Holiday planning

3. Holiday planning

From everything mentioned thus far, it can be concluded that for Internet users, modern journeys start before they leave the house. Holiday planning is important and in a way it represents an integral part of the holidays themselves. Therkelsen and Gram (2008) note that taking holidays consists of a decision, planning, execution and verification. The decision and planning depend on many internal and external factors, from the user’s idea of an ideal experience to the Internet itself, that is, how a tourist destination is represented, whether there is a language barrier, whether the amount of information is sufficient and whether the web content is entertaining and attractive. “Consumers are not just rational, but very much emotional and social beings who engage in the acquisition, consumption and disposal of products in order to construct a meaningful life”, argued Østergaard and Jantzen (2000, in Therkelsen & Gram, 2008, p. 271). The Internet as a source of information is most important in the planning phase. For planning, people mostly use the Internet search engines which confirm that the largest number of searches and inquiries are tourism-related. Searching for tourist information on the Internet is part of everyday life for millions of people, as well as a part of the popular and pop culture, a way to be cool. Croatia as a tourist destination has a number of different web sites dedicated to tourism. Volcic (2008) in the survey entitled “The Former Yugoslavia on the WWW” analyzed how the six former Yugoslav republics brand their image on a “user-friendly interface on the Internet” (Gauntlett & Horsley, 2004, p. 5). She stressed that there are “two main theoretical research traditions of exploring the nation-branding phenomenon, the applied marketing approach and the media critical tradition. The majority of marketing applied studies on the branding of nation are conducted by marketing scholars who celebrate market deregulation and understand nation as a brand (Kotler & Gertner, 2002; Kotler, et al., 1999; Papadopoulos, Heslop & Beracs, 1989; Will & Porak, 2000, in Volcic, 2008, p. 396). Thus, the main goal is an economic one, namely to obtain global capital, and it has been adopted, the author believes, by many countries such as Singapore, Malaysia, South Africa, Spain and Croatia. In her article, she examined the construction of self-image from a critical theory perspective. Generally, the web presentation of Croatian tourism, as Volcic (2008) stressed, focuses on the “freshness of Croatia—of its sea, people, food, cuisine and culture—Croatia is indeed unique” not only for its crystal clear, clean blue sea, but also for a thousand years of different cultures! Tourism representation frames Croatia as a special kind of place, a natural paradise not ruined by

a destructive civilization, yet modern enough so that tourists can enjoy “expensive, first class shopping” and “five star hotels” (Volcic, 2008, p. 405). Despite the fact that the author in her detailed analysis may sound a little ironic, we assert with full responsibility that everything she wrote is true and that tourists in Croatia can indeed enjoy all the benefits rarely found in other Mediterranean countries. However, it is important to bear in mind her claim that

Internet as a source of information for tourists —The case of Croatia

the “Internet self-representation” and the “process of online-nation branding” should be kept under control and prevented from straying into excess commercialization where they would lose their own national identity.