관광정보로서의 UCC가 관광목적지 이미지와 향후 방문의도에 미치는 영향

Abstract

긍정적인 이미지는 관광객의 여행 동기가 약한 경우에도 여행행동을 유발할 수 있는 효과가 있고 관광객의 목적지에 대한 태도와 선택에도 매우 중요한 영향을 미치므로, 관광목적지 이미지의 제고는 관광목적지의 성공적인 운영을 위하여 필수적인 요소이다. 따라서 관광마케터들은 마케팅 전략 수립에 있어서 차별화된 이미지의 구축 및 제고를 통한 잠재관광객의 방문을 유도를 도모하기 위한 노력을 해야 한다. 잠재관광객들은 관광지를 선택함에 있어 ‘지각적 모호성’으로부터 벗어나고자 한다. 즉, 이들은 가능하면 생생하고 현실을 그대로 반영하는 관광정보를 필요로 한다. 잠재관광객을 대상으로 커뮤니케이션 하기 위해서는 이러한 관광객의 요구를 반영할 수 있는 매체 선택이 중요한데, 최근 생생하고 현실감 있는 정보를 효과적으로 전달할 수 있는 매체로서 주목 받고 있는UCC가 그 방안이 될 수 있다. 정보의 생동감과 더불어UCC는 다른 매체에 비해 비상업적인 성격을 지니므로 전달력이 높고, 적은 비용으로 집행이 가능하므로 비용대비 효과성이 높다고 알려져 있다. 이러한 장점에도 불구하고 아직까지는 관광목적지의 마케팅 수단으로서의 UCC의 효과성에 대한 실증적인 검증은 미비한 상황이다. 따라서 본 연구는 UCC의 효과성을 실증적으로 검증함으로써 향후 관광목적지 마케팅에 있어 UCC의 활용에 대한 이론적 근거를 제공하고자 하였다. UCC가 관광목적지 이미지 형성과 향후 방문의도에 영향을 미치는가를 검증하기 위해, ‘지리산 둘레길’라는 관광목적지에 대하여 그에 관한 동영상 UCC에 노출되기 전과 후의 각 이미지 및 향후 방문의도를 실험연구를 통해 측정하였다. 측정방법은 관광목적지 이미지 측정에 관한 선행연구를 바탕으로 23개의 인지적 이미지 척도와 9개의 정서적 이미지 척도를 사용하였으며 향후 방문의도를 묻는 3개의 척도를 사용하였다. 측정된 변화가 통계적으로 유의한 차이를 보이는가를 분석하였으며 분석결과는 다음과 같다. 첫째, 동영상 UCC는 인지적∙ 정서적 이미지 및 전반적 이미지와 향후 방문의도에도 긍정적인 영향을 미치는 것으로 나타났다. UCC 노출 전과 후의 이미지 척도의 평균을 비교한 결과 모든 척도에서 UCC노출 후 평균값이 증가하는 것으로 나타났으며 몇 개의 인지적 요소를 제외하고는 모두 통계적으로 유의한 차이를 보이는 것으로 분석되어 인터넷 구전 커뮤니케이션 매체인 UCC는 관광목적지의 이미지 및 향후 방문의도를 변화시킬 수 있는 가능성이 있는 것으로 확인되었다. 둘째, 향후 방문의도의 변화가 이미지의 변화를 통해 초래된 것인가를 확인하기 위해 이미지와 향후 방문의도간의 단계적(Stepwise) 다중회귀분석을 실행한 결과, 동영상 UCC관광정보를 통한 이미지의 변화는 향후 방문의도에 통계적으로 유의한 수준의 긍정적인 영향을 미치는 것으로 분석되었으며 향후 방문의도에 영향을 미치는 인지적, 정서적 이미지의 구성에도 변화를 가져오는 것으로 확인되었다. 이는 실험변수로 사용된 UCC의 내용에 따라 달라진 것으로 보이며 이는 제작주체의 의도를 담은 UCC를 통해 목적한 이미지를 형성 또는 강화할 수 있는 가능성을 의미한다고 볼 수 있다. 셋째, UCC가 이미지 구성개념 간의 관계에 미치는 영향을 분석하기 위해 정서적 이미지를 종속변수로 하고 인지적 이미지를 독립변수로 하는 단계적(Stepwise)다중회귀분석을 시행한 결과, UCC노출 후 정서적 이미지를 설명하는 인지적 이미지 구성에 변화가 있었으며 그 설명력 또한 변화하여, 이미지 구성개념 간의 관계에도 유의한 영향을 미쳤다. 분석 결과를 종합해 보면 관광목적지에 대한 동영상 UCC는 관광목적지의 이미지 구축 및 변화를 유도할 수 있는 마케팅 매체로서의 가능성이 있으며 잠재적 관광객으로 하여금 향후 방문을 유도할 수 있는 효과적인 수단임을 알 수 있다. 본 연구는 UCC가 잠재관광객의 인식구조에 영향을 미쳐 이미지 변화에 영향을 미치고 결과적으로 향후 방문의도를 증대시키는가를 실증적으로 검증함으로써 관광목적지 마케팅에 있어 도입단계인 온라인 구전커뮤니케이션의 효과성에 대한 실증적인 검증근거를 마련하였다는 점에서 의의가 있다. 이러한 실증적인 검증의 결과는 기업 혹은 관광목적지 관리 주체에게 온라인 관광정보로서의UCC의 효과성에 대한 이론적 근거를 마련해줌으로써 보다 효과적인 마케팅 전략을 구축하는 데에 도움을 줄 수 있을 것이다.

주제어: 온라인 관광정보, UCC(User Created Contents), 관광목적지 이미지, 인지적 이미지, 정서적 이미지, 향후방문의도, 구전커뮤니케이션 |As positive images of a tourist destination can often cause even tourists with low travel motivation to form positive attitudes toward the destination and has important influence on tourists’ choose of destination, making a better image of a tourist destination is inevitable for a successful management of it. Therefore, marketing managers in the field of tourism need to plan effective marketing strategies that can differentiate and promote the images and thus attract potential tourists to the destination. It is very important for a successful strategy to deliver vivid and clear information to potential tourists because they usually want to stay away from perceptual incertitude. This is the context where UCC (User Created Contents) are being spotlighted among various marketing methods of WOM (Words of Mouths). UCC are also said to stand out among other media for their credibility due to their lack of commerciality, and for their high cost-efficiency. Nevertheless, empirical studies on the effectiveness of UCC as a marketing method have not been carried out sufficiently yet. This study aims to provide an academic basis for the effectiveness of UCC as a marketing method in the field of tourism through empirical verifications. In this study, in order to verify whether UCC have influence on forming images and visit intentions to tourist destinations, the ‘Jirisan Trail(Dul-e-gil)’ is set as the tourist destination, and the images and visit intentions of potential tourists before and after an exposure to a given UCC regarding the destination are measured and analyzed. Based on former studies on measuring images of tourist destinations, 23 components of cognitive images, 9 components of affective images and 3 components of future visit intentions have been selected, and changes thereof have been analyzed to see if they have statistical significance. The main results are as follows: Firstly, UCC can exert some positive influence on cognitive images, affective images, overall images and also future visit intention. As a result of mean value analysis, mean values in all scales for image measurement have increased, and except for a few in cognitive images, all those increases showed statistically significant difference. Therefore this study has verified the possibility that UCC can derive changes of images and future visit intentions for tourist destinations. Secondly, a stepwise multiple regression analysis was executed to verify that the change in future visit intentions was derived from changes in images. As a result, it is verified that changes in images caused by the UCC have positively affected future visit intentions in the level of statistical significance. In addition, it was found that there were changes as to which cognitive and/or affective components are decisive to the future visit intentions. This changes seem to be caused by messages and contents of the UCC used as the experiment variable, which implies that UCC can deliver messages targeted to specific image components of which the images marketers intend to form or enhance. Lastly, results of another stepwise multiple regression analysis, in which affective image components are set as dependant variables while cognitive as independent, showed that there were changes as to which cognitive image components are relevant to a given affective image component, and also as to the degree of the relevancy. To summarize, results in this study shows that UCC on tourist destinations as marketing media can be viable means for building and/or changing images thereof, and are effective in attracting potential tourists and inducing them to visit the destinations in the future. This study has empirically verified the chain of relevance between influence on cognitive structure, changes in images, and increase in the intention to visit a given tourist destination in the future, thus provided an academic basis to the effectiveness of UCC as means for marketing tourist destinations. The results of this study might thus be of some help to entities managing tourist destinations plan a more effective marketing strategies.

*Key words: Online tourism information, UCC(User Created Contents), Destination Image, Cognitive Image, Affective Image, Future Visit Intention, WOM(Word Of Mouth Communication); As positive images of a tourist destination can often cause even tourists with low travel motivation to form positive attitudes toward the destination and has important influence on tourists’ choose of destination, making a better image of a tourist destination is inevitable for a successful management of it. Therefore, marketing managers in the field of tourism need to plan effective marketing strategies that can differentiate and promote the images and thus attract potential tourists to the destination. It is very important for a successful strategy to deliver vivid and clear information to potential tourists because they usually want to stay away from perceptual incertitude. This is the context where UCC (User Created Contents) are being spotlighted among various marketing methods of WOM (Words of Mouths). UCC are also said to stand out among other media for their credibility due to their lack of commerciality, and for their high cost-efficiency. Nevertheless, empirical studies on the effectiveness of UCC as a marketing method have not been carried out sufficiently yet. This study aims to provide an academic basis for the effectiveness of UCC as a marketing method in the field of tourism through empirical verifications. In this study, in order to verify whether UCC have influence on forming images and visit intentions to tourist destinations, the ‘Jirisan Trail(Dul-e-gil)’ is set as the tourist destination, and the images and visit intentions of potential tourists before and after an exposure to a given UCC regarding the destination are measured and analyzed. Based on former studies on measuring images of tourist destinations, 23 components of cognitive images, 9 components of affective images and 3 components of future visit intentions have been selected, and changes thereof have been analyzed to see if they have statistical significance. The main results are as follows: Firstly, UCC can exert some positive influence on cognitive images, affective images, overall images and also future visit intention. As a result of mean value analysis, mean values in all scales for image measurement have increased, and except for a few in cognitive images, all those increases showed statistically significant difference. Therefore this study has verified the possibility that UCC can derive changes of images and future visit intentions for tourist destinations. Secondly, a stepwise multiple regression analysis was executed to verify that the change in future visit intentions was derived from changes in images. As a result, it is verified that changes in images caused by the UCC have positively affected future visit intentions in the level of statistical significance. In addition, it was found that there were changes as to which cognitive and/or affective components are decisive to the future visit intentions. This changes seem to be caused by messages and contents of the UCC used as the experiment variable, which implies that UCC can deliver messages targeted to specific image components of which the images marketers intend to form or enhance. Lastly, results of another stepwise multiple regression analysis, in which affective image components are set as dependant variables while cognitive as independent, showed that there were changes as to which cognitive image components are relevant to a given affective image component, and also as to the degree of the relevancy. To summarize, results in this study shows that UCC on tourist destinations as marketing media can be viable means for building and/or changing images thereof, and are effective in attracting potential tourists and inducing them to visit the destinations in the future. This study has empirically verified the chain of relevance between influence on cognitive structure, changes in images, and increase in the intention to visit a given tourist destination in the future, thus provided an academic basis to the effectiveness of UCC as means for marketing tourist destinations. The results of this study might thus be of some help to entities managing tourist destinations plan a more effective marketing strategies.

*Key words: Online tourism information, UCC(User Created Contents), Destination Image, Cognitive Image, Affective Image, Future Visit Intention, WOM(Word Of Mouth Communication)