Richard Tresidder
Introduction
This chapter explores the relationship between the study of semiotics and the marketing of tourism experiences and products. Communication remains one of the most signifi cant areas of marketing theory and practice, however the major emphasis of this theme within marketing studies focuses upon the mechanism of communication, and the means by which marketing communications are transmitted; resultantly, little reference is made to how the signs and images of tourism marketing are identifi ed, constructed and utilized. It can be argued that there is a semiotic language of tourism that consists of a set of conventions, words, images and experiences that signpost the experience of tourism to the consumer, and that subsequently can be seen to underpin all tourism marketing. This chapter explores how signs and images used in tourism marketing bestow meaning and value to tourism products, activities and experiences. The production of meaning has its foundations in the structural linguistic science and philosophy of semiotics, and has been identifi ed as a fundamental aspect of marketing practice (for a good discussion of semiotics within mainstream marketing see McCracken 1986; Mick, Burroughs, Hetzel and Brannen 2004; Mick and Oswald 2006; Oswald, 2012).
Semiotics is central to the marketing communication process, whereby, the meaning of tourism products and destination branding, are formed by utilizing codes that are understood, and whose signifi cance is recognized by particular segments or consumer groups who possess similar levels of knowledge and cultural capital. Therefore the use of different images, words or experiences that convey the essence of meaning of tourism, enables the marketer to position the tourism product, experience, ‘servicescape’ and the host/guest relationship within focused marketing communications. By exploring the semiotic structure, or conceptual framework that informs tourism marketing practice, it is possible to identify a semiotic language, or code, that is used by marketers and frames tourism marketing systems. These meanings are generated within tourism marketing texts and are intended to be read and understood by the consumer.
The semiotics of marketing is not external to the marketing practice, but is central to the communication process and it must be recognized that consumers exist within a semiotic system of signs, they are essential actors within the marketing system and are induced into thinking and behaving symbolically: ‘That is they (tourists) symbolically interact in the world socially and
The semiotics of tourism marketing experientially, they interact with symbolic products, engage in symbolic activities and engage in symbolic experiences’ (Tresidder and Hirst 2012: 153).
Semiotics and the signifi cance of signs
Before we can develop a semiotics of tourism marketing it is important to explore the meaning and signifi cance of semiotics as an area of practice. Semiotics is very simply the study of signs and systems of representation. ‘Signs are simply anything that stands for something (its object/
referent), to somebody (interpreter), in some respect (its context, i.e. in an advert, label, package, servicescape or retail environment)’ (Mick 1986: 198), therefore, as potential tourists or consumers we are all amateur semioticians. Signs surround our world, signs essentially make the world understandable and meaningful to us, they tell us when we can cross the road, which door to use and the way to the departure lounge. We all understand the global meaning of these signs, as we read, interpret and comprehend them; this is made possible from belonging to a shared cultural context and system of meaning that frames and guides our reading and understanding; in the literature this context is sometimes defi ned as a code (see Alexander 2000; McCracken and Roth 1989; Holt and Cameron 2010) or ‘cultural template’ (Arsel and Thompson 2011).
Essentially these codes or templates provide a framework through which signs make sense and are interpreted by the individual tourist. A good example of this is to think about a set of traffi c lights (Tresidder 2011; Tresidder and Hirst 2012); we all recognize and understand their role, this recognition is developed through historical conventions and experience whereby we equate the colour red with danger so we stop, and green with safety so know we can cross the road safely. Therefore, these rule based systems or organizing frameworks allows us to make sense of everyday reality and navigate our experience in the world, thus the images utilized in tourism marketing enable us to make sense of the tourism experience.
As codes are gathered and made sense of through our ‘lived experience’ and interactions with material and social reality, they are not always universally interpreted in the same way. That is to say, they may vary between individual consumers and particularly across different market segments, such as age, social background, geographical demographics or lifestyle sub-cultures. In this regard where we are unacquainted with the rules or do not understand the code, for example a 50 year old may not understand the codes represented within 18–30 marketing literature, as they do not belong to the age demographic, or possess the knowledge of contemporary clubbing culture to make sense of the experience being communicated. The signs and images contained and communicated with tourism marketing texts, direct our behaviour, expectations and perceptions of place, culture and heritage; thus signs place a signifi cant role in promoting the tourist experience and engaging the potential tourist in the discourse of tourism.
The order of signs
What is a sign? Signs are more than words or images, pretty much anything and everything can be treated as a sign and can be seen to hold semiotic meaning and value. In this way, the world and all its components can be treated as text or narrative, they are read for meaning, and as such, they have discursive signifi cance. Clothing for example has textual properties, and is often read in this way (McCracken and Roth 2003), this does not just work in terms of branded clothing but also the souvenir t-shirt purchased from a destination or an event. Both are read by the consumer, but are also read by people passing us by, through their reading they make all sorts of assumptions about the wearer, in terms of their experiences, background and cultural capital. As such, tourism products and activities carry and communicate meaning, as do the systems and
styles of consumption adopted by consumers in their endeavour to gain value and meaning from using and interacting with them (Holt 1998). Thus, the meaning and signifi cance of tourism products and experiences semiotically structure reality and our experiences of, and in, the world.
The signs contained within tourism marketing texts can be classifi ed into three general categories, these are symbols, icons and indexes. What marks these categories out from each other is the difference in the relationship between the sign and what the sign signifi es. The sign can be defi ned as the actual image or word, for example the word or image of a beach may equate to notions of warmth, escape or childhood etc. The result of this is that in order to understand the signifi cance and meaning of the sign used in tourism marketing texts we need to classify its status as a symbol, icon or index as this will directly defi ne and contextualize its meaning (see Tresidder and Hirst 2012).
Firstly, a symbol in tourism marketing is a sign that has an association to its object that works through processes of social and cultural convention, these come to defi ne and underpin contemporary tourism (see Tresidder 2010) marketing and how as consumers we understand it.
The use of a particular set of symbols in tourism marketing is one of the major conventions. For example one of the dominant semiotic conventions utilized within tourism brochures is the use of the deserted swimming pool or beach. The use of such images not only visually demonstrates the destination we may be visiting, but also through its denotative contents signifi es various potential experiences such as escape, luxury or romance. In this way these images signify something to each individual consumer, it is not just a swimming pool or beach, but it defi nes the experience of being a holidaymaker, it creates desires and expectations. What is important to note is that, although these images are a dominant convention, they still possess individual connotative associations and are individually defi ned by the individual tourist’s biography.
Secondly is the icon, this is a sign that has a close correspondence to its object, in short an iconic signifi er could therefore look, sound, smell, taste, or feel like that which it signifi es.
According to Tresidder and Hirst (2012: 157):
. . . iconic signs that may be found in THEF (Tourism, Hospitality, Events and Food) marketing materials or contexts could include amongst others: the sound of gun shots or explosions in battlefi eld recreations; the smell of the everyday lived experience of our ancestors at the Jorvik Viking Centre in York, or the spritzed essence of the seashore that may accompany your fi sh supper at Heston Blumenthal’s restaurant the Fat Duck. They could also be; a cartoon representation of a patriarchal Italian family in a pasta sauce advert;
a performer adorned in a Roman Centurion uniform or staged as a male mine worker at an heritage center or within an advertisement for a living museum; or the plastic lemon shaped packaging that contains Jif lemon juice.
Such signs and images are central to tourism marketing as they enable the tourist or potential tourist to fi nd something tangible in an intangible experience. They underpin the communicative staging of ‘servicescapes’ (Arnould, Price and Tierney 1998: 90). A very good example of this is Disney’s World Showcase Area at the EPCOT centre in Florida, the area contains various international Pavilions including a French, Chinese, German and British Pavilion. Each Pavilion provides the tourist with a glimpse into the culture of the country with hyper-real sets containing iconic buildings such as the Eiffel Tower, heavily country specifi c accented workers and the opportunity to consume indigenous food such as Beer and Fish and Chips in the British Pavilion or Sausages and Pretzels in the German Pavilion. The Showcase area enables the tourist to be transported semiotically to a bucolic context and setting (Arnould, Price and Tierney 1998) in which the essence of a country may be consumed.
The semiotics of tourism marketing Finally, is the use of indexical signs, these in a way represent the result of engaging in tourism, the use of romance (couples wandering down the deserted beach hand in hand for example) may be defi ned as an indexical sign as the romance or space for romance is the result of entering into the physical, environmental and liminality of the destination. This differs from the previous two categories by focusing on the relationship between an object and an indexical sign, this differ-ence is marked out by a causal relationship between destination etc. and result. For example the convention of locating healthy and tanned tourists within tourism marketing materials demon-strates the causal link between the climate, the sun, the water and their health giving properties.
Thus what we can see is that signs and images can take on differing meanings according to their context and purpose, for example the picture of a cake in a cooking book would generate mean-ings of luxury and indulgence, yet if the same picture was placed in a book aimed to help dieting, then the meaning would change completely.
The semiotics of tourism
The semiotics of tourism is not a new subject area, it has been developed and discussed by a number of authors who have identifi ed its application within tourism studies (see Dann 1996;
Echtner 1999; Jenkins 2003; Berger 2007; Thurlow and Aiello 2007) while Crick (1989) defi ned
‘the semiology of tourism’ as one of the three main strands of tourism research. The signifi cance of the semiotics of tourism is recognised by MacCannell (1999: 3) who considers that ‘. . . there is a privileged relationship between tourism and semiotics’. This opinion is reinforced by Dann who comments, ‘Nowhere . . . is a semiotics perspective considered more appropriate than in the analysis of tourism advertising with its culture coded covert connotations, in the study of tourism imagery and in treatment of tourism communication as a discourse of myth’
(1996: 6).
The representations of tourism within marketing utilize a semiotic language that has been formulated and embedded in contemporary travel writing and marketing texts, the language draws from a set of myths about the experience of tourism, the nature of destinations and the impact the activity may have on the individual. Therefore, it is important that we think about the relationship between tourism marketing, the discourse that underpins this and how the individual interacts and negotiates marketing communications.
Although the area of semiotics has not been fully developed in mainstream tourism studies or marketing, the signifi cance of semiotics in understanding and communicating of the touristic experience cannot be denied. In a famous quote Urry (2001: 139) states that: ‘One learns that a thatched cottage with roses around the door represents “ye olde England”, or the waves crashing on to rocks signifi es “wild, untamed nature”; or especially, that a person with a camera draped around his/her neck is clearly a tourist’. In the same vein Culler (1981: 158) observes that, ‘All over the world the unsung armies of semioticians, the tourists, are fanning out in search of the signs of Frenchness, typical Italian behaviour, exemplary Oriental scenes . . .’.
We cannot ignore the signifi cance of semiotics and their construction of the tourism experience. However, one of the reasons why semiotics has not been fully developed is that it is categorized as an interpretative methodology, and as such it is diffi cult to utilize in a commercial environment, as it does not produce replicable or objective readings of texts. What we end up with, is multiple semiotic readings with each individual creating and negotiating their own understanding of the messages communicated within marketing texts, this information is diffi cult to incorporate into mass marketing communications. As such, what we see is the semiotic language of tourism achieving in marketing texts the ‘signposting’ of experience (Jenkins 2003), whereby, the individual tourist’s interpretation is guided to a set of experiences
in the forms of icons, symbols and indexical signs that make the link between marketing communications and the individually negotiated experience of tourism.
The semiotic language of tourism marketing
Through the analysis of various tourism marketing texts including brochures, websites and television adverts, it is unmistakable that tourism marketing both relies upon, and creates, what may be termed a semiotic language of marketing (Tresidder 2010; Tresidder and Hirst 2012). This language of tourism marketing is formed by a number of reoccurring conven-tions, themes, images and words, which signpost a comprehensible and appreciated contem-porary experience of tourism. These conventions include various discourses that revolve around escape, authenticity, luxury, freedom, experience, play and time (Tresidder 2010). These may be divided into a number of pervasive categories the most dominant of these being time and authenticity.
The semiotic time and space of tourism
This operates at a number of levels, the purpose of focusing on time and space has two purposes, the fi rst purpose is to elevate the experience to that of the extraordinary and secondly the difference between time and space as a part of everyday lived experience and touristic time and space.
Time as extraordinary: There is a clear convention that there is a clear division between the extraordinary nature of touristic time and the stress, monotony of everyday lived experiences such as sitting in a traffi c jam or doing your washing. This is demonstrated in the use of time to set up the experience of tourism. For example we will witness discussion about ‘not enough time in the week’ or ‘everyone wants a part of you’. In the recent Baz Luhrmann television and cinema advertisement for Australia, the extraordinary nature of the Australian Outback was set against the dark, rainy, stressful urban environment of New York, whereby the executive was stressed and arguing with her partner. This was used as juxtaposition against the un-spoilt, light, sunny undeveloped Australian landscape in which it became possible to relax and fi nd peace in both life and her relationship. Time becomes used as a means of both fi xing everyday lived experience and release into a refl exive and therapeutic space. A very good example of this is the 2010 Thompson ‘Time for a Holiday’ campaign, the dialogue which accompanied moving images of a family being together, swimming, having fun on the beach, hugging each other and playing, expressed the signifi cance of time in our lives and the relationship between tourism and time, its constraints and the blurring between work and play time. What this advert does, and others like it, is to provide us with an alternative conception of time that is removed from the stress of everyday life, it becomes an extraordinary place of escape for two weeks each year, the chance to take stock of your lives, fi nd meaning. What it also accomplishes is the identifi cation of a type or form of emotional authenticity of feeling and experience. This is reinforced by the use of words such as timeless, luxury, escape and freedom.
The semiotics of authenticity
The notion of authenticity has always been identifi ed as an important theme in tourism studies (MacCannell 1999) and is often seen as a reaction to post-industrial society or part of the individual’s search for meaning. It is also an important convention for tourism marketing as it adds another level of signifi cance to the tourism experience.
The semiotics of tourism marketing
Experiences as authentic: The notion of authenticity works at a number of levels within tourism marketing, but it can broadly be broken down into a cultural lens and an experiential lens.
The utilization of culture in tourism marketing remains a signifi cant and reoccurring theme, the representation of culture may be seen both in terms of attractions, and also as representing the tourist having access to a more authentic and real world. These representations can take two forms. Cultural representations provide the opportunity for the potential to gaze upon traditional cultures and cultural artifacts, the immersion into these as a tourist enables them to participate (even if this is only as a voyeur) vicariously in these cultures. The recent ‘Incredible India’
advertisement uses this convention, it shows the tourist as an interactive participant, who is both watching and physically participating in cultural festivals and rituals. This provides an oppositional world in which to escape the inauthentic post-modern media led world of the West. Authenticity also operates at the level of the emotional in which it becomes possible to fi nd meaningful authentic time with your loved ones, family and friends (as seen in the 2010 Thompson ‘Time for a Holiday’ campaign). This theme of authenticity of emotions is a recurring theme with a couple being represented sitting alone at a table or walking hand in hand down a beach or, in the case of Luhrmann’s advertisement, swimming in a deserted pool.
The idea of authenticity of emotion and family is heavily used in family orientated marketing communications and is reinforced by phrases such as ‘What would you like your children to inherit, a house, a clock, the family silver or something a little more valuable . . . memories start here’ (‘Center Parcs Memories Start Here!’ campaign 2013).
The semiotic language of tourism is specifi c to the subject area, as it draws from the complex discourse of tourism that is constructed at the historical, social, cultural and individual level. What is also important within the semiotic language of tourism is to recognize what is left out or missing from representations of the tourism experience, the sanitization of landscapes (clean beaches, or, no traffi c or tourists at attractions), and is a signifi cant convention in tourism marketing. If we are trying to escape, or fi nd authenticity within the tourism experience, it is important that we do not get distracted by the reality and technology of modern life. So if we return again to the Luhrmann Australia advertisement, during all of the images of Australia used in the production, we do not see any other people, telephone poles, cars, technology etc. just an empty pure un-spoilt timeless environment. If any of these elements of modern life were included then the message and signifi cance of the campaign would be lost. Through the development of a conceptual framework it is possible to clearly identify and classify the semiotic themes that are contained within tourism marketing communications. However, it is more diffi cult to chart how the individual fi nds meaning and negotiates the marketing landscapes of tourism.
Interpreting tourism texts
The interpretation of marketing texts is an individual refl exive process, although we can state that marketing communications signpost or direct interpretation of the tourism experience, much of the interpretation process is reliant upon the individual’s personal biography, view of the world and their value systems. This biography is formed by the reader’s social and cultural background, gender, educational background and geographical awareness of place. In other words the interpretation of marketing texts is a direct consequence of their epistemological, ontological and axiological infl uences (for good general discussion of these aspects see Bryman 2004: 21–4), it is these areas of the individual’s experience or personality that defi ne the way in which they relate to the marketing process and the product or service being sold. Each of these three areas contributes to the individual’s interpretation process in a different way, and is summarized in Table 8.1 below.