The challenge of adjusting to new travel trends has led to a quest to find ways to motivate people to travel again and to make the industry more resilient long term. The implementation of phygital marketing as an information source seems promising. This is the first study considering phygital marketing initiatives as an approach to trigger people’s travel intentions. An online questionnaire incorporating a scenario-based 2x2 factorial designed experiment with a longitudinal prospective (2 waves) explored the impact of a technology-based peer-to-peer versus human-machine interaction phygital marketing initiatives as an innovative approach to trigger travel intentions for long-distance and short distance destinations. Study 1 (n=330) shows that the experience of using phygital initiatives not only builds trust but also encourages people to visit destinations, leading to a dynamic experience. Study 2 is currently in the field which means after all most of the pandemic related restrictions have been removed to compare to Study 1’s results. Alongside theoretical contributions, this study presents practical implications on how destinations could implement phygital marketing initiatives.

• Elisa Mameli(University of Surrey, United Kingdom)
• Brigitte Stangl(University of Surrey, United Kingdom)