Exploring the Possibility of Short-Form Travel Videos for Cross-Border Promotion in Rural Tourism During the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Case Study of Ganzi Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, China

Abstract

The impacts of short-form travel videos (STVs) on destination marketing have been widely acknowledged in recent years. Although there have been many prior studies on short video platforms, the mechanism and research system of the impacts of travel contents in short-form videos on users are not clear. This study aims to reveal the possibilities of STVs in cross-border tourism promotion and to develop research models and survey methods applicable to research related to the contents of STVs. Therefore, a scenario-based experiment was designed using STVs related to Ganzi (甘孜) destination. The findings (N = 456) highlighted that users’ attitudes towards STVs have a direct impact on destination image and travel intention, while users’ emotional resonance (self-reference, sense of presence) and cognitive resonance (perceived esthetics, credibility, and entertainment) jointly determine users’ attitudes towards STVs. With the application of stimulus-organism-response (SOR) theory as a basic framework, this study explains the influence mechanism of STVs. The possibility of cross-border promotion and destination image building in impoverished areas was explored using a scenario-based experiment.