Quality management practices and tourism destination branding: inter-relationship and preferential study of the components

Quality Management Practices (QMP) are already popular in engineering sector and it has enormously benefited both the manufacturers as well as the consumers. Due to globalization, especially in tourism sector, the trends have shifted towards providing Quality services and Quality experiences to tourists visiting several tourism destinations. Hence, the present study was done to build a framework for providing Quality tourism services as well as tourist experiences which could help the destination management organizations (DMOs) to gain competitive advantage. The main purpose of the study was to identify Quality Management Practices (QMP) as well as the components of Tourism Destination Branding. The preferences-wise study both in the QMP dimensions as well as in the Destination Branding Components (DBC) will help the tourism service providers or DMOs to prioritize their quality constructs and branding components to deliver the memorable experiences to tourists. Furthermore, the inter-relationship between the branding components was also analyzed to judge the psychology of the tourists visiting the tourism destinations. The Sample Area of the study was two important tourism destinations of North India viz. Jammu and Shimla. In this study, respective Destination Management Organizations (DMOs) were chosen. The Stratified Sampling Technique was applied for sampling purposes and total responses were 392 out of 500. The Statistical techniques of Mean, Standard Deviation, Correlation and Multiple Regression were used to analyze the ranking and inter-relationship between QMP and DBC. It has been concluded that the continuous approach to deliver the QMP leads to satisfied customers, which in turn could be utilized by the tourism service providers to contribute towards the strategic branding of the tourism destinations. Moreover, the results of the study suggest that DMOs should prioritize the implementation and practice of the Quality Management Practices (QMP) and Self-Actualization as a prominent Branding Components for effective implementation of Quality construct.