Digital marketing and food tourism: towards a better understanding of food tourists’ engagement

Having considered the importance of food in a destination’s development, its key role in the tourists’ experience, marketing and enhancing the existing tourism ‘product-service’ offering, it is not surprising that food tourism is a growing sector. Moreover, food has become a major theme across various digital communication channels. With this in mind, tourism businesses must maximise the potential of various new digital technologies which, enable tourists to engage with a destination, especially since consumers’ reliance on social networks is increasing due to the advances in technology and media communications. Subsequently, the purpose of this research is to examine the role of digital marketing communications within the food tourism context. To gain an in-depth insight into the industry outlook and a better understanding of tourists’ behaviour, a qualitative two stage multiple method research design has been proposed.