Competitiveness of Tourist Destinations According to the Customers’ View: introduction of a new method of assessment

Abstract

This article assesses the competitiveness of an inland city as a tourist destination, in relation to its key competitors. The work introduces a new method to measure the competitiveness of tourist destinations through the eyes of the customers, based on perceptual mapping of respondents, which allows evaluation of the main strengths and weaknesses perceived by the audience, and compare them with competitors’ competiveness. In addition to the subjective evaluation through perceptual mapping, the proposed method also uses Exploratory Factor Analysis to evaluate the destination's performance objectively, and to compare them with the main competitors. The work is innovative in relation to the precedents, once the proposed method allows simultaneously identify the main competitors for a tourist destination and evaluate their performance both in relation to the customers' expectations, and in comparison to the key competitors. Although encouraging, results shall be taken with care, given that the sample have a large portion of  students and that it was gathered by convenience over the internet, a method that does not allow much control over respondents' behaviour.