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TITRE DE LA COMMUNICATION
“Innovations in wellness tourism & spas: analyzing the consumer experience and listening to
customers”
« Innovations dans le tourisme de bien-être & spas: analyse de l’expérience du
consommateur et écoute de la clientèle »
Nom, Prénom des auteurs
SOTIRIADIS Marios (sotirm@unisa.ac.za ) & VAN ZYL Ciná, Vzylc@unisa.ac.za
University of South Africa (UNISA), Department of Transport Economics, Logistics & Tourism
Address: Club One, cnr Dely & Albert Street, Hazelwood, Pretoria, South Africa.
Tel: +27/0124334699 / Fax: +27/0866409838
Résumé (500 mots)
All tourist practices and activities are the expression of human needs and desires of a lifestyle within the social
and economic context of every time period. Consumers are the main actor of tourism activity. On the other hand,
tourism destinations and businesses are constantly looking for creating, managing and marketing experience
opportunities for visitors. Within this context, there is an imperative to properly address and meet the new
demands of tourists.
The main aim of this paper is to analyse the consumer experience as an efficient way to identify areas offering
innovation opportunities in the field of wellness tourism and spas and to suggest techniques to get customer
feedback. The issue of developing experience innovations might be approached from two perspectives i.e. supply
or demand (consumer experience); this paper adopts the latter approach. Hence, the paper is structured into three
sections:



Briefly present the theoretical framework of experiential marketing (Schmitt, 1999).
Analysis of spas and wellness tourism experience
Suggestions: proposing ways and possible areas of innovation opportunities in business offering and
methods of customer feedback.
In simple terms innovation means the introduction of new product/services, new production processes, supply
chain links, managerial revisions, and communication changes. Literature suggests that “innovation is the creation
of better or more effective products, processes, services, technologies, or ideas that are accepted by society,
markets, and government” (Hjalager, 2011: 127). It is estimated that innovation in tourism is much more than the
introduction of a new service; it may also be a new way to produce or organize a service, or a better link to
suppliers. Additionally, tourism innovation is dominantly a people process. Customers, suppliers, and business
partners possess a wealth of knowledge. Strategic innovation in tourism is about tapping that knowledge,
interpreting the information and recycling it in new contexts. The challenge is for organisations and managers to
get the time and resources to transform knowledge acquired into more systematic strategic processes (Hjalager &
Nordin, 2011).
The important categories of driving forces that materialize for organizations as incentives in innovation processes
in tourism businesses include: research, consumers, technology, suppliers (Jiménez-Zarco et al. 2011). Our
analysis focuses on consumers. An efficient way for wellness & spa providers to address this issue is to really
listen and understand their customers. Carefully attended / monitored consumers can be a goldmine of information
that can lead to changes in products, services and processes. Customer feedback refers to the transmission of
negative or positive information to providers about the services used. Such information can be useful for service
providers in identifying areas in which adjustments are required or new offers may be introduced. Methods to get
customer feedback include: customers’ complaints handling, systematic collection of ideas, customer surveys,
proposal boxes, observation and enquire customers; test users or ‘mystery shoppers’. Our analysis will contribute
to enhance wellness tourism providers to address news demands by consumers and to customize their offering by
developing new offers that are off the beaten track and/or that are differently produced.
Mots-clés:
Wellness & Spa services, Consumer Experience, Marketing, Customer feedback, Innovations.
Références bibliographiques
ATLAS Special Interest Group (2011), Spa and wellness research group, available at http://www.atlaseuro.org/sig_wellnes.aspx (Accessed on 4-10-2012)
Erfurt-Cooper P., Cooper M., 2009, Health and wellness tourism: spas and hot springs, Channel View
Publications, Bristol, UK
Haden L., 2007, “Spa tourism”, Travel and Tourism Analyst, 9, p.1-59
Hjalager A.-M., 2010, “A review of innovation research in tourism”, Tourism Management, 31(1), p. 1-12
Hjalager A.-M., 2011, Strategic innovation in tourism business, In L. Moutinho (Ed.), Strategic management in
tourism (2nd edn), CAB International, Oxfordshire, p. 127-140
Hjalager A.-M., Nordin S., 2011, “User-driven Innovation in tourism - a review of methodologies”, Journal of
Quality Assurance in Hospitality and Tourism, 12(4), p. 289-315.
Jiménez-Zarco A.I., Martínez-Ruiz M.P., Izquierdo-Yusta A., 2011, “Key service innovation drivers in the tourism
sector: Empirical evidence and managerial implications”, Service Business, 5(4), p. 339-360
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Schmitt B., 1999, “Experiential marketing”, Journal of Marketing Management, 15(1), p. 53-67
Schmitt B., 2003, Customer experience management: a revolutionary approach to connecting with your
customers, J. Wiley & Sons, New York
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Smith M., Puczko L., 2009, Health and wellness tourism, Butterworth-Heinemann, Oxford.
Sotiriadis M., (forthcoming), “Hotel spa & wellness services in Crete: a marketing analysis’, In A. Nedelea & B.
George (Eds.), Global tourism marketing: case studies, Lambert Academic Publishing, Germany.
Version 2.0 / 27-01-2014 / MS