Consumption and Hedonic Experience: Tourist Destination of Fernando de Noronha, PE, Brazil

Abstract

Individuals are influenced by hedonic and experiential factors at the moment of buying a product. The influence of comments through virtual communities have an important role within the process of the consumer experience, however theories suggest that the image of tourist destinations has great importance for the creation of past experience to travel, which is responsible for the expectations of visitors and involves emotional bonds of tourists to the destination. This study aims to analyze the hedonic experience of consumption on the tourist destination of Fernando de Noronha, Pernambuco, Brazil, via a virtual community. The data collection for this research was conducted through the comments posted by the participants of the virtual community TripAdvisor in the forum about the destination of Fernando de Noronha. The research is qualitative and exploratory in nature. A netnography analysis was performed in the virtual community about the tourist destination. The results show the presence of the experiential dimensions in the comments and interactions of each review in TripAdvisor. Data from tourists involved in such experiences had a set of information for future applications in the tourism industry, and to develop competitive strategies of tourist destinations.