Tourism Australia Analysis Assignment Sample

• Subject Name : Management

Externally Focused Business Research

Introduction to Externally Focused Business Research

Tourism Australia is the government agency run by the Australian Government. It is responsible for attracting large number of international visitors to Australia for both business events and leisure activities. It plays an active role in 15 major activities and markets comprising of PR and media programs, industry programs, advertising, trade shows, online communications, consumer research and consumer promotions (Tourism Australia, 2020). The major vision of the organization is to uplift the Australia as the most memorable and desirable destination to spend holidays with family and to organize major business events and programs on earth. The organization is governed by a board of directors who are required to report to the Federal Minister for Tourism. The key role of the board of directors is to establish a policy for Tourism Australia and to make sure that it is carrying out its operations in an effective and efficient manner.

Australia has grown-up from a destination fascinating more than 200000 overseas visitors over the past 5 decades and contributing more than $70 million on annual basis. In year 2016, more than 8 million visitors have arrived who undertook expenditure of over $39 billion (Tourism Australia, 2020). The success of Australia as destination has been established on its combination of unique wildlife and world class natural beauty along with their welcoming nature and delicious food and wine. Moreover, the visitor mix in Australia has evolved over the years from Europe, UK, New Zealand, USA to the rising markets of Asia involving Singapore, Japan, China, Indonesia, India and Malaysia. The organization is running a global campaign, named “There’s Nothing Like Australia” to capitalise the experiences and best attractions of Australia (Tourism Australia, 2020).

Tourism is contributing significantly to the growth of the Australia’ economy. The domestic expenditure of the country exceeded $100 billion and Australia stands as among the top ten nation incurring the international expenditure of over $64 billion on outbound trips (Australian Government, 2020). Australia is now being marketed as one of the inspirational destinations internationally, with a powerful emphasis on high value travellers. This accompanies the justifiable intent of tourism in Australia accomplishing strong economic advantages while dealing with several social and environmental impacts (Australian Government, 2020). However, the tourism industry is exposed to continuously travel trends and the risks linked to geopolitical and global economic uncertainties.

Revenue of the industry is calculated on the basis of total amount of expenditure incurred on tourism products and services by both international and domestic tourists. It has been forecasted that the revenue of the tourism industry will decline by 19.4% in the year 2019-20 because of the various travel restrictions being imposed by Federal Government and limits imposed by state governments on domestic travel (IBIS World, 2020). The average profit margin of the industry is likely to decline in 2020 because of the significant decline in tourism activities.

There are number of challenges that are being imposed for both industry and the company. The current bushfires in the country has significantly affected the industry of Australian tourism with fires across 9 regions of tourism (Australian Government, 2020). This affects the domestic as well as international tourism in Australia. The COVID-19 outbreak also led to the ongoing risks to the domestic and international tourism. The largest inbound visitor market of Australia is China with over more than 1 million visitor arrivals in the year 2018 – 19. Various travel restrictions have been imposed while the extent of the event is yet to be go through. A tourism 2020 strategy has been established which constitutes as a joint partnership among the tourism industry and Australian Government with an objective to double the expenditure to between $115 billion to $140 billion by the end of 2020 (Australian Government, 2020). This strategy also lays down several supply side targets in order to enable the industry to accomplish the set objective.

Business Enhancement

Business enhancement is defined as a transformation or the course of change that has been brought in the organization to enhance the product or service and to raise the value of the enterprise. A number of enhancements can be used by the organizations in order to increase the effectiveness and efficiency of various processes and operations performed by the business enterprise (Quinton & Wilson, 2016). There are some essential enhancements that can be effectively used in the industry. First enhancement is concerned with customers’ experience. Loyalty towards a particular brand increases with the better customer experience. Therefore, enhancement of customer experience is considered important to bring in new customers to raise the profitability of the enterprise. There are various strategies like identifications of problems and quick resolution of the same, use of technology to improve the quality of service, provide training to the staff members to give adequate customer service, etc. can be applied to enhance the customer experience.

The CSR activities have the potential to develop a wide range of customer values (Glaveli, 2020). An essential role is played by customer values in enhancing the perception of customers towards the brand and the company which further led to the enhancement of customers’ loyalty. Constant improvements in the business processes can help in reducing the inefficiencies and will lead to the improvement in the productivity in the performance of team members. The processes that are inefficient may highly discourage the workers and employees. It is considered highly important for business enterprises to optimize their advertising campaign. This will help in producing a positive image for the company’s brand. Various social media channels like Twitter, Facebook and Google + can be used to enhance the advertising endeavours. Development of employees also paly an integral role towards the growth of business. The companies must provide its employees with the ability to participate in various programs and events.

Research Aimed at Understanding Customers

A consumer is defined as a person or group of persons who pays the amount for consuming or using the products or services that are being offered by the organization. The businesses and developers in the today’s world are focussing too much on customer profiles and on correlations that have been attached in data and figures. Focussing just on consumer profiles are not enough rather understand what the customers are trying to accomplish in a specific scenario. It has been suggested that the innovators must effectively identify the inefficiently performed jobs in the lives of customers and then adequately design the experiences, products and processes revolving those jobs. The circumstances are considered relatively important as compared to characteristics of consumers, attributes of products, new technologies and trends in the market. Jobs cannot be defined as simple functions as they have strong emotional and social dimensions (Christensen et al., 2016). A thorough understanding of a particular will help the organization in innovating those jobs. The final objective of carrying out of consumer research is to assist as the voice of the customers.

This kind of research laid emphasis on gaining understanding about the customers as a person by learning effectively with regard to their attitudes, motivations, needs and behaviours. Moreover, consumer research helps in providing reliable, valid, relevant and recent information regarding its target customers to the business organization (Anshari et al., 2019). In the area of tourism, market research with regard to consumers can be defined as the orderly collection and assessment of data with regard to preferences of the customers for the products and services offered by the business organization. All the aspects of business environment are required to be examined while carrying out consumer research. A wide range of purposes can be served with the help of consumer market research. This will help the company in undertaking effective business decision making process and in obtaining the advantages over the rising competition in the market. Moreover, strategic and tactical decisions can be made by the marketing executives and managers while identifying the needs of the visitors with the purpose of satisfying them with the help of consumer market research (Chaffey & Smith, 2017).

It also eliminates some of the uncertainties by fetching relevant data and information about the current business environment, marketing variables and consumers. If such relevant information is not available then the adequate response of the visitors to various campaigns cannot be accurately and reliably predicted. Various insights are being provided by the consumer research that will help in optimising the tourist services and direct the enlargement of tourism into the new markets. Several characteristics of the target market are easily revealed by the research. Tourism Australia must identify and understand the jobs that are required to be done. This will help in creating the experience that is being needed by the customers and after that integrate those customer experiences in the processes of the company. Processes are concerned with the procedure followed in the organization with regard to integration of different functions in order to support the job to be done (Langenwalter, 2020). These are considered as the major part of the unspoken culture of the organization. Adequate attention towards these processes will fetch proper guidance to each and every employee working in the organization.

Research Aimed at Understanding Innovation

Innovation is defined as the process of more effective products and ideas. For a particular business enterprise, it can be considered as the implementation of new ideas, enhancement of services offered and development of dynamic products. Innovation have the potential to create business growth and help in adapting to the fast changing marketplace. Effective innovation practices must constitute as the major part of the business strategy where it can create a culture of innovation and a way of creative thinking. A completely new supporting technology infrastructure is required Tourism Australia. Connected and smart products are pressurizing the companies to restructure their industries and to completely renew their thinking patterns starting from the formulation of strategies. The products and services offered by the business organization have a strong influence on its operations and organizational structure. The infrastructure, data generated and the new product capabilities are continuously shaping the work of every function performed in the business organization including manufacturing, IT, logistics, manufacturing, sales, marketing, after slae service, etc.

Moreover, better coordination among these functions is required by the business enterprise (Porter & Heppelmann, 2015). New structures of cross functional association and completely different functions are evolving in the today’s business environment. These new functions may include unified organization of data and group of people responsible for ensuring optimization of customer relationships. The technology stack offers a gateway for exchanging the data between the servicers and visitors and integrates such data from external sources, business systems and various other related products. This will also act as a platform for storing data and analytics and running of several applications and to protect such data from unreliable access. The effective combination of data monitoring and capability to remote control helps in creating new and better opportunities for achieving optimization in operations and different functions performed by the business organization (Gaber et al., 2019). This technology stack comprised of multiple layers of embedded software, new product hardware, a product cloud comprising of software running effectively on remote servers, connectivity, a set of security tools, etc.

Alterations in tourism practices by Tourism Australia will help in generating key benefits by establishing change in the direction of greater sustainability within its supply chain and various other sectors. Trends that are leading to variations in travel patterns like adventure tourism and recreational activities are growing at a rapid rate (Mason, 2020). Moreover, green innovative practices may lead to creation of more jobs as well as will help in reducing the overall impact of tourism activities on the environment. It will help in reducing the expenditure and in achieving competitive advantage for several destinations and companies along with enhancement of customer experience. Innovation in tourism may comprise of innovation in products and services with changes in existing products and services or development of new products and services, innovation in processes by implementing new ways of delivering customer services, logistic innovation which is concerned with supplying the products and services in new ways to the customers and at last innovation in marketing techniques. Innovation will help Tourism Australia in accomplishing various key objectives like enhancement in the efficiency of its operations, rise in overall profitability and sustainability, decline in cost or expenditure, improvement in satisfying the needs and requirements of customers and helping the businesses to compete effectively in the international market (Pan et al., 2018).

Research Aimed at Understanding the Future

Google, Amazon, Baidu and various other technology giants have established artificial intelligence platforms with rising skilled and efficient digital assistants. Artificial intelligence assistants not only help in minimizing costs and risks for the customers but also help in offering unprecedented conveyance to them (Dawar, 2018). Sociocultural, demographic and sociostructural developments are leading to the successive changes in the tourism sector and tourism service providers are therefore, required to adjust themselves as per changes requirements of the trends. It has been estimated that the internet of things will become a $2 trillion market by the end of 2030 with approximately 75 billion connected devices. Machine learning and internet of things are increasingly becoming central part of the overall economy of the new digital era enabling the organization for formulating new business structures, effective collection of information and other relevant data, analysis of such information, and development of revolutionary systems for delivering efficient services (Pagoropoulos et al., 2017). The tourism and travel industry has significantly adopted the new and effective digital technologies that are generating favourable outcomes.

For instance, Airbnb has not only utilised the app technology in establishing a successful business model, it has completely changed the industry. Technology giants such as Amazon has pioneered the application of Alexa for Artificial intelligence systems meant for booking rooms in the hotels. It has been successfully anticipated that facial recognition technology, integration of mobile phones, artificial intelligence service, personalisation and virtual reality are going to play a crucial role in the tourism industry in future time period. Mobile technologies, machine learning, social media and big data analysis will constantly shape the future of the tourism industry. Therefore, it is considered important for Tourism Australia to keep itself ahead of this digital revolution. In the today’s world scenario, consumers have a desire to gain experience that completely matches their own preferences, starting from destination to accommodation and the various activities in which they engage themselves. Artificial intelligence is now becoming exclusively important for the tourism industry.

The technology of machine learning has entered the marketing avenues of tourism sector with artificial intelligence helping them in personalising the experience of customers with regard to finding and booking of trips and tours. Moreover, artificial intelligence can also be considered valuable in various contexts like smart rooms in hotels, determination of potential needs or requirements of guests and offering of services that will fit the requirements and preferences of guests and effective tuning of the environment (Buhalis & Sinarta, 2019). It is identifying and developing application everywhere in the world ranging from customer service to their security. Similarly, recognition technology is gaining importance in the travel and tourism sector. The major use of this technology at the areas having automatic gates. These gates have the capability to read out the details mentioned on passport or ID card of the traveller and match those details to his/ her face with the help of camera and technology called facial recognition technology.

Reflection of Externally Focused Business Research

I have analysed the scenario of Tourism Australia which is an Australian Government Agency. The organization is governed by a board of directors who are required to report to the Federal Minister for Tourism. The major vision of the organization is to uplift the Australia as the most memorable and desirable destination to spend holidays with family and to organize major business events and programs on earth. I understood that tourism contributes significantly to the growth of the Australia’ economy. The domestic expenditure of the country exceeded $100 billion and Australia stands as among the top ten nation incurring the international expenditure of over $64 billion on outbound trips. The COVID-19 outbreak led to the ongoing risks to the domestic and international tourism. The largest inbound visitor market of Australia is China with over more than 1 million visitor arrivals in the year 2018 – 19. Various travel restrictions have been imposed while the extent of the event is yet to be go through. However, to resolve this challenge, a tourism 2020 strategy has been established which constitutes as a joint partnership among the tourism industry and Australian Government with an objective to double the expenditure to between $115 billion to $140 billion by the end of 2020.

I analysed that focussing just on consumer profiles are not enough rather, understand what the customers are trying to accomplish in a specific scenario. It has been suggested that the innovators must effectively identify the inefficiently performed jobs in the lives of customers and then adequately design the experiences, products and processes revolving those jobs. According to my view points, Tourism Australia must identify and understand the jobs that are required to be done. This will help in creating the experience that is being needed by the customers and after that integrate those customer experiences in the processes of the company. I believe that effective innovation practices constitute as the major part of the business strategy where it can create a culture of innovation and a way of creative thinking. New structures of cross functional association and completely different functions are evolving in the today’s business environment. These new functions may include unified organization of data and group of people responsible for ensuring optimization of customer relationships.

I can say that innovation will help Tourism Australia in accomplishing various key objectives like enhancement in the efficiency of its operations, rise in overall profitability and sustainability, decline in cost or expenditure, improvement in satisfying the needs and requirements of customers. From reading the articles, I get to know about the role of artificial intelligence in the tourism sector. Artificial intelligence assistants not only help in minimizing costs and risks for the customers but also help in offering unprecedented conveyance to them. Machine learning and internet of things are increasingly becoming central part of the overall economy of the new digital era enabling the organization for formulating new business structures, effective collection of information and other relevant data, analysis of such information, and development of revolutionary systems for delivering efficient services. Moreover, I thought that artificial intelligence can also be considered valuable in various contexts like smart rooms in hotels, determination of potential needs or requirements of guests and offering of services that will fit the requirements and preferences of guests and effective tuning of the environment.

I found that technology giants such as Amazon has pioneered the application of Alexa for Artificial intelligence systems meant for booking rooms in the hotels. It has been successfully anticipated that facial recognition technology, integration of mobile phones, artificial intelligence service, personalisation and virtual reality are going to play a crucial role in the tourism industry in future time period.

References for Externally Focused Business Research

Anshari, M., Almunawar, M. N., Lim, S. A., & Al-Mudimigh, A. (2019). Customer relationship management and big data enabled: Personalization & customization of services. Applied Computing and Informatics, 15(2), 94-101.

Australian Government (2020) Economic research and industry reports. Retrieved from https://www.tra.gov.au/Economic-analysis/tourism-industry

Australian Government (2020) State of the industry 2018 – 19. Retrieved from https://www.tra.gov.au/Economic-analysis/state-of-the-industry

Australian Government (2020) Tourism research Australia – Economic value. Retrieved from https://www.tra.gov.au/Economic-analysis/economic-value

Australian Government (2020) Tracking tourism 2020. Retrieved from https://www.tra.gov.au/Economic-analysis/tracking-tourism-2020

Buhalis, D., & Sinarta, Y. (2019). Real-time co-creation and nowness service: lessons from tourism and hospitality. Journal of Travel & Tourism Marketing, 36(5), 563-582.

Chaffey, D., & Smith, P. R. (2017). Digital marketing excellence: planning, optimizing and integrating online marketing. Taylor & Francis.

Christensen,C.M., Hall,T, Dillon,K and Duncan D. S (2016) Know Your Customers’ “Jobs to Be Done”, Harvard Business Review, September 2016, pp54-62

Dawar,N (2018) Marketing in the Age of Alexa, Harvard Business Review, May–June 2018, pp80-86

Gaber, M. M., Aneiba, A., Basurra, S., Batty, O., Elmisery, A. M., Kovalchuk, Y., & Rehman, M. H. U. (2019). Internet of Things and data mining: From applications to techniques and systems. Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews: Data Mining and Knowledge Discovery, 9(3), e1292.

Glaveli, N. (2020). Corporate social responsibility toward stakeholders and customer loyalty: investigating the roles of trust and customer identification with the company. Social Responsibility Journal.

IBIS World (2020) Tourism in Australia – Market research report. Retrieved from https://www.ibisworld.com/au/industry/tourism/1903/

Langenwalter, G. A. (2020). Enterprise resources planning and beyond: integrating your entire organization (Vol. 12). CRC Press.

Mason, P. (2020). Tourism impacts, planning and management. Routledge.

Pagoropoulos, A., Pigosso, D. C., & McAloone, T. C. (2017). The emergent role of digital technologies in the Circular Economy: A review. Procedia CIRP, 64, 19-24.

Pan, S. Y., Gao, M., Kim, H., Shah, K. J., Pei, S. L., & Chiang, P. C. (2018). Advances and challenges in sustainable tourism toward a green economy. Science of the Total Environment, 635, 452-469.

Porter, M. E and Heppelmann, J. E (2015) How Smart, Connected Products Are Transforming Companies, Harvard Business Review, October 2015, pp97-114

Quinton, S., & Wilson, D. (2016). Tensions and ties in social media networks: Towards a model of understanding business relationship development and business performance enhancement through the use of LinkedIn. Industrial Marketing Management, 54, 15-24.

Tourism Australia (2020) Our campaigns. Retrieved from https://www.tourism.australia.com/en/about/our-campaigns.html

Tourism Australia (2020) Our organization. Retrieved from https://www.tourism.australia.com/en/about/our-organisation.html

Remember, at the center of any academic work, lies clarity and evidence. Should you need further assistance, do look up to our Management Assignment Help