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Social and Behavioral Sciences

University of Wollongong

Market segmentation

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Full-Text Articles in Business

An Investigation Of Tourists’ Patterns Of Obligation To Protect The Environment, Sara Dolnicar, Friedrich Leisch Nov 2008

An Investigation Of Tourists’ Patterns Of Obligation To Protect The Environment, Sara Dolnicar, Friedrich Leisch

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

Destinations are increasingly concerned about the environmental sustainability of the local tourism industry. A number of authors have proposed a demand-driven approach to sustainable destination management as a complementary measure to traditional supply-sided interventions. However, there is little empirical evidence to support the feasibility of such a demand-driven approach. This study contributes to this gap by investigating whether individuals who feel morally obliged to behave in an environmentally friendly manner represent useful target segments for destination management aiming to improve the ecological sustainability of the local tourism industry. Results indicate that distinctly different moral obligation segments exist that differ in …


Segmenting Tourists Based On Satisfaction And Satisfaction Patterns, Sara Dolnicar, H. Le Jan 2008

Segmenting Tourists Based On Satisfaction And Satisfaction Patterns, Sara Dolnicar, H. Le

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

Market segmentation has a long history in empirical tourism research. So does satisfaction research. Yet, little work has been done at the cross-roads of these two areas. This chapter makes a step towards filling this gap by (1) reviewing prior work in data-driven market segmentation with a specific focus on satisfaction, (2) analysing managerial recommendations resulting from these studies, and (3) providing empirical examples of how commonsense and data-driven segmentation studies could be conducted using satisfaction as discriminating criterion between tourists.


Management Learning Exercise And Trainer’S Note For Market Segmentation In Tourism, Sara Dolnicar Jan 2007

Management Learning Exercise And Trainer’S Note For Market Segmentation In Tourism, Sara Dolnicar

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

Tourists are different. Tourists prefer different destinations, engage in different vacation activities and perceive different aspects of their vacation as important. Differences (heterogeneity) among tourists enable the tourism industry to identify interesting groups within the market who have similar and very distinct needs, target them, and gain competitive advantage through offering superior service to a smaller group of tourists instead of trying to satisfy the entire market’s diverse needs. The process of identifying and learning about possible market segments that may be managerially useful is referred to as market segmentation. This article shows how researchers can develop learning exercises for …


Beyond “Commonsense Segmentation”: A Systematics Of Segmentation Approaches In Tourism, Sara Dolnicar Jan 2007

Beyond “Commonsense Segmentation”: A Systematics Of Segmentation Approaches In Tourism, Sara Dolnicar

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

Market segmentation is an accepted tool in strategic marketing. It helps to understand and serve the needs of homogeneous consumer sub-populations. Two approaches are recognized: a priori and data-driven (a posteriori, Mazanec, 2000; post-hoc, Wedel & Kamakura, 1998) segmentation. In tourism there is a long history of a priori segmentation studies both in industry and academia. These lead to the identification of tourist groups derived from dividing the population according to prior knowledge (“commonsense segmentation”). However, due to the wide use of this approach, there is not much room for competitive advantage to be gained by using a priori segmentation. …


Ascending Mount Kosciusko: An Exploration Of Motivational Patterns, Tracey Dickson, Sara Dolnicar Jan 2006

Ascending Mount Kosciusko: An Exploration Of Motivational Patterns, Tracey Dickson, Sara Dolnicar

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

This paper explores what, if any, usable market segments exist within those tourists visiting Mt Kosciuszko over the Easter period based upon their rating of a set of motivations. An assumption that might be made about visitors to Mt Kosciuszko is that their prime motivation was to ascend the summit of the highest point in Australia, however what this paper highlights is the wide range of motivations that inspire people to be on Mt Kosciuszko to visit and to return to the summit. This paper draws on previous research of visitors Mt Kosciuszko, investigates systematic motivational patterns among them and …


Choosing A Primary School In Australia: Eliciting Choice-Determining Factors Using The Theory Of Planned Behaviour, Edmund Goh, Sara Dolnicar Jan 2006

Choosing A Primary School In Australia: Eliciting Choice-Determining Factors Using The Theory Of Planned Behaviour, Edmund Goh, Sara Dolnicar

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

Many studies have been conducted in the past to identify why parents choose certain school types for their children. Although a number of interesting insights resulted from these studies, they did not take advantage of any of the established behavioural theories that may enable a more systematic analysis of school choice. In the present study we make a step towards filling this gap: we use the Theory of Planned Behaviour (TPB) as a basis for our study of school choice in the Australian context. The aims of the study are (1) to elicit reasons for choosing and reasons for not …


To Segment Or Not To Segment? An Investigation Of Segmentation Strategy Success Under Varying Market Conditions, Sara Dolnicar, R. Freitag, Melanie J. Randle Nov 2005

To Segment Or Not To Segment? An Investigation Of Segmentation Strategy Success Under Varying Market Conditions, Sara Dolnicar, R. Freitag, Melanie J. Randle

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

A computer simulation study is conducted to explore the interaction of alternative segmentation strategies and the competitiveness of the market environment, a goal that can neither be tackled by purely analytic approaches as there is neither sufficient and undistorted real market data available to deduct findings in an empirical manner. The fundamental idea of the simulation is to increase competition in the artificial marketplace and to study the influence of segmentation strategy and varying market conditions on organisational success. Success/failure is measured using two performance criteria: number of units sold and survival of organisations over 36 periods of time. Three …


Fear Segments In Tourism, Sara Dolnicar Feb 2005

Fear Segments In Tourism, Sara Dolnicar

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

This article proposes the investigation of fear segments in tourism. By doing so, a broadly accepted strategic marketing tool (market segmentation) is integrated with a topic that presently causes significant concern to the tourism industry: the impact of negative global events on tourism demand. The concept of psychographic segmentation is extended to a new construct of tourist psychographics: kinds of perceived fears associated with vacation travel. The academic relevance lies in the introduction of a novel segmentation base to tourism research, the practical value lies in the potential for improved target marketing, minimizing the risk of demand fluctuations. The concrete …


Understanding Barriers To Leisure Travel - Tourist Fears As A Marketing Basis, Sara Dolnicar Jan 2005

Understanding Barriers To Leisure Travel - Tourist Fears As A Marketing Basis, Sara Dolnicar

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

The usefulness of investigating fears tourists associate with leisure travel as basis for strategic and operational marketing is investigated. Tourism-related fears are elicited from the tourism marketplace to gain insight into the precise risks today’s tourists perceive and heterogeneity of respondents with regard to these risk perceptions are investigated in the context of domestic and overseas travel. Distinctly different patterns of perceived risks emerge for different destination contexts as well as subsegments of tourists. This knowledge could form a good basis for optimising marketing communication messages to address tourists’ concerns more effectively.


Beyond "Commensense Segmentation" - A Systematics Of Segmentation Approaches In Tourism, Sara Dolnicar Jan 2004

Beyond "Commensense Segmentation" - A Systematics Of Segmentation Approaches In Tourism, Sara Dolnicar

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

Market segmentation is an accepted tool in strategic marketing. It helps to understand and serve the needs of homogeneous consumer sub-populations. Two approaches are recognized: a priori and data-driven (a posteriori, Mazanec, 2000; post-hoc, Wedel & Kamakura, 1998) segmentation. In tourism there is a long history of a priori segmentation studies both in industry and academia. These lead to the identification of tourist groups derived from dividing the population according to prior knowledge (“commonsense segmentation”). However, due to the wide use of this approach, there is not much room for competitive advantage to be gained by using a priori segmentation. …


Segmenting Markets By Bagged Clustering, Sara Dolnicar, Friedrich Leisch Jan 2004

Segmenting Markets By Bagged Clustering, Sara Dolnicar, Friedrich Leisch

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

We introduce bagged clustering as a new approach in the field of post hoc market segmentation research and illustrate the managerial advantages over both hierarchical and partitioning algorithms, especially with large binary data sets. The most important improvements are enhanced stability and interpretability of segments based on binary data. One of the main goals of the procedure is to complement more traditional techniques as an exploratory segment analysis tool. The merits of the approach are illustrated using a tourism marketing application.


Tracking Data-Driven Market Segments, Sara Dolnicar Jan 2004

Tracking Data-Driven Market Segments, Sara Dolnicar

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

Market segmentation has become a standard concept in tourism marketing. A priori and a posteriori (data-driven) segmentation approaches enjoy high popularity among both practitioners and researchers. In order to optimize the market segmentation strategy it is not only necessary to identify relevant market segments, describe them, evaluate the match between corporate or destination strengths and segment needs but also, to determine how segments develop over time. This knowledge is typically accounted for when a priori segments are used. In the case of a posteriori segments, however, such trend tracking is neglected. In this paper a tracking framework is presented that …


Data-Driven Market Segmentation - A Structure-Based Conceptual Framework For Management Decision Support, Sara Dolnicar, Friedrich Leisch Dec 2003

Data-Driven Market Segmentation - A Structure-Based Conceptual Framework For Management Decision Support, Sara Dolnicar, Friedrich Leisch

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

Market segmentation increasingly uses homogeneous groups of consumers determined on the basis of empirical market data as target segments (a posteriori-, data-driven-, post hoc segmentation) rather than splitting individuals according to single, typically socio-demographic or geographic, criteria (a priori-, commen sense segmentation). A vast amount of contributions has been made to improve methodology of identifying or constructing data-based market segments. However, real world data sets often do not contain clearly separated density clusters. Therefore all techniques used in data-based market segmentation can render multiple solutions of similar quality. So far no attempt has been made to construct a framework enabling …


The Influence Of Interactions Between Market Segmentation Strategy And Competition On Organizational Performance – A Simulation Study, Sara Dolnicar, R. Freitag Jun 2003

The Influence Of Interactions Between Market Segmentation Strategy And Competition On Organizational Performance – A Simulation Study, Sara Dolnicar, R. Freitag

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

A computer simulation study is conducted to explore the interaction of alternative segmentation strategies and the competitiveness of the market environment, a goal that can neither be tackled by purely analytic approaches nor is sufficient and undistorted real market data available to deduct findings in an empirical manner.The fundamental idea of the simulation is to increase competition in the artificial marketplace and to study the influence of segmentation strategy and varying market conditions on organizational success. Success/failure is measured using two performance criteria: number of units sold and survival of firms over 36 periods of time. Three central findings emerge: …


Winter Tourist Segments In Austria - Identifying Stable Vacation Styles Using Bagged Clustering Techniques, Sara Dolnicar, Friedrich Leisch Jan 2003

Winter Tourist Segments In Austria - Identifying Stable Vacation Styles Using Bagged Clustering Techniques, Sara Dolnicar, Friedrich Leisch

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

Market segmentation is a very popular and broadly accepted way of increasing profitability. The number of reports published on a posteriori market segmentation studies has rapidly increased since Russel Haley’s milestone publication on benefit segmentation in 1968. Nevertheless, it is common practice in market segmentation to use a single segmentation base only, thus choosing the main dimensions of interest a priori, and to run a single calculation of a single algorithm, which dramatically increases the chance of building an entire marketing plan on a random solution of the algorithm chosen. The application presented constructs winter vacation styles on the basis …


A Review Of Data-Driven Market Segmentation In Tourism, Sara Dolnicar Jan 2002

A Review Of Data-Driven Market Segmentation In Tourism, Sara Dolnicar

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

Clustering has become a very popular way of identifying market segments based on survey data. The number of published segmentation studies has strongly increased since the milestone publication on benefit segmentation by Haley in 1968. Nevertheless, numerous very fundamental weaknesses are permanently encountered when studying segmentation studies in detail, thus making the results reported more than questionable. This article illustrates how data-driven segmentation studies are typically conducted in the field of tourism research, provides a systematic overview of applications published in the last decades, outlines critical issues that often lead to overestimation of the validity of results and offers solutions …


Profiling Vacation Segments With An Environment Protection Attitude – A Strategic Marketing Approach Towards Sustainability, Sara Dolnicar Jan 2002

Profiling Vacation Segments With An Environment Protection Attitude – A Strategic Marketing Approach Towards Sustainability, Sara Dolnicar

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

The optimal way of implementing sustainable tourism is to identify that particular market segment that cares about environmental issues and does not perceive it as sacrifice to treat the destination’s resources with care. This study aims at reviewing past endeavours in this direction and empirically illustrate the approach suggested by characterizing the group of sustainable summer vacationers in Austria. These tourists turn out to offer a strong basis for the creation of a sustainable niche segment for future marketing action.


Getting More Out Of Three Way Data - Simultaneous Market Segmentation And Positioning Applying Perceptions Based Market Segmentation (Pbms), Sara Dolnicar May 2001

Getting More Out Of Three Way Data - Simultaneous Market Segmentation And Positioning Applying Perceptions Based Market Segmentation (Pbms), Sara Dolnicar

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

Perceptions based market segmentation (PBMS) is a simple framework for market structure analysis integrating the issues of segmentation and positioning. The only requirement is the availability of three-way data (numerous respondents evaluate numerous brands according to numerous attributes). The implicit consideration of interrelations between positioning and segmentation prevents unharmonized strategic marketing decisions and enables managers with clear strategic goals to analyze market information in depth and arrive at a profound basis for segmentation and positioning decisions. In this study, PBMS is applied to deodorant data. The simultaneous treatment of all three data dimensions enables insights into deodorant brand images (among …


Behavioral Market Segmentation Of Binary Guest Survey Data With Bagged Clustering, Sara Dolnicar, Friedrich Leisch Jan 2000

Behavioral Market Segmentation Of Binary Guest Survey Data With Bagged Clustering, Sara Dolnicar, Friedrich Leisch

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

Binary survey data from the Austrian National Guest Survey conducted in the summer season of 1997 were used to identify behavioural market segments on the basis of vacation activity information. Bagged clustering overcomes a number of diffculties typically encountered when partitioning large binary data sets: The partitions have greater structural stability over repetitions of the algorithm and the question of the "correct" number of clusters is less important because of the hierarchical step of the cluster analysis. Finally, the bootstrap part of the algorithm provides means for assessing and visualizing segment stability for each input variable.