Cultural tourism, driven by marked changes at the cultural awareness level and the visitor needs, has been experiencing drastic changes in recent years, both in the way of presenting cultural values and satisfying the widely diverse population of cultural tourists. The aim of this study is to provide an insight into the range of newly formed selective types of the offer, as well as to provide a conceptual background that could serve as a basis for the future research by other authors, with an emphasis on the vulnerability of the elementary concept of cultural tourism, based on diversity and recognition. It also points out to the necessity of setting and solving the problematic issue of further pervasive diversification of cultural programs, at the expense of preserving developmental progress and protecting the connection of cultural contents with true cultural valuesfrom the aspect of cultural sustainability. This empirical study emphasizes the importance of separate observing the cultural phenomenon from the overall view of the destination tourist system.

The estimate of market attractiveness by the local management structures shows its basic shortcoming in that it does not take the impression of visitors as a relevant criterion to a sufficient extent. The abovementioned impressions, transformed into the appropriate rating system of the offered values would allow for a more efficient analysis of current cultural-tourism offers at localities. Accordingly, in a research study conducted at the site of the Petrovaradin fortress (in the northern Serbian province of Vojvodina), a testing of the modified assessment approach was performed, based on the application of the basic model of tourist valorization: Du Cross (2000). This approach is based on the conversion of quantitative parameters of assessment (numerical score on a scale) into qualitative data (attributive measurement characteristics of attractiveness). By grouping of attributive characteristics, based on the previously performed procedure of average values ranking of the scores, the conditions for creating a unique "structural list" of tourist attractions are made. The principle for grouping is the determination of direction and the size of deviation of average values from the determined arithmetic mean of ranks. Thus, in contrast to the basic model (Du Cross), in which only the position within the relevant field of the matrix of market attractiveness and robustness (MAR) is essentially determined, the possibility is offered to accurately classify the elements of attractiveness according to their importance and partially achieved contribution to the resulting /total market positioning.

The difficulties of delivering a consistently satisfactory quality of tourism services emerge as a result of the discrepancies between the productive structures and corresponding dimensional features of delivering values during their cycle of consumption. Organizational enterprise system is the primary responsible for the above mentioned phenomenon, and it consists of production (working) units and departments in charge of quality management as well as control and monitoring of the production processes, that is, the flow of delivery. This paper discusses the current models of structural complexity, dimensional observations of quality as well as the phases of user participation throughout the life cycle of tourism services. The possibility of identifying several typical levels in the complex tourism product provides the groundwork for a more meaningful comparison between “projected and actual quality”, as well as achieving greater organizational performances in the domain of market-delivered value of the resulting service. The main objective of this paper is to provide a theoretical basis for the implementation of deeper organizational and functional analysis models and continuous monitoring of the achieved quality. The effects of such systematic approach would be manifested to the ultimate degree of fulfillment of expectations and the overall customer or user satisfaction with tourism service.

Abstract:The difficulties of delivering a consistently satisfactory quality of tourism services emerge as a result of the discrepancies between the productive structures and corresponding dimensional features of delivering values during their cycle of consumption. Organizational enterprise system is the primary responsible for the above mentioned phenomenon, and it consists of production (working) units and departments in charge of quality management as well as control and monitoring of the production processes, that is, the flow of delivery. This paper discusses the current models of structural complexity, dimensional observations of quality as well as the phases of user participation throughout the life cycle of tourism services. The possibility of identifying several typical levels in the complex tourism product provides the groundwork for a more meaningful comparison between "projected and actual quality", as well as achieving greater organizational performances in the domain of market-delivered value of the resulting service. The main objective of this paper is to provide a theoretical basis for the implementation of deeper organizational and functional analysis models and continuous monitoring of the achieved quality. The effects of such systematic approach would be manifested to the ultimate degree of fulfillment of expectations and the overall customer or user satisfaction with tourism service.