Affiliate Marketing in Travel and Tourism

Technology-Driven Online Marketing Performance Measurement

“…Lacking regular reassessment, these objectives are unable to evolve and account for new opportunities (Kellen, 2003;Valos & Vocino, 2006). For example, the majority of the participants as well as the existing studies (Daniele et al, 2009;Figg, 2005) recognise that affiliate marketing contributes to brand exposure and awareness. Yet, present revenue-oriented affiliate marketing objectives do not aim at the achievement of such intangible benefits as, for example branding enhancement, because branding has traditionally been regarded as difficult-to-measure and from the outset has not been associated with affiliate marketing.…”

Affiliate Marketing in Tourism

“…Nevertheless, AM is also associated with a number of risks. From a merchant's perspective, this mainly includes deceptive behavior by affiliates in order to obtain commissions by fraud (Payton 2006) and issues of brand control (Daniele et al 2009). AWs are often the first touch point with potential customers, and online information has a significant effect on images and representation of tourism providers (Li et al 2009).…”

“…AM programs have emerged as one of the fastest-growing methods to acquire customers and increase sales on the web (Mariussen, Daniele, and Bowie 2010; Fox and Wareham 2010) and have, therefore, gained importance in the strategic marketing considerations of tourism businesses (Daniele et al 2009). Although precise estimates of the global AM market size are difficult to obtain, it has been growing continuously over recent years (e.g., IAB 2012).…”

“…The primary objectives of AM are therefore to promote and sell products or services through traditional distribution outlets, by driving web traffic to affiliates and generating transactions from online users in return for a commission (Malaga 2007). Recent research (Mariussen, Daniele, and Bowie 2010; Daniele et al 2009) indicated an increased relevance of AM for the travel and tourism industry, and demonstrated its major strategic importance for customer acquisition and revenue generation.…”

“…The importance of online information sources for consumers’ perceptions of tourism products has been highlighted (Li et al 2009). Thus, given the importance of AM in tourism distribution, Daniele et al (2009) contended that the tourism industry in particular needs to gain a deeper understanding of consumers’ acceptance of AM activities, and their attraction to different types of affiliate websites (AWs). The latter represents a crucial issue for the effectiveness of AM activities, as success ultimately depends on the number of generated leads, and thus consumers’ acceptance of affiliates (Goldschmidt, Junghagen, and Harris 2003; Hofmann and Novak 2000).…”