External Information Search:

Abstract

External information sources are employed by tourists and form the basis for vaction planning. For marketers it is relevant to know what kind of information should be used in tour brochures to stimulate the tourist's external vaction search process. In this context the effect of experiential and non-experiential information on external search behavior is examined in a field experiment. External information search is defined as the request of a free vaction magazine through the sending of a brochure response card. Actually, this overt behavioral response to brochures is measured as the dependent variable. The results indicate that tour brochures with experiential texts and a readers' instruction to enactive imagery, did not cause more external search than brochures without such information.