METHODOLOGICAL APPROACHES TO THE FORMATION OF THE TOURIST IMAGE OF THE REGION

Abstract

Problem Statement and Purpose Tourist images of countries, regions and cities largely determine their attractiveness, generate a desire to visit them, eventually affect the geography of tourist flows. Therefore, it is so important to use the variousscientific approaches to purposefully form the tourist image of the territory and promote it through marketing among the population – potential tourists. The purpose of the study is to compare the methodological approaches to the formation of the tourist image and to determine the factors that influence its formation.Data & Methods The methodological basis of this study is the work of geographers and researchers – experts in regional marketing and tourism management. In thearticle, the following research methods are used as analysis and synthesis, logical approach, definition, description, interpretation, comparative-geographical, statistical. The selected set of methods is the most optimal in determining theimage-forming factors. The information base of the study was compiled by the State Statistics Service of Ukraine.Results. The article considers such key concepts as tourist’s representation of the territory, tourist’s image, branding of the territory. The discrepancies between geographic and marketing methodological approaches to the formation of the tourist’s image of the territory are revealed that for a geographic approach, complexity is typical, unlike marketing, which focuses mainly on the availability of natural resource potential and consumers. The factors that influence the formation of the tourist’s image of the region are divided on two groups – objectively existing such as natural, cultural, infrastructural resources, and subjective factors, depending on the individual perception of the tourist destination. The tourist image of the territory consists on the basis of one or more spatial nuclei, the function of which, as a rule, is carried out by tourist centers of different specialization. On the basis of the analysis, the factors of formation of the tourist image of the Ukrainian Black Sea tourist region are determined.