The present research provides insights into the complex landscape of online advertising channels to support tourism organizations in formulating their marketing strategies. People often use search engines and online travel agencies in a very similar way. The aim and sequence of actions that consumers perform on Google or Booking.com are exactly the same, but for the potential sellers each channel presents different costs and attributes. In the Google model, firms make bids and pay on a cost-per-click basis. In the Booking.com model, firms pay commissions based on the value of services sold. Under budget constraints, one of the first problems a company may encounter is determining the resource allocation to different channels. Hence, an analytical model is introduced to compare the profits generated from online search engines and online travel agencies. Assuming a trade-off between different online marketing channels, the study suggests the maximum cost per click that a tourism organization should pay to benefit from search engine marketing as much as from online travel agencies. The analytical model is tested empirically by using data from two hotels and managerial implications are discussed.

本研究提供了有关在线广告渠道复杂景观的见解，以支持旅游组织制定其营销策略。人们通常以非常相似的方式使用搜索引擎和在线旅行社。消费者在Google或Booking.com上执行的目标和行动顺序完全相同，但是对于潜在的卖方，每个渠道呈现出不同的成本和属性。在Google模型中，公司以每次点击费用出价和付款。在Booking.com模型中，公司根据所售服务的价值支付佣金。在预算约束下，公司可能会遇到的第一个问题是确定对不同渠道的资源分配。因此，引入了一种分析模型来比较在线搜索引擎和在线旅行社产生的利润。假设在不同的在线营销渠道之间进行权衡，该研究建议旅游组织为受益于搜索引擎营销而应从在线旅行社获得的每次点击费用最高。该分析模型通过使用来自两家酒店的数据进行了经验检验，并讨论了管理意义。