Papel dos centros de informações turísticas na promoção dos destinos turísticos

Abstract

Information services for tourists constitute one of the components of the tourist offer – and consequently – of the tourist product. Currently, information is a crucial element of competitiveness in organizations, all agents and members of the tourist activity are linked to it. Tourist information centers are information units, physical or virtual spaces (based on the web) in which tourists, visitors or those interested in certain tourist destinations seek information. In this context, this work aims to understand the contribution of tourist information centers (CIT's) in promoting tourist destinations. However, to carry out this work, exploratory research was used, with bibliographic research as a procedure to achieve the objectives. The results of this research show that tourist information centers are one of the important elements for campaigns to promote tourist destinations, as, through their services, they help tourists to establish the first impression of a location, which can be essential in the decision to return from that tourist to the locality in another opportunity. These centers also collaborate in order to make their services more agile and reliable, and with an active posture, enabling them in a more prominent position as an instrument to support the other elements of the offer and the real and potential tourist demand. (TRADUÇÃO NOSSA)