Social media users as place marketers
: how foreign citizens living in Portugal promote the country online

  • Inês Martins de Albuquerque (Student)

Student thesis: Master's Thesis

Abstract

With the growing relevance of social media and social media influencers, the way a country is presented on social networking sites can shape the attitude of future visitors or residents and their intention to visit the country. Although the phenomenon of travel influencers has already been studied, to our knowledge, there are still no studies that try to understand the impact that foreign residents can have on the promotion of a country on social media. This study aimed to fill this gap in the literature by analyzing the role of foreign people living in Portugal as promoters of the country, identifying the main types of content they produce and how the country can benefit from this type of promotion, including through the attraction of residents to Portugal. The findings highlighted the relevance of social networking sites in the promotion of the country and in the attraction of tourism and foreign residents, as well as the positive and negative effects of this attraction, the negative ones being linked to the problem of mass tourism. Furthermore, this study demonstrated how social media influencers contribute to the effect of globalization and influence the attitudes of others towards a country, in this case, Portugal.
Date of Award27 Oct 2023
Original languageEnglish
Awarding Institution
  • Universidade Católica Portuguesa
SupervisorCarla Martins (Supervisor) & Joana Machado (Co-Supervisor)

Keywords

  • Social networking sites
  • Influencers
  • Travel influencer
  • Tourism
  • Country branding
  • Country image

Designation

  • Mestrado em Gestão

Cite this

'