Online Communication and Italian Tourism

Tourism destinations seek to attract tourists in innovative and enticing ways by using web-based communication media. Since tourists have the choice between many destinations of the same target category, destinations are required to provide something special in order to stand out from other destinations. Recently, a lot of attention has been paid to the idea of creating promotional ecosystems able to represent territorial specificities while, at the same time, taking advantage of the global attractiveness of the country brand. However, less is known about how integrated bottom-up approaches. Since congruence between destination image and destination identity was already found to be highly important for successful destination branding, integrated bottom-up communication could provide a reliable basis for developing effective destination branding campaigns