Application of Network Attention in Tourism Marketing: A Case Study of Guangdong Hot Spring Tourism Destinations in China

Guangdong is famous as a hot spring tourism destination in China. In spite of its popularity, the development of Guangdong hot spring tourism destination is also facing many problems. On one hand, the market of hot spring tourism in Guangdong is highly concentrated and tends to saturation. Customers from Guangdong province account for above 90%. Customers from other provinces just account for a small proportion, and only get a very slow growth. On the other hand, there is an obvious seasonality in time distribution of the customers. Because of these problems, the pressure of market competition of Guangdong hot spring resort industry is becoming increasingly intense. Exploring the potential tourist market is the urgent problem facing Guangdong hot spring resort industry. Based on the survey of Guangdong hot spring tourism destination, using the analytical tool "Baidu Index", this paper makes a deep analysis on the network attention of hot spring tourism destinations in Guangdong. According to the research, in terms of time distribution, the trend of time-changing curve of Guangdong hot spring tourism destinations' network attention is basically in accordance with that of the real tourist market, but a time deviation is observed in the occurrence of the wave. In terms of spatial structure, Guangdong hot spring tourism destinations' network attention and real tourist market have a certain similarity in general feature. However, there are still certain differences. The discovery offers a useful reference for both exploring potential tourist market and determining optimal marketing opportunity in the future development of Guangdong hot spring tourism destinations.