The state of Oregon in the USA has become a beacon for tribal tourism as Native American villages have been developed to host theme based tours. This has led to the surge in creation of tourism jobs across the state. A special museum has been created in the town of Warm Springs to facilitate learning about the tribal communities. As yet the level of tribal tourism has not reached the frenzy of neighbouring Washington state or Canada’s British Columbia, but some luxury hotels have sprung up.

Market researchconducted by a leading firm has generated certain results and tips which can best accelerate automation in marketing. Certain methods have been suggested to ensure the same. Personalization is passé, now is the era of hyper-personalization. Buyer personas must be understood to tailor products/ services accordingly. Greater investment must be made in the field of Business analytics. Each marketing campaign must have its own content strategy. Sales and marketing must not be exclusive of each other, but must instead complement. The future of business and marketing lies in the smartphone. Data generated must be synced between all sources including Facebook, e-mail, field data and LinkedIn. A platform such as Makesbridge must be selected as it ensures multi-tasking capability. Communication must be a continuous process within the firm. Crucially, integration across channels must be implemented as it helps in utilization

Engagement Labs which has created the eValue score has joined up with Macromeasures to form a business analytics and consumer insights giant. Clients will now be able to tap information important regarding social media and analytics to develop buyer personas suited to their products/ services. It will help in demographic segmentation in order to develop corporate strategy. Each firm will get a score to benchmark itself against more than a hundred thousand brands. KPIs will also be generated on social media responsiveness, impact and engagement success.

ERP eventually developed out of integration between various back-end processes which found common platform as it was needed. Similarly, firms have tried developing suites to package all social media products into one bundle. However, business research conducted by Forrester has proved this to be unsuccessful as only the word social is common to Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram etc. and their purpose and operations are totally different. Adobe Social which is an integrated suite has been unable to generate the business analytics which the creators hoped to. They have also made management training more complicated than ERPs

Corporate strategyhas usually considered alignment of technology solutions to operations as best possible outcome. Yet at a conference held at Ras-al-Khaimah, an IT industry insider pointed out that the industry has always tried to keep things complicated at operational level to maintain the aura which tourism firms hold technology in. Software is often created by geeks in order to satisfy their creative urges, but may not always be applicable and this creates complexities in CRM. 

Eleven people have been identified as trendsetters in the travel industry generating numerous tourism jobs and creating further avenues for travelers. Ruzwana Bashir has developed a digital suite at peek.com to explore unique travel packages and enable bookings along with other back end operations. The founder is an MBA with Fulbright scholarship. Robert Milk has founded NOVICA, which is an online, fair trade market place to promote art developed by local artists often working from home industries. Now nearly fifty thousand works of art get traded there. HarriKulovaara of Royal Caribbean cruises has initiated the construction of world’s largest, yet thrilling ships such as ‘Oasis of the Seas’ and ‘Allure of the Seas’. His smart-ship ‘Quantum of the Seas’ is fitted with an observation pod, virtual balconies and skydiving facilities. Number of tourism jobs have been generated by this. Using business analyticsADARA started by Layton Han, collects data and arranges for seat upgrade on flights. For the youth in the USA, bus travel seemed unfashionable until very recently when it has revamped thanks to the efforts of Dale Moser and his megabus.com which enables travel on double decker buses fitted with state-of-the-art facilities. Chris Lopinto’s expertflyer.com provides users with a virtual round-up on all inexpensive flights and the amenities expected. Zeke Adkins and Aaron Kirley have developed Luggage Forward which enables the transport of luggage across more than two hundred countries. Travis Kalanick has disrupted market dynamics by founding Uber which uses crowd-sourcing to organize cabs for travelers. Ed Kushins of Home Exchange has arranged for a website which helps travelers to seek rooms rented so they can reside locally at low prices. Geraldine Caplin of Hilton Worldwide has come up with this new tablet which allows travelers to check-in to hotels without the assistance of the reception counter. Even rooms at hotels worldwide can be unlocked using the smartphone or tablet post booking confirmation.

While tourism is a harbinger of great prosperity and generator of good number of travel jobs, certain cities in Europe are resenting the excesses of the same. Barcelona residents feel that tourist numbers are too great and beyond the city’s carrying capacity. While Lisbon tourist association’s corporate strategy feels even greater numbers can be accommodated, the locals view the situation differently and feel too many hotels are propping up, many of them with uncertain business practices. Venice has always had this feel of isolation but now increasing number of traditional residents are leaving the city due to tourism related overcrowding. Rome’s famous city centre has become notorious for having restaurants charging excess from visitors thus increasing cost of living even for residents.