Findings on harvesting tourists ideas through an online contest

Younger users tend to submit higher quality ideas.

The study from Dr. Lidija Lalicic and Prof. Astrid Dickinger, both from the Department of Tourism and Service Management, demonstrates how Destination Management Organizations (DMOs) can fruitfully harvest users' ideas by facilitating an online idea contest to enhance value creation and innovation processes.

In total, 489 ideas were assessed based on the overall quality and effects of various factors. A structural model was tested to analyze the dimensions contributing to quality of the submissions that influence the overall idea quality. Furthermore, non-parametric tests were performed to reveal how specific user traits as well as contest-related traits relate to overall idea quality. Lastly, post-hoc analyses were performed to reveal if mean values differ among users who are grouped according to age, overall idea quality, place of residence and age at time of submission

The study found that novelty, feasibility, relevance and elaboration explain overall idea quality. Only the age of the idea submitter exhibits an impact on the level of idea quality, meaning younger users tend to submit higher quality ideas. The areas of innovation significantly differ depending on the users' place of residence and age. Moreover, none of the contest-related traits that were analyzed have an impact on the level of overall idea quality.

 Practical uses mean that Marketing Managers and DMOs could be given a set of recommendations on how to facilitate internet-based participation tools, such as ideas contests, to collect high quality input from various user segments and, subsequently, to feed their value creation and innovation processes.

Learn more aboutProf. Astrid Dickinger's research

Learn more aboutDr. Lidija Lalicic's research