Accommodation businesses in the research area of Mugla which have websites and answered the questionnaire are composed of 2, 3, 4, and 5 star hotels, apart hotels and holiday villages.
Travel agencies which responded to the questionnaires are mainly “A” type agencies with 48 Yasar Sari et al.
their own websites. Services provided in the websites of the organizations responding to the questionnaires are given in Table 3.1. As this table demonstrates, services provided consist mainly of e-mail addresses, product and service promotion and providing helpful informa- tion services. The low rates of online reservation and customer feedback show that these sites are not dynamic at desired levels but still have static structures. Moreover, the low level of intra-firm information sharing shows that intra-firm communication is still carried out mainly via conventional methods (i.e. paper, telephone, and face-to-face).
Table 3.2 displays the items used in electronic documents and brochures that were cho- sen for product and service promotion in the websites of the organizations. Values given in Electronic Documents and Brochures for Sustainable Tourism Marketing 49
Table 3.1: Services offered in the websites of the organizations.
Yes No No
response
Offered services N Ratio % N Ratio % n Ratio %
Product and service promotion 103 94.5 6 5.5 - -
Providing helpful information 102 93.6 6 5.5 1 0.9
(weather, exchange rates, etc.)
e-mail services 96 88.1 12 11.0 1 0.9
Online reservation 70 64.2 35 32.1 4 3.7
Customer feedback 65 59.6 38 34.9 6 5.5
Intra-firm information 62 56.9 43 39.4 4 3.7
sharing
Table 3.2: Advertisement and promotion items used in electronic documents and brochures in the websites of the organizations.
Yes No No
response Electronic document and n Ratio% N Ratio% n Ratio % brochure items
Items consisting of pictures, 88 80.7 12 11.0 9 8.3
photographs, drawings, animations, and texts
Items consisting of voiced video 55 50.5 49 45.0 5 4.6 images
Items consisting of three 34 31.2 70 64.2 5 4.6
dimensional virtual reality images that can be seen with the help of the mouse
the table show that most of the items used in electronic documents and brochures are almost the same as those used in classic paper printing. This result reiterates the idea that these organizations websites are static. Moreover, this result also shows that the organiza- tions are not exactly aware of the Internet environment and opportunities offered by this environment in terms of advertisement and promotion. Thus, it seems that for the organi- zations there is not much difference between the advertisement and promotion through normal paper printing than that of the Internet.
Table 3.3 refers to the weighted mean values indicating the opinions of the organiza- tions about their annual average paper consumption throughout the years following the development of their own website. When the values given in the table are analyzed, an increase in paper use in advertisement and promotion and inner office paper is shown.
Some decrease is observed with regards to mailing activities. Based on these values, it can be speculated that the Internet is primarily used by the organizations for the purpose of communicating with customers; however, conventional ways are drawn upon more than the Internet for promotion activities and intra-organization transactions. In this case, it can be argued that the Internet is perceived as an alternative, but not adequately efficient pro- motion medium by the organizations.
When looking at the results of the questionnaire that asked the accommodation business to rating of the given ideas and judgments according to penta 5 scale, a value of 3.68 indi- cates that websites of accommodation businesses were heavily visited by foreign tourists.
However, more than half of the businesses had a clear idea about their number of their web site visitors (52.3%). The other group (43.1%) declared that they had no idea how many web- site visitors they had. When the above-mentioned business accommodations asked about the
“use of the Internet reduces paper consumption” their agreement rate of 2.90 weighed mean out of 5 indicates that they either generally agree or would like to believe that. But owing to the structure of the Internet medium technologies which leads to some problems and unreli- ability, it can be said that they were not able to reflect this in their applications.
Conclusions and Implications
In the globalizing- and technology-based developing world economy, the tourism industry also has been developing new methods to provide information exchange between service 50 Yasar Sari et al.
Table 3.3: Opinions of the organizations about their own paper consumption in the years following a website possession.
Sort of paper N Meana
Expenses for promotion and advertisement brochures 102 2.19 such as leaflets and booklets
Expenses for paper used for intra-organization transactions 109 2.14 Expenses for paper used to get in contact with customers 101 1.52
a3⫽increased, 2⫽unchanged, 1⫽decreased.
providers, middlemen, and consumers. The development of ITs, emergence of E-trade practices, and wide use of the Internet lead to important changes in the structure, marketing, booking, and sales within tourism. The most important of these are online ticket reservations and sales. This type of IT usage results in excessive use of paper rather than the intended paperless environment. This research has been designed to cover accom- modation and travel businesses which have websites on the Internet and are operating within the district of Mugla, a popular tourist destination located in the south-west part of Turkey.
The first suggestion would be to turn the websites into active environments rather than static, so that they can be used by both visitors to these sites and staff of the organizations conveniently and comfortably. This way people will be able to use the Internet and consequently the businesses’ websites to communicate. Many items which are impossible to present on paper can be used in the websites. Awareness of this issue within the organizations should be raised and they need to be educated in the use of three dimensional virtual reality items equipped with video and voice which can offer more than that provided through paper. Moreover, every organization should find some way of hav- ing precise information about the number of visitors to their sites. Thus, over time, they will be aware of the fact that documents and brochures printed on paper have become obsolete. From the information obtained from open-ended questionnaire items and face- to-face interviews, it seems clear that tourism service providers believe or at least are willing to believe that improvements in ITs and the Internet would decrease paper con- sumption.
On the other hand, whether in public or private sector or educational institutions, in working environments, the most commonly used material is, as we all know, paper.
People feel more secure with paper because it is conventional. Most of the time, an elec- tronic document in a computer is read from its print out. People feel as if it would not be understood when read from the screen. However, in reality, there is nothing that gets changed, lost or misunderstood; it is just a matter of perception. Regardless of how closely people are engaged with ITs, they find them less secure than traditional methods. All of us, from time to time, experience computer crashes and loss of invaluable data. It is highly rea- sonable for a person who has had such an experience not to rely on electronic documents.
In this respect, information-processing managers and authorities have considerable responsibilities to provide data security and to find the ways of backing up data. Raising the consciousness of users with regards to having their personal backups, providing incen- tives and control and performing periodic and flawless institutional backing up activities as well are of great importance in terms of data security and encouraging electronic document use.
Secondly, in transition to electronic documents and brochures, it is important not only to raise institutional awareness of the environment, but also to get personnel to realize the necessity of the use of recycled paper. This consciousness raising will provide a good moti- vation for people to look for alternatives to paper. Finally, the use of electronic documents makes meeting bureaucratic requirements easier for the individual. Besides preventing some documents from being kept under desk pads, it will make enable better use of control mechanisms. In this way, the reduction of efficiency’s through document traffic would be prevented and the individual would aim to fulfill his responsibilities as best he Electronic Documents and Brochures for Sustainable Tourism Marketing 51
can without being bogged down among documents. After that, the concepts of paperless office, digital office or paperless environment will be evaluated from different perspec- tives, and perhaps one day, paper will really be redundant. However, present trend indi- cates that at least for a while both paper and electronic documents and brochures will be in use simultaneously, but who knows what will happen in 10 years.
Conscientious use of ITs not only reduces paper consumption but also supports tourism activities and reduces the cost of communication and coordination. Changing cost struc- tures also lead to new market structure and emerging new middlemen. The Internet espe- cially offers strong marketing opportunities. Marketing in the Internet is much more flexible compared with the traditional marketing instruments. Marketing units can update according to customer feedbacks and add new products accordingly. Cost of updating in the Internet is cheaper than traditional pamphlets and catalogues. Another advantage of the Internet is availability; consumers can reach any information about the product and buy it at any time without a middleman. Furthermore, multi-dimensional medium and virtual reality applications provide the product a realistic visibility, process can take less time and data entry is faster and more flexible which are some of the advantages of using informa- tion technologies.
This chapter can be accepted as the first study in this subject. For that reason, the study may be used as a guidepost to lead comprehensive researches in this field. In Mugla, com- mercial institution activities make up an important share of the businesses. In coastal areas generally the main public income is based on tourism activities, i.e. accommodation and travel agencies. According to this study, the personnel working in these industries are not aware of the environmental destruction because of the increase in the consumption of paper products. Attention should be paid to develop a project to raise awareness of increased paper consumption within the area and promote and develop programs for effi- cient use of ITs.
References
Ataman, B. K. (1999). Science of archiving terms dictionary. Iⴢstanbul: Librairie de Pera.
Baillie, J. (1997). Moving one step closer to the paperless office? People Management, 3(April 3), 44.
BT Vizyon (2001). Developing environment system unit and paperless office concept. http://www.
btvizyon.com.tr/viz_dergi_dosya.phtml?kulakcik_nox⫽26&konu_dosya_no x⫽45 (01.12.2004) Cross, J. A. (1986). A paperless environment for group effort in document development. Computer
Science Department, Indiana University of Pennsylvania, ACM, pp. 97–101.
Hemphill, B. (2001). Paperless or less paper. Financial Planners’ Guide to Technology, 14(7), 22–25.
Heresniak, E. J. (1997). The paperless office. Across the Board, 34(February), 15.
Hilgen, D. (2000). Going paperless. Best’s Review, 101(3), 124.
Isaacs, L. (2002). Following the paperless trail. American City and County, 117(6), 51–60.
Icoz, O. (2001). Turizm Iⴢ¸sletmelerinde Pazarlama, 2.b. Ankara: Turhan Kitabevi.
Kaplanseren, E. (2004). Technology is increasing paper consumption. Mesaj, http://www.nethaber.
com/haber/haberler/0,1082,48537_3,00.html (01.12.2004) Karahasan, F. (2004). Marks – Trends. Milliyet, 25.04.2004, pp. 3–4.
52 Yasar Sari et al.
Liu, Z., & Stork, D.G. (2000). Is paperless really more? Rethinking the role of paper in the digital age. Communications of the ACM, 43(11), 94–97.
Odabas, H. (1999). Electronic documents and archives. Adventure of information: Past, present and future ... society of Turkish libraries foundation 50 years international symposium’s announce- ments November, Ankara, pp. 17–21.
Phelan, S. E. (2003). A paperless success story. http://www.aicpa.org/pubs/jofa/ oct2003/phelan.htm (20.06.2005)
Sellen, A. J., & Harper, R. H. R. (2003). The myth of the paperless office. USA: The MIT Press.
Electronic Documents and Brochures for Sustainable Tourism Marketing 53
This page intentionally left blank
54