Research On The Factors Of Destination Image And Their Effects On The Development Of Moroccan Tourist Destination

In the tourism sector,customers regard the image of the destination as an essential concern.Actually images have a critical position in the choice of destination and they are considered to be more valuable than reality since the services in toxurism context are intangible.Remaining to the tourist destination brand,efficient positioning becomes the key of the creation of this brand value.The destinations with international positioning have become aware of the existence of the destination image as a medium and have evolved from traditional marketing to a dynamic model adapted to new characteristics of services.In general terms,branding and marketing research have always focused on the appearance of a product,the value it brings to the product,and its perception or its evaluation at the consumer level.However,in tourism,the construction of a brand is one of the main development barriers for professionals.Indeed,being a very competitive and turbulent sector,the professionalism in tourism must be the subject of a consistent visibility in order to position itself in an optimal way.Therefore,image studies are treated to be an:indispensable element of marketing strategies.With the purpose of exploring the touristic destination image of Morocco,a questionnaire was conducted;it focused on three approaches,the cognitive,affective and conative one.It comprised the open-ended and closed-ended kind of questions.Additionally,a five Likert scale was adopted in the quantitative research.The survey was distributed to 260 foreigners.The software of SPSS statistics 20.0 was used in the analysis of the results.The results were obtained following a factorial analysis which showed that tourists place a lot of importance on the five factors of experiential quality,namely:The natural resources with the highest coefficient followed by the comfort,the price and value,the general attractions and finally the social environment.These factors have a real impact on the overall destination image.This study has allowed us to understand how the destination of Morocco is perceived in the perception of foreigners tourists through the factors of the cognitive approach,in order to properly and effectively manage the dimensions shown above in order to sit down a good positioning.The results presented by our study will enable decision-makers to review,improve and,above all,develop their marketing strategies on the international market in order to gain more visibility and notoriety compared to their competitors.