Destination marketing as a team effort: the practices and experiences of three tourism entrepreneurs in northern Sweden

Abstract: This thesis set out to see how small and medium sized tourism entrepreneurs
are using collaborative destination marketing as a complement to their use
of marketing as a single destination. To accomplish this, a case study
approach was used with interviews carried out with respondents from three
tourism companies in the Swedish region of Norrbotten. The results show
that the tourism SMEs are working within long-term partnership networks
crossing muncipal and regional boarders. Perhaps as a consequence to this,
the companies do not consider themselves to have any competitors, only
partners. Another finding was that the reasons for entering a collaboration
varies and depend on the situation for the single company. Finally the
results show that while previous work have considered tourism SMEs as
rather poor marketers, these companies are strong in certain aspect while
weak in others.