ABSTRACT
Travel experience is increasingly characterized by more complex journeys based on multi-channel and multi-media systems of interaction between customers and companies. Moreover, the progress of technology and the development of social media and of mobile devices gives travelers the opportunity to share the experience real-time with other peers, affecting the various steps of the travel behavior process (pre-trip, during-trip and post-trip). Travel experience is then the result of a co-creation process increasingly affected by peer-to-peer relationships. Especially during their experience, travelers can create context-related information that influences the behavior of further tourists, who are at the destination at that moment or who will visit it in the future or are searching for information about the destination. Thus, to create, manage and attempt to control the experience of each customer has become increasingly complex for firms.
The chapter provides a conceptualization for the “traveler journey” and explores travelers’ experience at the different stages of their behavior (pre, during and post-trip). The analysis of the “traveler journey” shows a gradual convergence of travel behavior activities from the pre-trip and the post-trip stages to the during-trip. This transformation has important implications for travel companies.
