Destination Brand Governance: An Exploration of Destination Management Organisations’ and Operators’ Perspectives.

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Author(s)
Primary Supervisor
Grace, Debra
Gardiner, Sarah
Other Supervisors
Gryd-Jones, Richard
Year published
2014
Metadata
Show full item recordAbstract
This thesis explores Destination Management Organisations’ (DMOs) and operators’ role in destination branding. The thesis draws upon a resource-based view to explore how the combination of a destination’s key resources and capabilities (i.e. destination brand) create valuable destination experiences that are aligned to consumer needs and wants. In doing so, through a multi-stakeholder exploration of branding practices, this thesis builds on existing destination branding literature. As the broker of the destination’s resources, the DMO must balance the relationships with operators to establish a consistent destination experience ...
View more >This thesis explores Destination Management Organisations’ (DMOs) and operators’ role in destination branding. The thesis draws upon a resource-based view to explore how the combination of a destination’s key resources and capabilities (i.e. destination brand) create valuable destination experiences that are aligned to consumer needs and wants. In doing so, through a multi-stakeholder exploration of branding practices, this thesis builds on existing destination branding literature. As the broker of the destination’s resources, the DMO must balance the relationships with operators to establish a consistent destination experience through brand governance. Yet, destination brand governance is complex due to the heterogeneity of the organisations involved developing and delivering the brand. As such, balancing the relationships within the destination to establish brand buy-in is a challenge for DMOs. This thesis defines brand buy-in as the operators’ willingness to engage positively with the destination brand. The process requires the operators and DMOs to contribute resources together to achieve a consistent brand experience. Failure to do so weakens brand experience and negatively influences consumer loyalty. It is therefore vital that DMOs understand the dominant logic influencing operators’ destination branding goals to stimulate brand buy-in. The absence of empirical research exploring destination brands from an operator perspective and, in particular, ways to promote their buy-in prompt the need for this research. In doing so, ways for DMOs to balance operator relationships through governance mechanisms are revealed
View less >
View more >This thesis explores Destination Management Organisations’ (DMOs) and operators’ role in destination branding. The thesis draws upon a resource-based view to explore how the combination of a destination’s key resources and capabilities (i.e. destination brand) create valuable destination experiences that are aligned to consumer needs and wants. In doing so, through a multi-stakeholder exploration of branding practices, this thesis builds on existing destination branding literature. As the broker of the destination’s resources, the DMO must balance the relationships with operators to establish a consistent destination experience through brand governance. Yet, destination brand governance is complex due to the heterogeneity of the organisations involved developing and delivering the brand. As such, balancing the relationships within the destination to establish brand buy-in is a challenge for DMOs. This thesis defines brand buy-in as the operators’ willingness to engage positively with the destination brand. The process requires the operators and DMOs to contribute resources together to achieve a consistent brand experience. Failure to do so weakens brand experience and negatively influences consumer loyalty. It is therefore vital that DMOs understand the dominant logic influencing operators’ destination branding goals to stimulate brand buy-in. The absence of empirical research exploring destination brands from an operator perspective and, in particular, ways to promote their buy-in prompt the need for this research. In doing so, ways for DMOs to balance operator relationships through governance mechanisms are revealed
View less >
Thesis Type
Thesis (PhD Doctorate)
Degree Program
Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)
School
Griffith Business School
Copyright Statement
The author owns the copyright in this thesis, unless stated otherwise.
Item Access Status
Public
Subject
Destination Management Organisations’ (DMOs)
Destination branding
Buy-in framework
Tourism