Yokoso! Japan: Classifying Foreign Tourists to Japan for Market Segmentation

摘要

This article reports that there are distinctly different types of foreign tourists who visit “destination Japan” for various different reasons. While it is correct, in essence, to generally group domestic tourists in Japan, it is not necessarily correct to assume the same for foreign tourists—that is, to assume group homogeneity. Using a qualitative research method, this research classifies the various types of foreign tourists to Japan using their motives and behaviors as descriptive criteria to guide tour planners and Yokoso! Japan marketers, when targeting international tours. The research further identifies the source markets and their regions, which also helps to segment the groups. This is the first research in and on Japan to use a purely qualitative research process to classify foreign tourists to Japan in order to formulate an effective marketing plan.View full textDownload full textKeywordsJapan travel, Yokoso! Japan, international destination marketing, market segmentation, tourists' typology, tourists' classificationRelated var addthis_config = { ui_cobrand: "Taylor & Francis Online", services_compact: "citeulike,netvibes,twitter,technorati,delicious,linkedin,facebook,stumbleupon,digg,google,more", pubid: "ra-4dff56cd6bb1830b" }; Add to shortlist Link Permalink http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/19368623.2011.615016