketing, social media marketing, radio and television advertisements and mobile
marketing. Thereby, this study adopted the definition of Chaffey and Smith where it is going to be
applied as one which is in support of the digital tourism marketing strategies.

1.11.3 Digital tourism marketing

Refers to the actions performed on online environments to attract visitors to a specific place. Hotels,
cities, countries, attractions and other places and places related to leisure and business trips applying
basic online strategies or specific techniques designed to increase the number of visitors (Antevenio
2019). Digital tourism marketing strategies have a very high potential impact in the tourism sector. In this
sector, digital marketing strategies should seek to arouse in the tourists’ desire to search more information
about the tourism destination as well as the experiences that this destination can provide to them, with the
main objective to inspire them to visit it. (Salvi, 2014).

1.12 Organization of the Chapters

1.12.1 Chapter One
This is an introductory chapter that covers the background of the study, statement of the problem,
purpose and objectives, research questions, methodology, delimitation and limitations of the study,
definition of key terms and chapter summary of the methodology to address the problem.

1.12.2 Chapter Two

The chapter covers the literature review. Literature was reviewed with the guidance of the research
objectives and questions. Possible knowledge gaps were identified to further put the study into focus

1.12.3 Chapter Three

This chapter looked at the research design and methodology. Key issues expounded included the research
philosophy, research approach and design, data collection instruments, population and sampling, data
collection analysis, validity and reliability of the study and ethical considerations as well as the chapter
summary.

1.12.4 Chapter Four

This chapter presented and analysed data gathered following the main themes rooted in the research
questions and objectives. The chapter also discusses and interprets the findings presented in the study.
Findings were also compared with those from other related empirical studies where a similar
phenomenon was investigated.
5
1.12.5 Chapter Five
This chapter provided the achievement of the research objectives, summarised and concluded the study
before making recommendations on digital tourism marketing strategies, impacts, challenges and
opportunities in Masvingo urban.

1.13 Chapter Summary

This chapter introduced and provided the background of this study. The chapter highlighted the fact that
the use of digital tourism marketing strategies in the conduct of business has led to high generation of
digital records that are presenting the strategies impacts, challenges and opportunities especially in
developing cities like Masvingo. The chapter outlined the purpose and objectives of the study, research
questions, methodological approach, delimitation and limitations of the study as well as definitions of key
terms. The chapter reserved extensive methodological explanations to Chapter Three. The chapter also
gave a snapshot of the structure of the dissertation showing five chapters, each covering a different
component. The next chapter presents the literature review.

6
 CHAPTER TWO: LITERATURE REVIEW

2.1 Introduction
This chapter reviews literature carried out by other researchers, on digital tourism marketing. The chapter
discusses digital tourism marketing strategies, their importance, impacts, challenges and opportunities as
well as other relevant sub-topics which support the literature for this study.

2.2 Digital marketing from global to regional level

The global population stood at 7.99 billion at the start of October 2022, and Global mobile users have
reached 5.48 billion. The world’s mobile user base has grown by 170 million in the year 2022
(Datareportal, 2022), with 68.6 percent of all the people on Earth now using some form of mobile phone.
Internet users increased by 3.5 percent in the year to October 2022, reaching 5.07 billion. 171 million
new users over the past 12 months have taken global Internet penetration to 63.5 percent. Social media
users grew by 190 million over the past year, to reach a total of 4.74 billion at the start of October 2022.
and social media users now equate to 59.3 percent of the world’s total population (Datareportal 2022).

From the above analysis, it is stated that the total number of internet users in the year 2022 is increasing
at a rapid rate globally. This means that the number of people who are using social media platforms is
increasing, therefore a cause for digital tourism marketing strategies growth and development globally
can be noticed over and over. There were 78.02 million internet users in Germany in January 2022.
Germany’s internet penetration rate stood at 93.0 percent of the total population at the start of 2022.
Analysis from other authors indicates that internet users in Germany decreased by 1.6 million (-2.0
percent) between 2021 and 2022 (Datareportal 2022).

There were 109.2 million internet users in Nigeria in January 2022. Nigeria’s internet penetration rate
stood at 51.0 percent of the total population at the start of 2022. Analysis some relevant sources indicated
that internet users in Nigeria increased by 4.8 million (+4.6 percent) between 2021 and 2022
(Datareportal 2022). There were 41.19 million internet users in South Africa in January 2022. South
Africa’s internet penetration rate stood at 68.2 percent of the total population at the start of 2022. Kepios
(2021) analysis indicated that internet users in South Africa increased by 494 thousand (+1.2 percent)
between 2021 and 2022. For perspective, these user figures revealed that 19.21 million people in South
Africa did not use the internet at the start of 2022, meaning that 31.8 percent of the population remained
offline at the beginning of the year.

There were 4.65 million internet users in Zimbabwe in January 2022. Zimbabwe’s internet penetration
rate stood at 30.6 percent of the total population at the start of 2022. Kepios (2021), analysis indicated
7
that internet users in Zimbabwe increased by 265 thousand (+6.0 percent) between 2021 and 2022. For
perspective, these user figures reveal that 10.56 million people in Zimbabwe did not use the internet at
the start of 2022, meaning that 69.4 percent of the population remained offline at the beginning of the
year (Datareportal 2022).

From the above statistics, the analysis sought by datareportal in the current year 2022 for the internet
users from global level to international to regional level clearly shows that Nigeria, one of the African
countries has the total population rounding to 109.2 million connected to the internet, followed by
Germany which has 78.02 million of the total population connected to the internet in 2022, followed by
South Africa with 41.19 million of the total population connected to the internet, and lastly Zimbabwe
with 4.65 million of the total population connected to the internet. It is also clear that the number of
people who are getting connected to the internet is decreasing at an increasing rate in Germany rather
than African countries just like Nigeria, South Africa and Zimbabwe, where the number of people
connecting to the internet is increasing at an increasing rate. This therefore means that Africa has many
people using digital marketing strategies in contrast to Germany. However, the way Zimbabwe is still
lagging behind regardless of the total population shows that there has to be an improvement on the
development of digital tourism marketing.

The key takeaway is that tourism operators need to be more purposeful, ensuring that their marketing
activities and content actively add value to their clients or audiences’ online experiences. In particular,
digital tourism marketers need to be more conscious of adding value when they use interruptive
advertising formats especially when it comes to the content that they add to people’s social media feeds.
On the one hand, the latest data reveals that roughly half of all working age internet users actively, visit
social platforms to learn about brands, and to research products and services that they are considering
buying. However, with people becoming more thoughtful about where and how they spend their online
time especially in social media, it’s essential that brands do not risk irritating their clients with irrelevant
content.

Moreso, with many tourism operators facing budget cuts due to the challenging economic outlook, it’s
never been more important for them to ensure their investments in media and content deliver tangible
value, both to the clients, and to the brand’s bottom line. The latest research from the International
Telecommunication Union (ITU) indicates that more than two-thirds of the world’s population will be
using the internet by the end of 2023. For clarity, this means that twice as many people will be online as
offline, resulting in internet users achieving supermajority status. However, the ongoing analysis suggests
that user growth will continue to slow over the coming years, especially after the surge in digital adoption
during the COVID-19 years. The latest available data suggest that global internet users grew by just 3.5
8
percent in the year to October 2022, equating to less than half a million new users each day. This
warrants an investigation into the digital tourism marketing in Zimbabwe.

2.3 Digital tourism marketing strategies

Digital marketing refers to the utilization of electronic media by the marketers to promote products or
services into the market with the main objective of attracting customers and allowing them to interact
with the brand through digital media (Yasmin et al., 2015). One of the important techniques in digital
marketing is social media marketing (Chaffey, 2011). Digital marketing is also referred to as marketing
online whether via websites, online adverts, opt-in emails, interactive kiosks, interactive TV or mobiles
(Chaffey and Smith, 2008). Mandal et al. (2016) defined digital marketing as promotion of brands using
all available forms of digital advertising media to reach the target segment.

For purposes of this study, digital marketing refers to promotion of products and services using digital
advertising media such as social media like Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram. Social media is a
digital marketing tool that is frequently used by tourists as a source of information as well as engagement
(Barcelos, 2019). Social media allows users to form virtual communities (Mariani et al., 2016) and plays
an important role in influencing decision making when people publicly share their travel experiences
(Magano, 2020). Social media is an active social platform with many potential customers (Leung, 2019).
The growth of social media has been triggered by people’s need for social connections and for
interpersonal interactions (Mkono, 2016). The ability for tourists to instantly share, follow, like, rate and
discuss various types of content helps to keep friends and family up to date about ongoing travel
experiences (Jansson, 2018). In addition, social media postings appeal to the emotional needs of potential
customers (Molina et al., 2020). Social activities such as real-time texting and video sharing facilitate
online social contact among people and peer-to-peer communication (Molina et al., 2020).

Digital tourism marketing strategies like social media also allows tourists to post online reviews of
destinations. Online reviews have gained popularity as an important source of information and an
influencer of consumer decision-making (Tran, 2020). The use of emoticons and graphic demonstrations
of facial expressions when reviewing destinations has become a common and convenient tool for online
customers to better express their ideas or feelings. More than eighty-five percent of travelers read online
reviews during their pre-trip stage (Huang et al., 2020). This means that the majority of customers rely on
the opinions of others to make their travel decisions. From a marketers’ perspective, social media is an
important communication and engagement platform (Mariani et al., 2016). For example, Facebook
enables businesses to create pages which potential customers can like in order for them to access and stay
up to date with new content as well as to directly interact with the business. This interaction feature
allows administrators to understand how customers engage with the business page (Perakakis et al.,
9
2016). Furthermore, administrators can host events, competitions and post stories, photos and videos
(Goodman, 2017) in order to promote discussions for the followers of the business page.

Digital technologies have revolutionized the rules of marketing (Magano, 2020) and transformed how
tourist destinations are promoted online. Careful selection of digital marketing tools enhances the
organizations’ marketing efforts and reduces marketing costs (Cranmer et al., 2020). With the tourism
industry being characterized by a different range of online channels, the challenge lies with tourism
marketers to be cognizant of how tourists access information (Moreno-Gil, 2017) and to find effective
marketing tools and strategies that contribute to the maximization of profits (Angeloni & Rossi, 2020).
Traditionally, the digital marketing landscape was simple; platforms were maintained by businesses with
an exclusive focus on commercial interest whereas now, new sites have evolved with different functions
(Bronner, 2016) such that the effective use of digital marketing tools hinges on understanding the digital
marketing tools within the tourism context. Magano (2020) supports the notion that understanding digital
marketing and harnessing the power of digital marketing tools is crucial to achieving success in the
tourism industry. Based on this, the following section will discuss digital marketing tools that are
employed in the tourism industry.

2.3.1 Websites
Websites are considered an organization’s place of business and the cornerstone of the organization’s
marketing actions occur on the Internet (Digiorgio, 2016). Websites are perceived as trustworthy and
credible digital sources of information when they have a high degree of institutional control over the
content posted. Website content should be target-oriented, relevant, and comprehensive and should be
updated regularly (Labanauskaitė et al., 2020). Websites aim to engage directly with customers by
maintaining communicative exchanges, thereby eliminating the middlemen (Bocci, 2019), and creating
customer loyalty towards the brand. Tourists use search engines in the early phase of the search in order
to obtain travel related information about destinations. Afterwards, tourists turn to the destinations’
websites (Angeloni & Rossi, 2020). Using search engine optimization, the use of search techniques such
as, using keywords to increase traffic-websites can gain better visibility and boost their sales (Digiorgio,
2016).

2.3.2 Mobile travel applications

The days of using paper maps and guidebooks are slowly becoming a thing of the past and being replaced
by interactive mobile applications (Zillinger, 2020). Although the potential of travel applications is yet to
be fully exploited (Labanauskaitė et al., 2020), trends show an increase in the use and downloading of
mobile applications for travel and tourism related reasons (Kabia, 2020). Travel applications provide
travelers with convenient, low-cost options and can come with many functions such as travel itinerary
10
generator, geo-tracking services, weather or climate forecasting, language translator, currency converter,
world clock time converter, location-based emergency services and service integration. Mobile travel
applications allow travelers to be spontaneous in their planning since they always have their smartphones
with them and tourists are finding it easier to plan holidays using the functions of travel apps. Current
usage trends show that mobile travel applications are an expanding niche developed with new and
improved features (Labanauskaitė et al., 2020). Trends show that current travel applications often have
in-application messages and push notifications. This in-app message allows marketers to reach out to the
user when they are physically using the application while the push notifications allow marketers to reach
out to the user when they are not physically using the app in order to attract them in.

2.4 Digital Marketing and Tourism

Digital marketing has been investigated by previous studies such as Chaffey (2011), Yasmin et al. (2015),
Waghmare (2012), and Lies (2019). Yasmin et al. (2015) conducted a research which on the effectiveness
of digital marketing in the challenging age. The study used correlation analysis and found that the
elements of digital marketing such as online marketing and social media marketing are highly positively
correlated to sales increase. Yasmin et al. (2015) highlighted that there are many advantages that digital
marketing can bring to customers which include; staying updated to products or services, greater
engagement, clear information about products and services, easy comparison with others, 24/7 shopping,
share content of the products or services, apparent pricing and enables instant purchase. According to
Yasmin et al. (2015), digital marketing has seven elements which are online advertising, e-mail
marketing, social media marketing, text messaging, affiliate marketing, search engine optimization and
pay per click.

Bang (2014) examined digital marketing by concentrating on digital marketing strategy with
manufacturing industries using a qualitative approach and found that small-medium sized companies
mostly use homepage as a digital channel. This study concentrates on digital marketing with tourism
particularly the tourist arrivals. In 2018, Bala did a critical review of digital marketing to identify current
and future trends in marketing for India. The study found that there is a radical change toward
digitalization whereby consumers are looking and searching more on the Internet to find best deals.
Furthermore, Bala and Verma (2018) argued that knowing which social media sites a company’s target
market utilizes is another key factor in guaranteeing that online marketing will be successful.

Digital statistics by Digital Odyssey (2019) show that one of the top digital marketing trends in Nigeria
for 2019 is 17million active mobile social users implying potential business opportunities to explore
customers with mobile marketing using mobile advertising since 50 percent of Nigeria’s population use
smartphones. Past studies have mentioned that mobile technology allows consumers to access hotel
11
websites in a variety of ways and through a variety of devices (Murphy et al., 2016). In addition,
Stringam and Gerdes (2019) emphasized on the need to improve load times to capture potential
customers who access hotel websites so that the time to load hotel websites is not long. In general, 80
percent of Africans use mobile phones to access the tourism organizations’ websites.

In Africa, Adeleye (2015) did research on social media marketing with a case of Africa by examining
challenges of social media marketing in Africa and proposed that marketers can utilize passive marketing
tools as sources of marketing intelligence and as active marketing tools meaning as platforms of
communication, promotion, brand awareness, consumer interaction and a feedback mechanism. Equally,
Begho (2019) mentioned that five digital marketing predictions for African brands in 2019 are creative
content, customer capital, integrated marketing and communications, user experience and block chain
technology. Pradhan et al. (2018) advocated that there is a need to conduct research to investigate the
opportunities created by digital marketing. Therefore, in view of the recommendations by Pradhan et al.
(2018), this study contributes to expanding literature on digital marketing by exploring digital marketing
in relation to tourism with a focus on strategies, challenges and opportunities for Zimbabwe

2.5 Digital Tourism Marketing Channels

By providing tourists with the means to buy several products and services on their own, the Internet now
functions as the intermediary role that was traditionally played by tourism operators and travel agencies.
As such, tourists have the ability to meaningfully participate in the digital world. The level of
digitalization of tourism products differs in different countries. Tourism destinations and businesses in
first world countries, for example, have the ability to capitalize on the new technological wave of
innovations for destination marketing at a rate that many tourism destinations and businesses in third
world countries would struggle to cope with (Li et al., 2017). Marketers should, therefore, constantly seek
to improve and optimize their online marketing efforts in order to stay relevant and competitive. To
achieve this, the next section discusses the digital marketing channels affecting tourism and offers views
on future trends.

2.5.1 Social Media Marketing

Before explaining the concept of social media marketing (SMM), it is important to consider and
understand the term ‘social media’. As proposed by Kaplan and Haenlein (2010), social media is based
on applications that are available on the Internet and allow developing, consuming and sharing User
Generated Content. These applications have created many opportunities for anyone to create personal
content, share it and exchange ideas in interactive frameworks that take different forms, from blogs,
microblogging, and general social networking websites. Also, from a general perspective, Filo et al.

12
(2015) explained the concept of ‘social media’ by focusing on its interactivity and co-creation of user-
generated content in the relationships established between organizations and individuals.

Social media marketing is now a well-established part of the marketing vocabulary in universities,
government agencies, non-profit organizations, and private profit-making organizations. The subject has
also received increasing scholarly attention (Mkono, 2016). Titles such as blogger, social media content
manager, digital communications manager and manager of social marketing can now be found in
consulting companies and it is likely that new job titles will emerge in the near future. The number of
social media sites and users keeps growing (Sönmez, 2017) such that digital marketing anchors around
social media (Okumus & Nusair, 2016). The adoption of social media sites by society has been growing
tremendously, with Facebook Inc. (Which comprises Facebook, WhatApp, Facebook Messenger and
Instagram) dominating the social media landscape (Matikiti et al., 2016). The use of social media in the
tourism industry has affected both the demand and supply sides of tourism marketing.

Marketers consider social media an effective marketing strategy with a global reach that is cheap, easy to
use and easy to create and update information on (Chen & Law, 2016). Many destinations have created
social media accounts (Jiménez-Barreto et al., 2020), in order to promote and market their tourism
destinations (Trunfio & Lucia, 2019) and to achieve a sustained competitive advantage (Mariani et al.,
2018). The posting and sharing of pictures and videos by customers, provides marketers with an insight
into what kinds of activities customers are taking part in. The younger generations have a notable
presence on social media, in terms of photo and video content sharing (Moreno-Gil, 2017) such that there
is a growing trend in providing photo opportunity spots at destinations which are benefitting destinations
(Singh, 2019).

Social media provides a platform for customer feedback (Leung et al., 2019) and allows for the
elimination of barriers such as time, location and media that might affect communications between
tourism destinations and customers. As alluded to earlier, social media promotes two-way
communication in marketing and provides tourism marketers an avenue through which to engage with
tourists in real-time. The majority of Destination Management Organizations in Europe have official
representation on social media with accounts on Facebook, Twitter and YouTube and Instagram (Uşaklı
et al., 2017), supporting the notion that social media marketing can be performed through different
platforms. In employing social media strategies, a destination’s brand must be perceived as credible
(Jiménez-Barreto et al., 2020).

For customers, social media is a crucial source of information that affects consumers’ decision-making
processes (Leung et al., 2019). With the growing trend of travelers now using social media for

13
accommodation and itinerary related decisions (Singh, 2019), it has been found that tourists prefer to find
more focused travel-related information when searching for travel information (Gunter, 2020). In as
much as social media is a popular source of information, tourists are often faced with the problem of
navigating through piles of information and not being able to locate desired information. The future is
likely to see the increasing usage of hashtags since the use of hashtags makes social media a better source
of information, over other digital marketing tools, as it enables the effective filtering of content. This
makes information searching easier because of high content visibility. Hashtags are used to identify a
discussion topic or a point of interest and to track the conversation about it (Buhalis, 2019). A literature
review shows that the use of social media in marketing is likely to continue increasing, with the next
decade likely to witness a considerable rise in specific social media marketing trends such as messenger
marketing, travel blogging and digital storytelling as discussed below;

2.5.2 Messenger marketing

The increasing popularity of Facebook and WhatsApp has resulted in a tremendous usage of the
messenger, a communication function for both Facebook and WhatsApp. Facebook and WhatsApp have
evolved from merely communication tools to persuasive business marketing tools. With WhatsApp and
Facebook virtually always in the customers’ pockets, messenger marketing is likely to be appreciated by
tourists. Facebook, as the largest community and interactive social media platform (Trunfio & Lucia,
2019), provides organizations with a strong media presence hence Facebook’s popularity makes it an
attractive marketing platform (Lucia, 2019). Through Facebook, businesses can send private messages
directly to their customers and marketers can create and send content links of videos, texts and audio.

2.5.3 Travel blogging

Within the next few years, travel blogging is likely to play a more influential role in customers’ travel
decision making. This is because travel blogging covers all the stages of tourists’ travel decision making:
pre-trip, information search, purchase or consumption and post- consumption or evaluation of
experiences. During pre-purchase, travelers search for travel-related information (Diaz, 2019) such as
which destinations to go to, attractions to visit, activities to do, access to travel tips, weather reports,
exchange rates and up to date prices. As travelers seek travel advice and special offers, travel bloggers
post messages such as travel news, last-minute deals or special offers. Hence blogging assists travelers
with preparing for their journeys (Díaz-Meneses, 2019).

Travelers are likely to continue viewing and making use of travel blogs because the availability of travel
information makes tourists more informed about traveling. Potential travelers are increasingly placing
their faith in travel bloggers for recommendations as they rely on the personal experience of bloggers to
help guide their own decision making. Marketers therefore invest in online personalities commonly
14
referred to as influencers with large numbers of followers across one or more social media platforms in
order to influence their followers through content sharing/blogging. These influencers promote tourism
destinations and businesses to their followers and the organization’s target consumers through the content
they share on their personal social media platforms. An example of this is the Tuscany DMO, which held
a blog tour where bloggers, photographers, and video professionals were invited to participate in themed
itineraries and to then blog about their travel experiences to share it with their followers (Mariani et al.,
2016).

2.5.4 Digital storytelling

The addition of digital storytelling in travel blogs (telling of personal stories using digital forms through
audio and graphic visualization), attracts and encourages travelers to visit tourism destinations (Kim &
Hall, 2020). Digital storytelling allows for the visualization of tourism experiences through audio clips,
photos and videos and in so doing, provides concrete evidence of the experiences (An et al., 2020).
Digital storytelling stimulates a desire to travel by engaging with the imagination, anticipation and
prolonging the experience for tourists. It is almost a certainty that using influencers as travel bloggers
combined with digital storytelling, will only gain more popularity as tourism digital marketers evolve to
become modern digital storytellers that can capture the attention of future travelers.

2.5.6 Mobile marketing

Smartphones have evolved from being a means of communicating to increased sophistication and
functionalities (Dickinson, 2016). With smartphones, customers can decide when, where and what to
view (Chen, 2016). Smartphones have transformed customers from being passive receivers of
information to active retrievers. Smartphones allow users to purchase products, obtain travel itineraries,
share their experiences and access mobile banking from anywhere in the world and at any time. Travelers
use travel applications to enhance their travel experiences. A growing trend has been the development of
travel applications that are compatible with smartphones and that have features and functions that
enhance customers’ experiences (Chen et al., 2016). Travel applications can thus assist tourism marketers
to better position their tourism companies and destinations. As the use of smartphones is continuously
increasing (Kabia, 2020), mobile marketing will only gain importance in the years to come. This is
because mobile marketing takes advantage of customers’ most prolific touch points, the Internet and
smartphones. An emerging mobile marketing trend has been the use of emails and email signatures to
market and promote services. More people are viewing their emails on mobile phones and this increases
the probability of any marketing information sent reaching its intended targets. E-mails are used to create
a buzz around a product or a service. Tourism marketers send emails or newsletters to customers in their

15
database about the organization’s latest offers, special deals, holiday packages, membership clubs and
room availability.

Communication via emails is a simple, economic and fast way to build loyal relationships with tourists
(Digiorgio, 2016), such that emails remain an effective way of engaging and communicating with
customers from the early stages of the consumer decision making journey to after the conclusion of the
journey. Transactional emails can also be sent to tourists whilst they are waiting for their trip in order to
keep them updated about the status of their bookings. Moreover, after a journey has been concluded,
emails can be used to sustain a relationship with a customer (Digiorgio, 2016). The marketing strategy
provides customers with an option to opt-in or opt-out from the mailing list should they feel the emails
are too much or of no use to them. The last decade has seen renewed emphasis placed upon protecting the
environment. As consumers are increasingly being made aware of sustainable practices, the prospects of
sending emails can easily attract environmentally conscious customers since no paper is wasted in the
process. Moreover, marketers are providing consumers with options for optimizing their viewing
experience to mobile viewing or desktop viewing. Consequently, tourists can access travel marketing
information on the go and from the palm of their hand (Chen et al., 2016).

2.6 Digital Tourism Marketing Strategies

There are numerous types of digital marketing strategies however, in this context only the major ones are
highlighted;

2.6.1 Social Media Marketing

The term 'social' refers to relating or involving activities in which people spend time talking to each other
or doing enjoyable things with each other. Being social requires interaction between parties within a
community. Merriam Webster (2015) defines 'media' as a particular form or system or medium of
cultivation, conveyance or expression. It can be articulated that social media is an electronic
communication platform established to support interaction and information sharing between individuals
of a community. Walker (2010) defines social media as what we use in our daily life to communicate
with others for instance; Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, YouTube amongst others. In these networks
businesses seek a customer type and pay attention to them to promote their product.

2.6.2 Search Engine Optimization

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is defined by Cho (2010) as the use of methods to allow an increased
website traffic by using the suitable keywords in the content of a company's website to appear on top of
the search results page when a search of a certain topic is made. Chaffey et al (2006) stipulated that SEO
is a structured approach to increase the position of a company or its products in search engine natural or

16
organic results listings for selected keywords or phrases. On the other hand, Bang and Roos (2014)
pointed out that SEO is a set of techniques aimed at improving the ranking of a website in search engine
listings thereby making it more likely that the end user will visit the site. It is also defined as the process
of identifying factors in a webpage which would impact search engine accessibility to it and fine tuning
many elements of a website so it can achieve the highest possible visibility when a search engine
responds to a relevant query (Dimitroff, 2005).

2.6.3 Content Marketing

Current Market Institute (2017) defines content marketing as a practice of producing personalized
valuable content to an interactive, engaged and targeted audience. According to Kaplan and Haenlein
(2010) content marketing is a marketing and business process for creating and distributing valuable and
compelling content to attract, acquire, and engage a clearly defined and understood target audience with
the objective of profitable customer action. The authors suggest that the content has to offer information
in line with the organization’s goals, in this case the Destination Management Organizations’ goals.
Rowley (2008) states that content marketing interacts more with audiences than any other marketing
strategies by mostly using two-way communication. Lies (2019) points out that when content marketing
is being used, digital communities and media networks are well-organized and help consumers to
interrelate and engage with the delivered content. Content marketing is the management of text, rich
media, audio and video content aimed at engaging customers and prospects to meet business goals. It is
published through print and digital media including web and mobile platforms and is also repurposed and
syndicated to different forms of web presence such as publisher sites, blogs, social media and comparison
sites (Chaffey & Chadwick, 2016)
2.6.4 Email marketing

Email marketing is when the company promotes products to a known database of existing and probable
customers via email (Adeleye, 2015). According to Nguyen and Wang (2011) email marketing is
developing into an important part of online marketing and it has turned into an acknowledged method of
communication for both customers and companies. Nguyen and Wang (2011) further stipulate that email
marketing offers more practical benefits as compared to direct mail and these are the ability to send more
emails to better targeted and more audience at lower costs hence the National Tourism Organizations
reaching more traffic. It also can keep in touch with visitors by sending reminders and feeds for new
promotions as well as giving a platform for a two-way conversation between the customer and National
Tourism Organizations thus allowing feedback from users. This allows customized or personalized
service which is very crucial in tourism.

17
2.7 Importance of Digital Tourism Marketing
The World Tourism Organization (2014) highlighted how digital marketing has revolutionized the
tourism and the hospitality industry. E-mail marketing, websites, blogs, social networks, together with
mobile applications and online booking platforms are important digital marketing tools for the tourism
and hospitality industry. Digital marketing plays an important role in the tourism sector because
consumers first search on the destination and visit company websites before they make a choice to visit
the destination. According to Veller and Kester (2008) the benefits of digital marketing are varying as a
flourishing marketing strategy as it can benefit both consumer and company interests.

Chaffey and Chadwick (2016) alluded that digital marketing provides added channels by which
consumers can access information and make purchases. The ubiquitous characteristic of the various
digital marketing platforms allows tourists to gather information anytime and anywhere.The adoption of
digital marketing promotes interaction between the organization and the potential customers. According
to Veller and Kester (2008) digital marketing is interactive hence a two-way interaction between
customers and companies or between customers and likeminded customers is developed. These
interactions can help customers find the information, products or services they desire. According to
Chaffey (2016) technology plays a more facilitative role in purchasing and communication due to the fact
that customized relationships tend to be of greater importance when negotiating sales than remotely
transacted arrangements. In addition, social networks play an increasingly important role in linking
together both consumers and potential business partners.

Through digital marketing, organizations can engage with customers and form customer databases as
stipulated by Vella and Kester (2008). Customer database is important when an organization is carrying
out promotional activities and events to strengthen brand loyalty. Tourists need to be constantly reminded
of the new products and changes in the industry and this can be achieved through sending alerts to
consumers at regular intervals throughout the year. However, the down side of this is that customers may
change contacts, provide false information or avoid giving out information all together. Chaffey and
Chadwick (2016) argue that the Internet can be useful in penetrating the market by selling existing
products in existing markets.

Digital marketing has also proven to be cost effective as stipulated by Veller and Kester (2008). The
authors alluded that flexibility, product availability, prices and promotions can also be adjusted daily or
even hourly according to shifting market conditions. Chaffey and Chadwick (2016) on the other hand
highlighted that new geographical markets can be penetrated, taking advantage of the low costs of
advertising online, internationally without the need to invest in infrastructure in other countries.

18
In addition, digital marketing has a wide audience reach globally, with no geographic barriers and time
zone constraints which is beneficial to National Tourism Organizations because it allows organizations to
easily reach out and target profitable niche segments (Ryan, 2019). This holds true because tourism is a
phenomenon which has only been popular in developing countries in the recent years of technological
development. The advent of digitalization has seen under developing countries like Zimbabwe, Rwanda,
Zambia and Kenya experiencing a rise in tourist arrivals due to digital marketing initiatives.

2.8 Impacts of Digital Tourism Marketing

The digital revolution has a profound impact on tourism in the European Union. While in the past many
customers booked their trips in high-street travel agencies, nowadays they tend to plan and book trips on
their own through online travel agencies or search and meta-search engines, and are making increasing
use of mobile technology and apps. Digital technologies have also provided people an opportunity to
share their travel experiences through personal exchanges on social media platforms, travel blogs or
through commercial channels such as TripAdvisor. Social media platforms have been particularly
influential in shaping younger people's tourism-related decisions. Furthermore, real-time software is
making it easier for tourists to travel to places whose language they do not speak.

Most establishments serving tourists have understood the need to use digital technologies. The majority
of tourism businesses have access to the Internet and have a website or a homepage. As in 2015, 99 % of
businesses in the European Union tourist accommodation sector had access to the Internet, 95 % had a
website or a homepage, and 74 % provided online reservation or booking options. Many undertakings
serving tourist needs also offer various online and automated services. Most airports, in major European
cities in particular, nowadays offer online check-in, self-check-in kiosks and mobile boarding passes.
Automation and robots are also used in the hospitality sector, for instance, to allow guests to check in, to
answer customers' questions, to offer information on local attractions, weather or flights, or to offer
virtual tours of a hotel. Some restaurants even use robots to serve food. Others have replaced their paper
menus with tablets. Several museums in Europe use virtual or augmented reality to attract more visitors.
For instance, the International Centre for Cave Art in south-west France recreates precisely the
atmosphere of the Lascaux caves' interior and paintings. The center also offers a 3D animated film which
allows us to revisit past climate cycles and their consequences for people and animals.The tourism sector
has also started using driverless vehicles. For example, the Caves of Han in Belgium launched a pilot
project in September 2018 to transport visitors from the car-park to the entrance of the caves with a
driverless shuttle bus.

In digital marketing results can be followed and monitored easily with the help of various tracking
software. Rather than leading costly client research, organizations can rapidly see client reaction rates and
19
measure the achievement of their promoting effort continuously, empowering them to design all the
more adequately for the following one (Chandini, 2020). Due to the Internet consumers can do various
activities like going to the company's website, reading the information, buying products, among others.
This has increased consumer's engagement and improved their experience.

Many different companies promote their product through digital marketing, so it becomes convenient to
compare products of the different companies for the consumer. They do not need to visit various retail
stores to compare products (Yasmin, 2015).However, competitors can easily copy the digital marketing
campaign of others. Brand names or logos can be utilized to swindle customers (Todor, 2016). And also
if the Internet connection is slow or there is some problem with websites, then websites may take too
much time to open and the customer will not wait much and leave.

2.9 Digital Tourism Marketing Challenges

While the digital marketing revolution has brought some conveniences to tourists as well as travel and
tourism businesses, it has also offered them challenges, in particular with the emergence of the
collaborative economy also referred to as the sharing, shared, peer or access economy. A growing number
of individuals are proposing to temporarily share with tourists what they own for example, their house or
car or what they do for example, dining or excursions via online platforms. This growth has been most
notable in the accommodation and transport sector, but has also affected other areas such as excursions
and meals. Home-sharing platforms are now significant competitors to the hotel industry, and car-sharing
platforms to taxis. However, concerns have been raised over the quality and regulation of these online
platforms. Some European Union countries have tried to regulate or ban them, while others are still
thinking on how to best respond to these recent trends.

Findings from the literature review have managerial implications for tourism organizations and marketing
personnel that are considering applying digital marketing strategies into practice in their marketing
campaigns. Understanding how digital marketing tools operate and influence operations is a crucial
starting point for managing marketing strategies since it assists local, provincial and national
policymakers in designing policy intervention strategies.

Firstly, there is a need to control the media content. Due to the significant marketing opportunities
offered by digital technologies, tourism marketers should seek to rise to the challenge of establishing
maturity in their online activities (Stokłosa & Cantoni, 2019), in order to increase their brand stature
(Stokłosa et al., 2019) and satisfy customers by formulating effective marketing strategies. Tourism
experts and organizations may need to consider how they can control message content, frequency and
timing and who is able to release content as this will help create and maintain corporate brand awareness.

20
Secondly, tourism marketers can use much more data in content creation. Most content created by
marketers and consumed online by travelers will have been made with the purpose of either creating
awareness or encouraging the customers to purchase, sign up or learn more about the product. Big data
provides organisations with crucial information to better understand their current and potential customers
(Haneef, 2017) therefore making use of big data would enable the creation of relevant and valuable
content that can attract and retain customers. Additionally, tourism marketers can focus on aligning their
marketing strategies with their tourists’ aspirations by developing, optimising and customising their
digital platforms according to the needs of the tourists in line with the objectives of the organisation.

Thirdly, the need to expand digital marketing tools. Since destination marketers intend to attract tourists
to their destinations, information dissemination is an important part of tourism development. Marketers
can adapt and expand on the use of digital marketing tools that provide on-the-go connections, video
conferencing and instant messaging, in order to disseminate information to tourists quickly. For example,
Facebook has gained popularity because of its creative communication and its ability to incorporate
images, texts, videos, games, live videos among others, whilst Instagram is popular for its photographic
content (Jiménez-Barreto et al., 2020). Digital marketing tools are considered an effective facilitator that
can be used for better communication between tourists, tourism stakeholders and destination marketers.
The effective and innovative use of digital marketing tools within the tourism sector can aid in
destination development, awareness and revitalisation.

Fourthly, websites and pages may be overpopulated with content and information. The purpose of
promoting tourism products and services is for customers to be informed about what is offered by tourism
organisations so that customers can make appropriate decisions when purchasing the tourism products.
Tourism marketers can use digital marketing tools to increase customer engagement. Since, providing
information about all services and products offered by tourism businesses on their Facebook page can
overpopulate the profile page and make it clumsy, marketers can provide a website hyperlink on their
Facebook page. In addition, websites of organisations can have links to their social networking sites as
this would allow tourists to easily navigate across different platforms. Some digital marketing tools such
as chatbots can also work with other digital marketing tools like websites and social media in order to
fulfill customer needs for instant communication responses.

Fifth, the atmosphere of technological change. Constant changes in technology within the marketing
arena has provided strategic and tactical tools for tourism businesses to improve their competitiveness
and efficiency (Molina et al., 2020). The implication is that marketers should develop travel applications
around the organisation and or destination’s value proposition. The travel applications can also be

21
developed with social media links to allow for reviews, feedback and the option of commenting as a
strategy to boost the organisations’ ratings.

Sixth, network experience. The availability of the Internet has greatly impacted the way marketers reach
today’s tourists. Social media has a significant influence on customers’ social identification and the way
customers perceive service excellence, customer satisfaction and purchase intentions. Social media has
fostered the creation of online brand communities where people prefer to follow or be friends with people
like them. This implies that tourism marketers should ensure that their social media marketing strategies
allow customers to interact. A literature review thus suggests that the use of social media in tourism goes
beyond social networking and communication and can significantly benefit tourism businesses and
destinations to improve their competitiveness.

Last but not least, overpopulation in resources. AR and VR offer untapped potential for mass tourism
consumption through virtual visitations to actual tourism destinations which provides the opportunity to
access tourism for all, remotely. AR and VR show great promise to help in the protection of the
environment by easing the pressure from vulnerable destinations as a result of mass tourism (Li et al.,
2017). Policies can be developed in order to allow endangered tourist attractions to still be marketed and
enjoyed as virtual destinations.

2.9.1 Other Challenges include;

Problem of integrity. Digital marketing has been an essential theme of the profession (Clow & Baak,
2013). One of the challenges with digital marketing promotion is that they use several numbers of offline
and online advertising networks such as brochures, newspapers, press media as marketing frameworks.
Each item is used in isolation and accomplished as a different task not as an element of a combined
marketing campaign designed at creating awareness of definite purpose (Bostanshirin, 2014).

Lack of face-to-face contact. One of the key problems in e-tourism and digital marketing is the deficiency
of personnel. These difficulties have been criticized specifically in digital marketing competencies
(Goldsmith, 2002). Most consumers prefer face-to-face marketing which is known as personal
interaction. This is because consumers believe that they can talk to store personnel selling the product
one-on-one through personal contact and this will give them the opportunity to touch and feel the product
with their hands. Hence, this will build customer relationship management between the buyer and seller
(Kiang &Chi, 2001). They can touch and feel the products with their hand, because this act will build a
personal relationship between the buyer and the seller (Kiang & Chi, 2001).

Security & Privacy. In this ever-changing world, digital marketing needs information to be shared with
utmost privacy in the electronic world. It is very clear nowadays that customers’ top personal details are
22
shared with other companies without asking for their opinion or permission. In addition, other vital
personal data such as user names and passwords are easily hacked by Internet scammers (Lantos, 2011).

Lack of trust. Trust is defined as an online consumer perception of how a website would deliver
expectation, believable information and how confident the website commands its image (Bart et al, 2005)
the problem of insecurity is mostly derived from the absence of trust. Customers need trust to help them
eradicate challenges when consuming tourism products. This is why digital marketing expectation in
relation to trust is increasingly growing in tourism and hospitality study (Urban et al., 2009).

2.10 Digital Tourism Marketing Opportunities

Digital marketing is widely used as a means of marketing that promotes e-tourism products and services
to reach consumers using digital channels. However, marketers are continuously confronted with new
challenges and opportunities specifically in this digital era. Digital marketing has an empowering effect.
One of the prospects of digital marketing is related to special influence in enabling small businesses to
flourish on the Internet as it extends rapidly to reach large groups of audiences as well as efficiently reach
small and medium enterprises (SMEs) (Kshetri, 2004). In fact, online marketing creates a kind of
democratized environment in which marketing has been restructured in such a way that even small
businesses are given a good chance to promote their products on a larger scale (Tapp, 2008).

Digital marketing eliminates geographical impediments. Using digital marketing has the advantage of
reaching unlimited global audiences in practices of buying and selling, thereby eliminating the burdens
those geographical locations could impact in marketing medium reach (Sigala, 2008). Digital marketing
is available 24 hours/7 days. Thus, digital marketing furnishes the consumer with timely information
because it operates 24 hours in a day, and 7 days a week (Lane, 1996). There is no time limitation in
opening or closing time in digital marketing business, thereby overpowering the geographical obstacles.
Therefore, tourism and hospitality marketers can distribute products for different market segments with
no conditions (Mohammed, 2010). Digital tourism marketing is cost-effective. This means itt can be
deduced that compared with traditional marketing, which is the old-style way of advertising media
channels, digital marketing is very resourceful. Distribution of products and services via Internet is
evidently cost-effective and can accomplish its objectives at a very little cost (Poon& Jevons,2010).
Given all the above, this study contributes to literature by examining digital tourism marketing strategies,
challenges and opportunities for Zimbabwe.

2.11 Chapter Summary

This chapter was devoted to literature review. It pivoted on what literature review is and its importance in
research. The existing literature on key issues under the spotlight of this research were thematically

23
reviewed guided by the research objectives. This helped to further put this study into context and to
identify knowledge gaps that this study intended to bridge. It emerged from the literature that effective
adoption and use of digital tourism marketing strategies in the Masvingo urban is still a mammoth task.
Educational institutions and tourism stakeholders are yet to find lasting solutions to challenges like
technological obsolescence, lack of suitable and adequate infrastructure, skills, and standards among
others. The following chapter looks at research methodology, shedding light on how data was gathered.

24
CHAPTER THREE: METHODOLOGY

3.0 Introduction
This chapter focuses on how the study was actually carried out. Particularly this chapter presents the
research philosophy, research design and approach, study area, population sampling and data collection
instruments. It also presents data collection and data analysis procedures as well as the validity and
reliability of the study, plus ethical considerations and ends with the chapter summary.

3.1 Research Philosophy

Research philosophy refers to the development of knowledge adopted by the researchers in their research
(Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill, 2009). In other words, it is the theory that is used to direct the
researcher for conducting the procedure of research design, research strategy, questionnaire design and
sampling (Malhotra, 2009). It is very important to have a clear understanding of the research philosophy
so that the researcher could examine the assumptions about the way we view the world, which are
contained in the research philosophy we choose, knowing whether they are appropriate or not (Saunders,
2009). The philosophical underpinning of the study is interpretivism It is concerned with how the social
world is interpreted, understood, experienced, constituted, produced and applied ((Ngulube 2015; Denzin
and Lincoln 2000). The approach is inductive. It is based on methods of data generation that are both
flexible and sensitive to the social context in which data is produced (Mason 2002:3). This study is intent
on creating some facts from subjective evaluations, which are made by the subjects. Therefore,
interpretivism is the appropriate philosophy.

3.2 Research Design

Research design is a blueprint for empirical research, aimed at answering specific research questions
(Bhattacherjee 2012). It is the logical sequence that connects the empirical data to a study’s initial
research questions and ultimately to its conclusions (Yin 1994). Perry (2000) adds that it deals more with
the logic of the study than with the logistics and is a plan for moving from the research question to the
answer. The quality of any research project is enhanced by a good understanding of the research design
(Campbell,1998). According to Sauro (2015), common examples of research designs in qualitative
research include; ethnography, phenomenological, case study, narrative, grounded theory.

In this study, a case study to investigate digital tourism marketing strategies, impacts, challenges and
opportunities in Masvingo urban was used. Yin (1994), defines a case study as an empirical enquiry that
investigates a contemporary phenomenon within its real life context, especially when the boundaries
between phenomenon and context are not clearly evident enough. In case study research, cases can be

25
individuals, groups, organisations, movements, events or geographical units (Neuman 2003). Cases for
this study were tourism organisations that utilised digital tourism marketing strategies in Masvingo urban.

Descriptive Qualitative research design underpinned by a case study was found appropriate for this
research since it allows the researcher to use multiple sources of data in order to understand complex
social processes in their real world context and from the perspective of the participants. According to
Yilmaz (2013), qualitative research was defined as an emergent, inductive, interpretive and naturalistic
approach to the study of people, cases, phenomena, social situations and processes in their natural settings
in order to reveal in descriptive terms the meanings that people attach to their experiences. Whereas
descriptive research as a distinct process focuses on answering questions such as who, what, when,
where, and how of the topic under investigation, it usually describes the current situation or process
providers. Moreover, the purpose of this descriptive study is to demonstrate the digital tourism marketing
strategies, impacts, challenges and opportunities in Masvingo urban.

3.3 Research Approach

This study used the inductive approach. As Patton and Cochran (2002) would argue, an inductive
approach, which is qualitative in nature aims to answer questions about the what, how or why of a
phenomenon rather than how many or how much which are answered by quantitative methods. An
inductive approach was considered suffice for this study, which aimed at exploring a broader picture of
the digital tourism marketing strategies, impacts, challenges and opportunities in Masvingo urban. The
inductive approach was found appropriate for this research since it allows the researcher to use multiple
sources of data in order to understand complex social processes in their ‘real world context and from the
perspective of the participants (Yin 2009). Furthermore, it yields non-numerical data that provides depth
and detail through description of situations, and observing behaviours in order to generate patterns,
themes and ideas (Punch 1998). This explains why the researcher opted for this approach to explore in
detail the digital tourism marketing strategies, impacts, challenges and opportunities in Masvingo urban
Zimbabwe through the expressions of the operators involved in digital tourism marketing.

3.4 Study Area

The study focused on Masvingo Province as the study area. Masvingo is a province of Zimbabwe which
comprises the seven administrative districts, namely Masvingo, Gutu, Zaka, Bikita, Chiredzi, Mwenezi
and Chivi. Masvingo city, formally Fort Victoria, is the provincial capital and the oldest town in
Zimbabwe. The town serves as the administrative, commercial and industrial center for a rich mining and
industrial province. Also important to the city’s development is its nearness to the Great Zimbabwe ruins
or monuments which are a world heritage site of architecturally amazing stone walls from which the
country Zimbabwe (house of stones) derived its name. It is also near Lake Kyle or Mutirikwi, Kyle
26
recreational park and Mushandike national park and sanctuary which attract tourists from all walks of
life. It is one of the key tourist destinations in Zimbabwe.

3.5 Study Population

Parahoo (1997) defines population as the total number of units from which data can be collected such as
individuals, artefacts, events or organizations. Babbie (2004) defines it as the entire collection of entities
for inferences to be drawn from. It refers to all possible cases of what a researcher is interested in
studying (Kothari 2004). Welman (2005) added that it is a full set of cases from which a sample is taken
and is comprised of potential participants to whom the researcher wants to generalize the results of the
study. The targeted population for this study comprised all the tourism organization from the public and
private tourism sectors in Masvingo urban. These included government ministries, tourism parastatals,
publicity association, lodges and hotels. The diversity of population elements was deliberate to enhance
the validity of the study.

3.6 Sampling Frame

A sampling frame is a list of population elements from which a representative sample for the study is
drawn (Creswell, 2014) In this study, the researcher use the Zimbabwe Tourism Authority Facilities
database as the primary sampling frame from which study participants were drawn particularly with
respect to lodges and hotels in Masvingo urban.

3.7 Sampling
Sampling involves taking a representative selection of the population and using the data collected as
research information (Bobbie 2007). Trochim (2006) defines sampling as the process of selecting units
for example people or organizations from a population of interest. There are two standard categories of
sampling which are probability sampling and non-probability sampling. According to Bobbie (2007)
probability sampling is sometimes called random sampling. Probability sampling is a sampling procedure
or technique in which the subjects of the population get an equal opportunity to be selected as a
representative sample and this probability can be accurately determined (Surbhi 2016). The basis for
probability sampling is randomization or chance. Samples are more representative and have higher
external validity. Consequently, when a researcher needs to have a certain level of confidence in the data
collection, probability sampling should be used (MacNealy 1999). With probability sampling, the
samples can be rigorously analyzed to determine possible bias and likely error (Henry 1990). Examples
of probability sampling as outlined by Chaturvedi (2016) include; simple random sampling, systematic
random sampling, stratified random sampling, multi-stage sampling, multi-phase sampling and cluster
sampling.

27
On the other hand, non-probability sampling refers to any sampling method where some elements of the
population have no chance of selection or where the probability of selection cannot be accurately
determined (Chaturvedi 2016). Non-probability sampling is sometimes called non-random sampling. It
involves the selection of elements based on assumptions regarding the population of interest which forms
the criteria for selection (Chaturvedi 2016). The subjects of the population are chosen arbitrarily to
belong to the sample by the researcher. Non-probability sampling is useful for researchers to achieve
particular objectives of the research at hand because the sample knows the most or is the most typical
(Fink 1995). It is much applicable when the research is exploratory. Examples of non-probability
sampling as outlined by Chaturvedi (2016) include; convenient or opportunity, purposive or judgmental
or expert opinion sampling, quota sampling, snowball sampling and sequential sampling.

In this study, purposive sampling was employed to select study participants. Purposive sampling is
selecting a sample based on the researcher's knowledge of the population, its elements and the nature of
the research aims (Babbie, 1990). In purposive or judgmental sampling, the researchers choose the
sample based on who they think would be appropriate for the study. This is used primarily when there is
a limited number of people that have expertise in the area being researched (Chaturvedi, 2016). Purposive
sampling was deemed appropriate since not all people in the tourism industry are knowledgeable in
digital tourism marketing systems.

3.8 Sample Size

A sample size refers to the total individuals, units, objects or events that will be considered in a research
project. The study sample comprised thirteen (13) study participants from a diversity of tourism
organization from the public and private sectors Masvingo urban. On the list, three (3) were from central
government ministries and departments, eight (8) were from the local lodges and the other two (2) were
from city hotels. Out of the 13 study participants, three were provincial tourism managers and officers
from government and ten (10) were digital tourism marketing officers and managers from the lodges and
hotels in Masvingo urban, thereby making the sample size for this study be 13 participants.

3.9 Data Collection Procedures

During the data collection phase, the researcher started by making appointments for interviews with all
the 13 study participants in Masvingo urban. In the end, 10 study participants were interviewed right at
their offices and work places. Each interview lasted 20-30 minutes and an audio recorder, pen and paper
were used to captures the data live and avoid data loss. These study participants were seen as best suited
to shed light on digital tourism marketing strategies, impacts, challenges and opportunities in Masvingo
urban.

28
3.9.1 Research instruments
Data collection instruments allow researchers to systematically collect data about people, objects and
phenomena, and about the settings in which they occur (Elmusharaf 2012). According to Chaleunvong
(2009), if data is collected haphazardly, it will be difficult to answer the research question in a conclusive
way. As Marshall and Rossman (1999) observed, qualitative researchers usually rely on four methods for
collecting information, which are; in-depth interviewing, observation, participation and analyzing or
reviewing documents. Generally, speaking, an instrument is any device or procedure for systematically
collecting data. According to Lubart (2015), an instrument is any device for systematically collecting data
such as questionnaires or interviews. An instrument can also be viewed as a data collecting device that is
used by the researcher to collect data, analyses it and present the results recommendations. In this
research, an interview guide was used as an instrument to gather information on participants' views on
digital marketing strategies, impacts, challenges and opportunities in Masvingo urban.

3.9.1.1 Interviews
Amongst the several research instruments in qualitative data collection, interviews are regarded as one of
the widely used and powerful methods. Interviews enable the researchers to understand the participants
and explore their thoughts, experiences and feelings towards the issue under study (Bryman 2008).
According to Begum (2015), qualitative interviews are much more like conversations than formal events
with predetermined response categories. Manson (2002) also defines qualitative interviewing or semi-
structured interviewing as the interactional exchange of dialogue that may involve one-to-one
interactions, larger group interviews or focus groups and may take place face to face, or over the
telephone or the Internet. Face to face interviews were considered suitable for this current study because
peoples’ knowledge, views, understandings, interpretations, experiences and interactions are meaningful
properties of the reality it seeks to explore. Cohen (2006) argues that face to face interviews allow
informants the freedom to express their views in their own terms and they can provide reliable and
comparable qualitative data. Moreover, they have the highest response rate and permit the longest
questionnaire since the interviewer can ask all types of questions and can use extensive probes (Neuman
2000). According to Babbie (2010) probing is a technique involved in interviewing to solicit a more
complete answer to a question. It is a non-directive phrase or question used to encourage a respondent to
elaborate on an answer. In this regard, interviews are therefore a useful way to get large amounts of data
quickly (Begum 2015). Detailed information was needed in this study to explore digital tourism
marketing strategies, impacts, challenges and opportunities in Masvingo urban to address the objectives
and questions of this study outlined in Chapter One.

29
However, interviews have their own disadvantages. The major limitation with interviews is that
participants may give distorted responses due to personal bias, anger, anxiety, politics and simple lack of
awareness (Kothari 2004). In other words, interviewees may be unwilling or uncomfortable to share all
that the interviewer hopes to explore (Marshall and Rossman 1999). The appearance, tone, voice,
question wording and so forth of the interviewer may affect the interviewee. Neuman (2000) also argues
that high costs and time consuming are the biggest disadvantages of face to face interviews. However,
despite these limitations, interviews can go further to investigate motives, perceptions and feelings.
Moreover, interviews minimize some challenges like, low response rate, reporting error, completion by a
wrong person and lack of control over how the respondents interpret questions (Bernard 2000).

3.10 Data Analysis

Data analysis is considered to be the important step and heart of the research, because it transforms raw
data into information by arranging it in a certain format or a meaningful order (Tiwari 2013). Data
analysis involves creating categories, indexing or coding documents, sorting data to locate patterns,
describing patterns, generating theories from data and validating the theories (Blaikie 2010). In simpler
terms it refers to the procedures followed in interpreting and presenting data (Creswell 2009). It is a
process of bringing order, structure and meaning to the mass of collected data. Furthermore, data analysis
and interpretation are the most critical and essential supporting pillars of research (Tiwari 2013).
Qualitative data analysis is usually based on three stages; preparing and organizing data, coding the data
and presenting the data in the form of text, tables and figures (Adu 2015). Qualitative data analysis
methods include; comparative methods, discourse analysis, content analysis and narrative analysis. In this
research, data were manually processed and analyzed using thematic analysis.

Thematic analysis is probably the most prevalent approach to the qualitative analysis of documents and it
comprises a searching out of underlying themes in the materials being analyzed (Bryman 2004).
According to Miles and Huberman (1994), thematic analysis is a form of analysis that sharpens, sorts,
focuses, discards and organizes data in such a way that final conclusions can be drawn and verified. It
allows categories to emerge from data and recognizes the significance for understanding the meaning of
the context in which an item being analyzed and the categories derived from it appeared (Bryman 2004).
By using the category system, the aspects which are to be filtered from the material are defined. The
strength of thematic analysis is that the material is analyzed systematic (Bryman 2004). In line with
Creswell (2009)’s outline of stages followed in thematic analysis, the researcher; transcribed the data,
put together raw data, organized and prepared the data for analysis, read through all data, coded the data,

30
came up with themes, interpreted themes and drew conclusions from the themes guided by study
objectives as dominant themes.

3.11 Validity and Reliability

In qualitative research validity and reliability are often referred to as trustworthiness and credibility
(Creswell 2014). Positivists often question the trustworthiness of qualitative research, arguing that
validity and reliability cannot be addressed in the same way in naturalistic work (Shenton 2004).
However, writers like Silverman (2001) and Guba (1981) have demonstrated that qualitative research can
incorporate measures that deal with validity and reliability. According to Guba (1981) and Billups
(2014), rigor in qualitative research can be attained by considering four constructs of trustworthiness
which are; credibility, transferability, dependability and conformability.

Credibility is ensuring that the findings are believable, truthful and capture a holistic representation of the
phenomena under exploration (Billups 2014). In this study, credibility was attained through soliciting
data from different participants, that is, the tourism government personnel, digital tourism marketing
officers and the managers in the tourism sector.

The research instruments were pre-tested to detect flaws in data collection and to enable the researcher to
refine them as recommended by Yin (2009). Pre-testing ensures that data collected from respondents will
not give ambiguous statements, but can be relied on. In this study, the researcher sent to the supervisor
the first draft of the interview guide for review. The feedback and remarks from the supervisor offered
the researcher the opportunity to fine tune the research instrument so that it can yield credible data. After
that, interview questions were posed to officers at the Zimbabwe Tourism Authority department in a pilot
study. The pilot study gave the researcher insight into the need to explain technical terms, make clearer
some vague questions and remove repeated questions. According to Adu (2015), pre-testing is invaluable
for data collection instruments to pass the test of reliability, validity, consistency, dependability and
replicability of the data.

To minimize investigator bias, the researcher used a well prepared observation checklist with a list of
specific objects to be observed as recommended by Chaleunvong (2009). Interview biases due to mistrust
by the interviewees were reduced in the following ways as also recommended by Chaleunvong (2009);
adequately introducing the purpose of the study to the informants, phrasing questions on sensitive issues
in a positive way, taking sufficient time for the interviews and assuring informants that the data collected
will be confidential.

31
3.12 Ethical Considerations
As earlier on alluded to in Chapter One, research ethics encompass how research is conducted and
whether the researcher has acted responsibly in accordance with scientific norms (Coontz 2008).
Research ethics minimize the risk of abuse or making mistakes which are of real consequence to the
people under study. According to Creswell (2009), it is therefore important for researchers to protect their
participants, develop trust with them, promote the integrity of research, and guard against misconduct and
impropriety. Ethical considerations are very critical to avoid physical or emotional harm which according
to Chaleunvong (2009) can be caused by; violating informants’ right to privacy by posing sensitive
questions or gaining access to records which may contain personal data, observing the behavior of the
informants without their knowledge, allowing personal information to be made public which informants
would want to be kept private and failing to observe or respect certain cultural values and traditions or
taboos valued by the participants.

To deal with these issues, the researcher adhered to the values and principles expressed in the 2022 Great
Zimbabwe University Research Ethics principles and guidelines. The researcher sought permission in
writing to carry out the research to the tourism organizations, explaining clearly the research topic and
purpose of the study. The researcher also ensured that the rights of all participants were not violated by
obtaining informed consent from participants before the actual data collection exercise. The researcher
agreed with the participants on dates for data collection through appointments, and the interview schedule
was strictly followed. This is in line with the recommendation of Olsen (2012) and Yin (2009) who
argued that the basic ethical issues in social science research include issues of informed consent by
participants, the respect for their privacy and the safeguarding of the confidentiality of the data. As
elaborated by Matangira (2016), informed consent is a mechanism for ensuring that people understand
what it means to participate in a particular research study so that they can decide in a conscious and
deliberate way whether they want to participate.

The researcher established a good relationship with the informants to gain their trust. The ethical
clearance letter obtained from the university helped in this regard as well as regular visits to the tourism
organizations. According to Chaleunvong (2009), this is really critical if the research involves exploring
sensitive issues. Regularly visiting organizations gave the researcher an opportunity to learn some of their
organizational culture so as to better appreciate and understand their concerns and perspectives during the
actual data collection sessions. The researcher also made an effort to create a friendly atmosphere so that
respondents can feel at ease during interviews.

32
The researcher also ensured the confidentiality of the data collected. Participants were told that their
names were not going to be mentioned in the collected data. Furthermore, the studied organizations
respondents’ names were assigned alphabetical letters A to J to ensure anonymity. The information
gathered was treated confidentially and was solely used for academic research purposes. The researcher
also acknowledged the work of original authors by referencing appropriately. No preconceptions or prior
values shaped the results of this study. In addition, the results of the study were not falsified or
exaggerated.

3.13 Chapter Summary

This chapter covered the methodology of this study. The study moved with the qualitative approach in the
form of a case study design. The research used face-to-face interviews, as data collection instruments.
Interviews were carried out with ten respondents, comprised of the hotel managers, regional tourism
officers, as well as digital marketing officers. The chapter also looked at research ethics which are critical
to protect participants, develop trust with them, promote integrity of the research findings and guard
against misconduct and impropriety. The next chapter looks at analysis and presentation of research
findings.

33
CHAPTER FOUR: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSIONS

4.0 Introduction
This chapter presents a comprehensive presentation, analysis and interpretation of data gathered through
interviews on digital marketing strategies, impacts, challenges and opportunities in Masvingo urban. Data
gathered is presented following the main themes rooted in the research questions and objectives and
analysis follows every presentation. The chapter also focuses on the discussion of the research finding
linking it to the reviewed literature to draw contextual meaning for informed decision-making.

4.1 Response Rate

The researcher managed to carry out interviews with ten (10) study participants out of the 13 initially
targeted participants. This yielded a response rate of 77%, which is higher enough for the study to
provide valid results. The higher response rate is preferable in research.

4.1 Demographic Information

In this study, in terms of gender; six of the participants were female and four were male. This shows the
increasing role of women participation in the tourism sector, particularly in Masvingo urban. In terms of
experience, amongst all the participants the most experienced individual in the tourism industry had
twenty-four years of experience whilst the least experienced participant had only two years of experience.
Participants were experienced enough to provide useful information for the study, thus enhancing the
validity of study results. With regards to positions in the tourism industry, study participants occupied the
following positions in both the public and private tourism sectors; provincial tourism officer, tourism area
manager, lodges and hotel managers and marketing officers, thus showing a fairly wide representation of
players in the tourism industry of Masvingo urban. Finally, in terms of education, the most educated
participant had a Master’s Degree, whereas the least educated participant had a diploma; this means that
the study participants were educated enough to provide well considered and useful information for the
study.

Table 4.1 Demographic information of study participants.

ORGANISATIONAL
RESPONDENT DESIGNATION GENDER EXPERIENCE LOCATION
TYPE
A Regional ZTA Male 22 years Masvingo
Manager Urban

34
B Regional Tourism
MECTHI Female 13 years Masvingo
Officer
Urban

C Operations Information Center Male 2 years Masvingo

Officer Urban

Digital marketing
D Hotel Female 3 years Masvingo
Officer
Urban

E Marketing Lodge Female 13 years Masvingo

Manager Urban

F General Manager Lodge Female 12 years Masvingo

Urban

G Manager Lodge Female 11 years Masvingo

Urban

H Managing Lodge Male 24 years Masvingo

Director Urban

I Marketing officer Lodge Male 3 years Masvingo

Urban

J Manager Lodge Female 6 years Masvingo

Urban

Source: Author’s compilation 2022.

Digital Tourism Marketing in Masvingo Urban

4.2.1 Digital tourism marketing strategies used in the tourism industry in Masvingo urban.

To begin with, the results obtained from the following interview shows that tourism stakeholders in
Masvingo urban are attending to a few digital marketing strategies. The strategies include; Facebook,
WhatsApp, Instagram, Twitter, Internet websites, Search Engine Optimization, content marketing, mobile
marketing, Email marketing as well as video display marketing. Tourism industry players in Masvingo
urban seem to accord much and rely on social media platforms like, WhatsApp, Facebook, Twitter
handles, Instagram pages and YouTube, SEO, email marketing and mobile marketing in support of their
35
digital tourism marketing strategies. Digital tourism marketing strategies were concluded from the
responses captured from the participants;

"we use WhatsApp Platforms, Instagram Pages, Facebook Accounts, Twitter Handles"
(Respondent C)

"(i) Social Media Marketing- use of social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter
(ii)Search Engine Optimization (iii) Content Marketing (iv) Mobile Marketing (v) Email
Marketing (vi) Display and video marketing" (Respondent D)

As highlighted from the literature, these key terms used to refer to social network sites through which
travelers and destinations share multimedia content Facebook, Twitter, Google+ and YouTube, (Mair,
2013). These findings contradict with the finding by Chaffey et al (2006) who stipulated that SEO is a
structured approach to increase the position of a company or its products in search engine natural or
organic results listings for selected keywords or phrases. As quoted in the literature, ‘one of the important
techniques in digital marketing is social media marketing’ (Chaffey, 2011). This means, the strategies
mentioned by the respondents from the interviews are the most important ones since much of them
involve social media marketing, thus WhatsApp, Facebook, YouTube, Instagram and twitter.

The findings clarify that, social media tools like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and WhatsApp media
platforms are the most reputed digital tourism marketing strategies. These strategies are given so much
attention because they are user friendly, cheap, and easy to engage with, due to their interface features.

The researcher thought, it would be of a great development for Masvingo urban tourism industry players
if they use other digital tourism strategies which are more centralized that, everyone can have access to,
which are more specific to online reservations, for example the use of online booking applications such as
Booking.com, and TripAdvisor. The researcher’s opinion is supported by the literature on how important
these other digital marketing strategies are; World Tourism Organization (2014) highlighted how digital
marketing has revolutionized the tourism and the hospitality industry. E-mail marketing, websites, blogs,
social networks, together with mobile applications and online booking platforms are important digital
marketing tools for the tourism and hospitality industry.

4.2.2 Impact of digital tourism marketing strategies on the performance of the tourism industry.

From the following interviews, on a scale of 5/5 measuring performance, where 1 means limited or poor,
2 means minimal, 3 means relatively positive or okay, 4 means positive, 5 is highly positive or great. The
impact of digital tourism marketing strategies on the performance of the tourism industry has been proved
to be illustrated by the following table 2.

36
Respondents’ reaction on impacts
 PERFORMANC POOR MINIMAL OKAY POSITIVE GREAT
E 1 2 3 4 5

R1 
R2 
R3 
R4 
R5 
R6 
R7 
R8 
R9 
R10 
Table 2: Impact of digital marketing strategies on the performance of tourism industry
Source: Author’s compilation 2022.

According to the findings of this study, most respondents agreed that the impact of digital tourism
marketing on the performance of tourism industry has been positive since the tourism industry heavily
relies on ICT(s), therefore in everything that has anything to do with for example pre-bookings and
reservations nowadays can be simply done online, through the use of social media platforms such as
WhatsApp, Facebook, Text messages, Emails and other centralized online travel booking applications
such as Booking.com where tourists can access the available accommodation or airline seats online as
well as other information about their travel online. From the results, some informants supported that the
impact of digital tourism marketing on the performance of the tourism industry is highly positive,
whereas the other respondents debuted that the impact of digital tourism marketing to the performance of
the tourism industry is minimal. This was supported by some of the respondents’ statements;
“The impact on performance seems great! Because, digital tourism marketing has brought about
the ease of communication between the client and the organization'. The interviewee also
highlighted that digital tourism marketing 'acts as a middleman'. 'It also brought about accuracy
all the time as a result of saving money and effort'. She also contrasted, 'however both the clients
and the staff need some skills of technical knowhow as digital marketing tools require adequate
knowledge and attention more often". (Respondent F)

37
 "The impact has been so minimal- because they are not all facilities which have pages on the
social media sites” (Respondent B)

"The impact on performance has been so limited-, as many players in the industry do not know
how to use and operate some Internet platforms and even the gadgets themselves, this therefore
gives an indication that we are going nowhere when it comes to this thing of digital tourism
marketing". Therefore, by saying all that, the interviewee proved that the impact of digital tourism
marketing on the performance of the tourism industry is limited due to lack of knowhow and lack
of training as well!” (Respondent J)

Social media presents an excellent opportunity for the tourism industry to make greater contact with its
customers, with an ultimate goal of developing a partnership for brand growth and development.
Underlying that opportunity are the twin dangers that tourism operators mishandle their social media
connections or that customers will move on, leaving the industry behind. So, just as hotels and some
restaurants have built their websites, they now have to make sure that their site is optimized for search
engines, have mobile apps, and, more to the point, keep customers involved in a conversation about the
operation. Study participants stated that the impact of digital tourism marketing has been positive on the
performance of the tourism industry; some had supported that the impact has been good, since digital
marketing has brought about the easiness of communication between the organization and the client.

4.2.3 Challenges affecting the use of digital tourism marketing in Masvingo urban

The researcher obtained the following results on challenges affecting the use of digital tourism marketing
in Masvingo. The respondents mentioned about poor network connectivity as a major outstanding
problem affecting the use of digital marketing in Masvingo, which is as a result of poor service provision
from the network service providers, and electricity blackouts, where some respondents proved that lack of
knowledge contributes in cementing the challenges affecting the use of digital tourism marketing in
Masvingo, hence slow development of the process is forecasted. Lack of knowledge is fostered by lack of
training on how to use and operate on a digital system. Some also stressed out the issue of shortage of
resources to develop in-depth on digital marketing. Some of the respondents has this to say about the
challenges affecting the use of digital tourism marketing in Masvingo;

"Poor network connectivity is a major issue, as we only act beyond the system and there is
nothing we can do about it, also lack of security and privacy; lack of knowledge on how to go
digital, therefore we still lagging behind and we still relying on some old ways of marketing which
involves tools like posters and fliers when marketing our products. Shortage of resources also

38
 adds as one of the challenges affecting the use of digital tourism marketing in town”. (Respondent
H)

"Erratic power supplies, poor service by the Internet service providers, and lack of knowledge by
some operators on the use of digital marketing tools are some of the challenges affecting the use
of digital tourism marketing in Masvingo". (Respondent A)

"Poor skills and lack of technical knowhow, shortage of resources and facilities, poor information
dissemination and outreach status, and lack of training of employees on how to operate on digital
marketing websites are affecting the use of digital marketing in Masvingo". (Respondent F)

The respondents also alluded that, not all organizations have the strength to access up to date ICT
facilities; some players in the tourism industry cannot afford all the necessary strategies of digital tourism
marketing. And this is as a result of security and privacy, as well as lack of knowledge and financial
strength, hence forcing most tourism players to use outdated equipment which does not meet the present
goals.

Only a few respondents viewed the issue of responsiveness and mobile friendly approach as one of the
causes of the challenge on the use of digital tourism marketing in Masvingo urban. For instance, a client
has been asking for correspondence or directions and gets no or late responses from an organization due
to poor network connectivity, this might get them lose some interest because that will not be what they
expected from the service. Thereby leading to an organization losing its potential clients, which is not
okay. This means that there is a lack of responsiveness in the tourism sector industry in Masvingo urban.

From this section, the researcher notes that there is still a huge gap posed by the challenges affecting the
use of digital tourism marketing in Masvingo urban. Therefore, a lot has to be done in order to work this
out. The researcher thought, if the government provides incentives and loan schemes in Masvingo
urban’s tourism industry, that may enable the tourism organizations to access funds to upgrade their
digital tourism marketing strategies as well as purchasing enough digital marketing equipment and ideas,
hence improving performance standards of the Masvingo urban’s tourism industry.

The tourism organizations must also engage or participate in capacity building in, where people would be
educated and trained on how to use digital marketing systems in particular, as this helps in reducing the
challenges affecting the use of digital marketing in Masvingo since training equips employees with
adequate knowledge on how to use the digital systems.

4.2.4 Digital tourism marketing opportunities in the Masvingo urban tourism industry.

39
Following the findings, the researcher got from the informants, most respondents predicted to embrace
and exploit the already existing social media marketing platforms, which is, YouTube, WhatsApp,
Twitter, Instagram and Facebook more efficiently. This was because they hardly believe these are the
only strategies where the tourism industry in Masvingo urban is heavily relying on, since they seem to be
significantly cheaper, user friendly and even easier to use when interacting with clients. However, some
respondents went on to suggest the use of other strategies like Internet websites and central online
reservation systems such as Booking.com and TripAdvisor. Only a few pointed out the use of online
newspaper publications for example The Masvingo Mirror, distributing online newspapers with the
tourism information for Masvingo urban. The same respondents also articulated the utilization of TV
advertisements and use of the city radio station (HevoiFm) and Great Zimbabwe University Campus
Radio, to have at least segments where they discuss tourism offerings and attractions in Masvingo urban.

Therefore, digital marketing strategies like, websites, central online reservation systems, online
newspapers distribution radio and TV advertisements are the only digital tourism opportunities that can
be exploited by tourism industry operators in Masvingo urban as this was observed in the following
sentiments;

"I think there is a need for us to do more in Masvingo urban, thus introducing an all in one app
for example the use of Booking.com which is centrally controlled by other parties. Organizations
may also utilize applications like Tik-Tok in order to improve our digital marketing lines".
(Respondent A)

"I think, tourism places for example the Great Zimbabwe Monuments can assist in coming up with
huge events that benefits most of the players in the industry for example the Lake October Great
Zimbabwe Festival, broadcasting the event live online on YouTube and Instagram platforms, as
this helps in generating revenue into the organizations through online campaigns and other paid
programmes". (Respondent D)

"Online newspapers, TV and radio advertisements, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube videos,

emails, text messages, phone calls, visiting websites more often may lead to exploitation of all the
necessary strategies which can be used by tourism operators in Masvingo urban for the
development of digital tourism marketing". (Respondent G)

The reviewing sites can have relatively more impact than the enhanced communications sites such as the
Facebook or Twitter sites (Rowe, 2011). This means that not engaging in all kinds of digital marketing
could result in missed opportunities. The researcher, therefore note the eradication of new potential
advertising applications such as the Tik-Tok, Snap-Chat and strategies like live location sharing, Email
40
marketing, mobile marketing and text messaging, as well as Search Engine Optimization and Video
display marketing can be also exploited as a way to extend business information and outreach.

4.3 Chapter Summary

This chapter presented findings gathered through face to face interviews from the tourism and hospitality
organisations in Masvingo urban, to address the research questions presented in Chapter One in line with
the objectives of the study. It emerged from the findings that tourism organisations in Masvingo started to
adopt the use of digital tourism marketing strategies at different intervals stretching from past years to
present. However, the organisations showed that they still have challenges in attaining these digital
tourism marketing strategies for business use and they cannot properly ingest them. The researcher also
notes that the digital marketing strategies were also not well developed and did not conform to standards
in the period. The digital tourism marketing initiatives in the studied organisations were faced with
challenges such as inadequate resources and suitable infrastructure, lack of skilled personnel and limited
standard guidelines. The next chapter explains the achievement of the objectives as well as the
conclusions, recommendations and suggestions for further research.

41
CHAPTER FIVE: SUMMARY, CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS

5.0. Introduction
This chapter serves to present the summary, conclusions and study recommendations. This chapter is
invaluable as it shows how the study achieved its objectives and answered the research questions. The
chapter is also important because it assesses the study in terms of its contributions to the body of
knowledge. In light of this, the chapter has been structured to include the conclusions, recommendations
and suggestions for further research.

5.1. Restatement of objectives

 To identify digital tourism marketing strategies that is being used in the tourism industry in
Masvingo urban.

 To determine the impact of digital tourism marketing strategies on the performance of the tourism
industry

 To examine the challenges affecting the use of digital tourism marketing in Masvingo

 To identify the digital tourism marketing opportunities can be exploited by tourism industry
operators in Masvingo urban

Summary of Study

The study sought to establish the digital tourism marketing strategies, impacts, challenges and
opportunities in Masvingo, Zimbabwe. The study adopted the interpretivist philosophy underpinned by a
descriptive qualitative research design. Face to face interviews were held with ten (10) study participants
from both the public and private sectors of the tourism industry in Masvingo. The participants were
purposively selected from government ministries and department, information centre, lodges and hotels
in Masvingo urban. Data were thematically analysed. The study revealed that Facebook, Twitter,
WhatsApp, email were common digital tools and strategies used by tourism industry organisations and
they do have a positive impact on performance in Masvingo. Lack of ICT infrastructure, limited internet
coverage, and lack of knowledge are some of the challenges affecting the use of digital tourism marketing
in Masvingo. The study revealed that digital tourism marketing opportunities exist in several ways and
they can be exploited by players in the tourism industry.

42
5.2. Achievement of the research objectives
Digital tourism marketing strategies used in the tourism industry in Masvingo Urban
The study revealed that a number of digital tourism marketing strategies are being used in the tourism
industry in Masvingo. This includes most social media tools like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram,
WhatsApp and YouTube that are strongly used by tourism operators. The researcher also finds out that
there are some digital marketing strategy tools which are being used in support or social media platforms,
which involves, centralized online booking applications, Tik-Tok, Internet websites, online newspapers,
radio and TV advertisements are quite being used by tourism organizations in Masvingo, to expand their
operations and advertisements of tourism attractions and offerings.

Impact of digital tourism marketing strategies on the performance of the tourism industry

The study found out that digital tourism marketing strategies have positively influenced the tourism
industry in terms of performance since this digital tourism marketing has widened the coverage in terms
of communication between the consumers and the organization. From the researcher's findings, digital
tourism marketing has brought about convenience where tourists can access information online and do
their bookings in the comfort of their homes, regardless of time and distance.

Challenges affecting the use of digital tourism marketing in Masvingo

The study revealed that there are many challenges affecting the use of digital tourism marketing in
Masvingo. The researcher found out that poor network connectivity, erratic power supplies, lack of
understanding on how to use digital systems, use of outdated digital systems, lack of training, and even
shortage of resources mostly affect the tourism operators. This implies that the availability of resources
helps the operators to improvise and invest more on digital marketing systems. This means availability of
digital marketing strategies in place will also spice the tourism marketing environment.

Digital tourism marketing opportunities in Masvingo urban tourism industry

The study found out that, there are so many digital marketing opportunities that can be exploited by
tourism operators in Masvingo which includes, the use of centralized online booking applications such as
TripAdvisor and Booking.com, Google+, Tik-Tok application, distribution of online newspaper, radio
and TV advertisements, Search Engine Optimization, mobile marketing, Email and Video marketing.

5.3 Conclusions
The study sought to establish the digital tourism marketing strategies, impacts, challenges and
opportunities in Masvingo, Zimbabwe. In conclusion, Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp, email were
common digital tools and strategies used by tourism industry organisations and they do have a positive
43
impact on performance in Masvingo. Lack of ICT infrastructure, limited internet coverage, and lack of
knowledge are some of the challenges affecting the use of digital tourism marketing in Masvingo. The are
several digital tourism marketing opportunities can be exploited by players in the tourism industry in
Masvingo, Zimbabwe.

5.4 Recommendations
The researcher recommends that in order to develop on digital tourism marketing, the following should
be done:

Effective policy making by the government authorities

Through a development of policies that are digital tourism friendly, the government can provide the
finesse to these prospects as no initiative can succeed without official support. The government of
Zimbabwe can devise methods to incorporate digital tools of tourism to maneuver the tourism industry
into a modernized and digitized industry. In this regard, provision of fast Internet to more areas directly
intersecting with the tourism industry can help a lot..

Networking system upgrade

The Telecommunications and networking companies or service providers should also make sure access to
a secure, faster and reliable communication network is a big challenge, especially in small cities like
Masvingo. This is critically required for any serious digitization effort to take root in Masvingo. Unless
we have equitable digital access across Zimbabwe, we will never have comprehensive, reliable and
timely information regarding on-ground situations, which is critically required for good decision making
at the top.

Incorporation of global digital tourism standards

Zimbabwe should also learn lessons from successful countries like South Africa, Botswana, Tanzania,
Italy, and France among others to digitize our tourism industry while integrating national standards.

5.5 Suggestions for further research

The researcher suggests that additional studies examining digital tourism marketing should be carried out
in Zimbabwe as a whole for more robust reflection of digital tourism marketing strategies, impacts,
challenges and opportunities in the tourism sector of Zimbabwe. A study can be carried out with tourists
being study participants. More studies can be carried out in other provinces of Zimbabwe.

44
REFERENCES

Adeleye, A. (2015), “Social media marketing: the case of Africa”, available at:
Social_Media_Marketing_The_Case_of_Africa (accessed August 9, 2019).

Adu, KK. (2015). Framework for digital preservation of electronic government in Ghana. PhD thesis,
University of South Africa, Pretoria. Africa. Archives and Manuscripts. DOI:
10.1080/01576895.2016.1277361:1-14

Anderson, C. (2010). Presenting and evaluating Qualitative research. American Journal of

Pharmaceutical Education 74(8):1-7.

Babbie, E. (1990). Survey research methods. 2nd edition. California: Wadsworth Publishing Company.

Babbie, E. (2004). The practice of social research. 10th edition. Southbank Victoria: Wadsworth
Thompson.

Babbie, E. (2010). The practice of social research. 12th edition. Belmont: Cengage Learning Inc.

Begum, RA. (2015). Preserving social media: a case of LTU archives. Masters’ thesis, Lulea University
of Technology, Lulea.

Bhebhe, S. (2015). Contemporary diplomatics of the civil and deceased estate case files found at the
National Archives of Zimbabwe. Digital Records Management Journal 25(1):107-120.

Bryman, A. (2004). Social research methods. 2nd edition. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Bryman, A. (2008). Social research methods. 3rd edition. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Buhalis, D. (2008). Progress in information technology and tourism management. 20 years and 10 years
after the Internet. The state of e-tourism research. Tourism Management 29 (4), 609–623

Campbell, R & Ahrens, CE. (1998). Innovative community services for rape victims: an application of
multiple case study methodology. American Journal of Community Psychology 26(4):537-571.

Chaffey, D.: Applying organisational capability models to assess the maturity of digital marketing. J. Mar
Chaffey, D. and Smith, P. (2008), Emarketing Excellence: Planning and Optimizing Your Digital
Marketing, Routledge, London and New York, NY. k. Manage. 26(3–4), 187–196 (2010)

Chaterera, F. (2012). Towards harnessing e-government adoption in Zimbabwe. Mousaion30(2):78-93.

Chaterera, F. (2016). Managing public records in Zimbabwe: the road to good governance,
accountability, transparency and effective service delivery. Journal of the South African Society of
Archivists 49:116 136.

Chen, J., Teng, L., (2016): The effect of online information sources on purchase intentions between
consumers with high and low susceptibility to informational in fluence. J. Bus. Res. 69, 467–475

45
Creswell, JW. (1998). Qualitative inquiry and research design: choosing among five traditions.
Thousand Oaks: Sage.

Creswell, JW. (2009). Research design; qualitative quantitative and mixed methods approaches. 3rd
edition. Los Angeles: Sage.

Creswell, JW. (2014). Research design; qualitative quantitative and mixed methods approaches. 4th
edition. London: Sage.

Crompton, J. (1979): An assessment of the image of mexico as a vacation destination and the influence of
geographical location upon that image. J. Travel Res. 17(4), 18–23

Curry, LA, Nembhard, IM & Bradley, EH. (2009). Qualitative and mixed methods provide unique
contributions to outcomes research. Circulation 119:1442-1452.

Denzin, NK & Lincoln, YS. (2000). Handbook of qualitative research. 2nd edition. London: Sage.121

Fesenmaier, D.R. (2002). The web-based virtual tour in tourism marketing. Journal of Travel and
Tourism Marketing 12 (4), 1–17

Fielding, N & Thomas, H. (2008). “Qualitative interviewing”, in Gilbert, N (ed), Researching social life.
London: Sage Publications.122

Fink, A. (1995). How to sample in surveys. vol 6. London: Sage Publications.

Golafshani, N. (2003). Understanding reliability and validity in qualitative research. The Qualitative
Report 8 (4):597-607.

Gomes, J., Montenegro, M. (2016). Profile of female tourists visiting Porto and North of Portugal.
World. Hosp. Tour. Themes 8(6), 677–690

Gretzel, D (2015). The management of electronic information: opportunities and challenges. D Phil
thesis, University College London, London.

Guba, EG. (1981). Criteria for assessing the trustworthiness of naturalistic inquiries. Education
Communication and Technology Journal 29:75-91.

Henry, GT. (1990). Practical sampling. vol 21. London: Sage Publications.Hess, DR. 2004. How to
write an effective discussion? Respir Care 49(10):1238-1241.123

Herrero, Á., San Martín, H. (2017): Garcia-De los Salmones, M.M: Explaining the adoption of social
networks sites for sharing user-generated content: A revision of the UTAUT2. Comput. Hum. Behav. 71,
209–217

Hofman, H. (2006). Standards: not ‘one size fits all’. The Information Management Journal May/June
2006:36-45.

46
Kalusopa, T & Zulu, S. (2009). Digital heritage material preservation in Botswana: problems and
prospects. Collection Building 28(3):98-107.

Kamatula, GA. (2010). E-government and e-records: challenges and prospects for African records
managers and archivists. ESARBICA Journal 29:147-164.

Kanyengo, CW. (2006). Managing digital information resources in Africa: Preserving the integrity of
scholarship. Paper presented at the Bridging the North-South Divide in Scholarly Communication on
Africa, Leiden, September.

Kaur, P. (2017). Qualitative case study methodology: study design and implementation for novice
researchers. The Qualitative Report 13(4):544-559.

Keakopa, S. (2010). The trends in long-term preservation of digital information: challenges and
possible solutions for Africa. Africa Media Review 18(1&2):73-84.125

Kim, S. (2017). Effects of tourism information quality in social media on destination image formation:
the case of Sina Weibo. Inf. Manage. 54(6), 687–702

Kothari, C. (2004). Research methodology: methods and techniques. New Delhi: Sage Publications.

Kumar, M.M. (2017). “Digital marketing: challenges and opportunities”, Paripex-Indian Journal of
Research, Vol. 6 No. 11, pp. 117-119.

Ladhari, R., Michaud, M. (2015): WOM effects on hotel booking intentions, attitudes, trust, and website
perceptions. Int. J. Hosp. Manage. 46, 36–45

Laudon, KC & Laudon, JP. (2005). Essentials of management information system: managing the digital
firm. 6th edition. New Jersey: Pearson Education.

Law, R. (2010). Progress in tourism management: A review of website evaluation in tourism research.
Tourism Management 31(3): 297-313

Leedy, P & Ormrod, J. (2005). Practical research: planning and design. 7th edition. Upper Saddle
River, NJ: Pearson.

Lemieux, VL. (2016). One step forward, two steps backward? Does e-government make governments in
developing countries more transparent and accountable. Washington (DC): World Bank.

Lester, FK. (2005). The theoretical frameworks, conceptual and philosophical foundations for research
in mathematics education. ZMD: International Reviews on Mathematical Education 37(6):457-460.

Maboreke, D. (2007). An evaluation of the effectiveness of records surveys in the management of public
records in Masvingo Province. M Inf Dissertation, National University of Science and Technology,
Bulawayo.

Mackenzie, N & Knipe, S. (2006). Research dilemmas: paradigms, methods and methodology. Issues in
Educational Research 16:193-205.

47
MacNealy, MS. (1999). Strategies for empirical research in writing. New York: Longman.

Malemelo, F., Dube, A., David, R & Ngulube, P.( 2013). Management of financial records at the

Mambo, E. (2012). Zimbabwe to go digital by 2015. Chronicle Newspaper. 03 January.

Manyambula, MT. (2009). Public service reform, accountability and records management: A case study
of Tanzania. ESARBICA Journal 28(2):2-33.

Marshall, C & Rossman, G. (2006). Designing qualitative research. 4th edition. California: SAGE
Publications, Inc.

Marshall, C & Rossman, GB. (1999). Designing qualitative research. 3rd edition. London: Sage.

Martín-Santana, J.D., Beerli-Palacio, A., Nazzareno, P.A. (2017): Antecedents and consequences of
destination image gap. Ann. Tour. Res. 62, 13–25

Mason, J. (2002). Qualitative researching. 2nd edition. London: Sage.

Mason, S. (2007). Authentic digital records: laying the foundation for evidence. Information
Management Journal 5:32-40

Masuku, M & Makwanise, N. (2012). Archives, accountability, human rights and good governance:
where is the nexus? Mousaion 30(2):169-181.

Matangira, V. (2016). Records and archives management in post-colonial Zimbabwe’s public sector. D
Phil thesis, University of Namibia, Windhoek.127

Mhizha, A. (2014). Application of the 'Chameleon Survival Strategy Model’ in the study of strategic
management in small and medium-scale enterprises. International Journal of Innovative Research and
Development, 3(6), 216-225.

Miles, MB & Huberman, AM. (1994). Qualitative data analysis. 2nd edition. California: Sage.

Mutsagondo, S. (2017). Electronic records management in public departments in the Midlands Province
of Zimbabwe. M Inf dissertation, University of South Africa, Pretoria.

Nduna, V. (2015). Digital records management and preservation. Paper presented at the XXIII
ESARBICA General Conference, Victoria Falls, 8-12 June.126

Nengomasha, CT. (2009). A study of electronic records management in the Namibian public service in
the context of e-government. D Phil thesis, University of Namibia, Windhoek.

Nengomasha, CT. (2013). The past, present and future of records and archives management in sub-
Saharan Africa. Journal of the South African Society of Archivists 46: 2-11.

Neuman, WL. (2000). Social research methods: Qualitative and quantitative approaches, 4thedition.
Boston: Pearson Education.

Neuman, WL. (2003). Social research methods: Qualitative and quantitative approaches, 5thedition.
New York: Oxford University Press.
48
Neuman, WL. (2011). Social research methods: Qualitative and quantitative approaches, 7thedition.
Boston: Allyn & Bacon.

Ngoepe, M & Keakopa, SM. (2011). An assessment of the state of national archival and records systems
in the ESARBICA region: A South Africa-Botswana comparison. Records Management Journal
21(2):145-160.

Ngoepe, M & Saurombe, A. (2016). Provisions for managing and preserving records created in
networked environments in the archival legislative frameworks of selected member states of the
Southern African Development Community. Archives and Manuscripts44(1): 24-41.

Ngoepe, M, Mokoena, L & Ngulube P. (2010). Security, privacy and ethics in electronic records
management in the South African public sector. ESARBICA Journal 29:36-66.

Ngoepe, M. & Van der Walt, T. (2009). Strategies for the preservation of electronic records in South
Africa: Implications on access to information. Innovation 38:1-27.

Ngoepe, M. (2015). When rain clouds gather – entrustment of government records to the cloud in South
Africa. Paper presented at the XXIII ESARBICA General Conference, Victoria Falls, June.

Ngoepe, M. (2017). Archival orthodoxy of post-custodial realities for digital records in South

Ngoepe, MS. (2008). An exploration of records management trends in the South African public sector:
A case study of the department of provincial and local government. M lnf dissertation, University of
South Africa, Pretoria.

Ngulube, P & Tafor, VF. (2006). The management of public records and archives in the member
countries of ESARBICA. Journal of the Society of Archivists 27(1):57-83.

Ngulube, P. (2003). Preservation and access to public records and archives in South Africa. DPhil
thesis, University of Natal, Pietermaritzburg.

Ngulube, P. (2005). Environmental monitoring and control at national archives and libraries in Eastern
and Southern Africa. Libri 55(2-3):154-168.130

Ngulube, P. (2009). Preservation and access to public records in South Africa. Saarbrucken: Lambert
Academic Publishing AG & Co. KG.

Ngulube, P. (2010). Mapping mixed methods research in library and information science journals in
sub-Saharan Africa 2004-2008. The International Information and Library Review 42(4):252-261.

Ngulube, P. (2012). “Ghosts in our machines”: preserving public digital information for the sustenance
of electronic government in sub-Sahara Africa. Mousaion 30(2):112-120.

Ngulube, P. (2015). Trends in research methodological procedures used in knowledge management

studies (2009 – 2013). African Journal of Library, Archives and Information Science 24(2)
(forthcoming).

Olsen, W. (2012). Data collection: key debates and methods in social research. London: Sage.

Parahoo, K. (1997). Nursing research: principles, process and issues. London: Macmillan Press.
49
Patton, MQ. (2002). Qualitative research and evaluation methods. 3rd edition. London: Sage.131

Perry, SR. (2014). Digitisation and digital preservation: A review of the literature. SLIS Student
Research Journal 4(1):1-12.

Punch, KF.(1998). Introduction to social research: quantitative and qualitative approaches. New Delhi:
Sage Publications.

Sauro, J. (2015). Five types of qualitative methods. Available at: http://measuringu.com/qualmethods/

(Accessed 16 June 2017).

Shenton, AK. (2004). Strategies for ensuring trustworthiness in qualitative research projects. Education
for Information 22:63-75.

Silverman, D. (2001). Interpreting qualitative data: methods for analysing talk, text and interaction. 2nd
edition. London: Sage.

Soava, D.C., Karjaluoto, H. (2017): Consumers’ acceptance of information and communications

technology in tourism: a review. Telemat. Inform. 34(5), 618–644

Sousa, S., Teixeira, M.S., Gonçalves, R. (2011): A aplicação do e-marketing em empresas de uma região
ultraperiférica - região autónoma da madeira. RISTI Rev. Iber. Sist. e Tecnol. Inf. 7(1), 17–32

Welman, C., Kruger, F & Mitchell, B. (2005). Research methodology. 3rd edition. Cape Town: Oxford
University Press.Wu, C.W. (2016): Destination loyalty modeling of the global tourism. J. Bus. Res.
69(6), 2213–2219 534 F. Jorge et al.

Yasmin, A. (2015). “Effectiveness of digital marketing in the challenging age: an empirical study”,
International Journal of Management Science and Business Administration, Vol. 1 No. 5, pp. 69-80.

50
 APPENDICIES

Appendix A: Ethical Clearance from Great Zimbabwe University

51
Appendix B: Letter for seeking authority to conduct research to the local organizations

25 October 2022

The Head Ministry/Department of……………….

Masvingo

Dear Sir/Madam

RE: Requesting for Permission to Conduct an Academic Research in Your Organisation

My name is Blessing Makuyana and I am doing an academic research with Dr. Phanos Matura, a PhD
holder Tourism Lecture in the Department of Commerce who is my supervisor towards a Degree in
Hospitality, Tourism and Culture at Great Zimbabwe University.

I am conducting research on digital tourism marketing strategies, impacts, challenges and opportunities
in Masvingo urban, Zimbabwe. The aim of the study is to examine the current strategies for digital
tourism marketing in Masvingo urban with a view to make recommendations for effective use and
adoption of these digital systems to guarantee continued accessibility. All research data will be solely
used for academic purposes. The research will involve interviewing digital marketing officers, the top
management and the heads of departments at regional level. I therefore seek authorisation to carry out
the interviews for this academic research at your organisation. Once permission is granted, I will make
appointments with the relevant officials for data collection sessions.

I kindly look forward to your consideration upon this requisition.

Yours Sincere,
Blessing Makuyana

Cell: 0774 777 935

Email: [email protected] or [email protected]

52
Appendix C: Interview Guide

Interview Guide Structure

MUNHUMUTAPA SCHOOL OF COMMERCE

SCHOOL OF HOSPITALITY TOURISM & CULTURE

INTERVIEW GUIDE

My name is Blessing Makuyana, student number, M192023. I am a student at Great Zimbabwe

University studying towards a Bachelor of Commerce, Honours degree in Hospitality, Tourism and
Culture. I am doing a research on Digital Tourism Marketing in Masvingo Urban, Zimbabwe;
strategies, impacts, challenges and opportunities. Therefore, I kindly request for your participation in
the study. The information you provide will be used for academic purposes only. The information will be
kept in strict confidence.

Demographic information

Gender ………………………………………………………

Experience in the industry ………………………………….

Position in the industry ……………………………………...

Education ……………………………………………………

Digital Tourism Marketing Questions

1. What digital tourism marketing strategies are being used in the tourism industry in Masvingo
urban?

53
 2. How has been the impact of digital tourism marketing strategies on the performance of tourism
industry?

3. What challenges are affecting the use of digital tourism marketing in Masvingo?

4. Which digital tourism marketing opportunities can be exploited by tourism industry operators in
Masvingo urban?

5. Are there any recommendations you have regarding digital tourism marketing in Masvingo
urban?

Thank you for participating in the study...

54