Klaipėdos universitetas

Film induced tourism or film tourism is a result of destination image formation and development through film industry with collaboration of other destination image stakeholders (policy makers, private and public investors, scholars and etc.). This postmodern tourism phenomenon links film driven emotions to the filming locations and at the same time is responsible for positive or negative destination image formation. In Lithuanian academic discourses this theory, as well as the impact of films towards local tourism, was not yet recognized. Therefore this article, according to the collected film tourism theoretical material, analyses Lithuanian potential for film induced tourism and how can it be turned into a destination promotion strategy. The conclusions show that there are real opportunities for Lithuania to use film industry as a tool of destination image formation, however it needs further analysis, a clear strategic plan, strong collaboration with Baltic region and the use of two recommendation models, which were presented in this paper. This research can be used for dynamic analysis as well as strategic planning in any specific institution related to filmmaking, tourism and regional image formation.

Higher education export is gaining more and more importance taking into account international competition, the benefits offered by the industry and demographic changes in many countries – the number of local students is reducing due to low birth rates and extensive emigration of young people. There are many academic publications on several aspects related to higher education export. The aim of research is to analyse foreign students’ evaluation on the importance of different organisations’ (universities, agencies dealing with higher education export, ministries) webpage content and design for higher education export. Research methods used: scientific literature review analysis, evaluation of webpages by experts, survey of foreign students (using the evaluation scale from 1 to 10, where 1 means ‘do not agree’, and 10 – ‘fully agree’). Data obtained from the foreign student survey are analysed by indicators of descriptive statistics (arithmetic mean, mode, median, range, standard deviations, standard error of mean), cross-tabulations, correlation analysis and factor analysis. The obtained research results have indicated narrow places and challenges for the information placed in respective webpages and webpage design which could be practically implemented.

This article reflects the impact of regulatory decisions of the Republic of Latvia on the food retail sector and sustainable product supply provided by food retail chains, as well as on operational trends. Attention has been drawn to the law of the Republic of Latvia on the key characteristics of foodstuffs and sales on the market. The research covers development of classification of the main instruments characterizing the products subject to the national regulation, as well as development of a scheme of the impact of the Latvian authorities on the operation of food retail chains. To implement the goal and tasks of the research, the authors have applied quantitative and qualitative research methods of economics, i.e., comparison, grouping, graphical, assessment and analytical methods. The research is based on the results of the previous research conducted by the authors so far, the law of the Republic of Latvia, scientific works published by other scientists, general and special literature and periodicals. The authors have summarized the findings and conducted comparative analysis of the regulatory decisions of the Republic of Latvia as well as presented a market survey within the research.

Social entrepreneurship is becoming more and more popular as there is a growing share of people who would like to contribute for social enterprises and are ready to become customers of the social enterprises and in this way participate in reduction of poverty in the country and support entrepreneurship development. For social enterprise marketing communications to be effective, an understanding is necessary not only of the information channels which are most effective but also of the preferences customers hold regarding the information channels that they would like to receive information from. Purpose of research: to investigate the preferences for different information channels among customers of Latvian social enterprises. Research methods: scientific publications analysis, analysis of previous conducted research results, social enterprise customers’ survey conducted by Kristīne Casno. Results of research have indicated that regular customers of social enterprises prefer such information channels as social networks, followed by television and radio.

Within development of telecommunication, e-commerce is rapidly replacing traditional shopping as well as offering new ways to pay for goods. Payment is one of the main phases of buying decision process and it is crucial to e-commerce, because there is a big possibility that consumer will abandon the shopping cart if preferred payment method is not available. Not only flexible payment options can help company to attract and retain customers, but it also can ensure that company get paid more quickly. The aim of the research is to find out how much money Latvian customers invest when shopping online and which payment methods they use to pay for the purchase on internet in Latvia. Research methods used in the study are scientific publication studies, studies of statistics on internet shopping development, survey realised in Latvia at the end of 2017 and beginning of 2018 on internet shopping in co-operation with company iMarketing, University of Latvia and Chamber of Trade and Commerce of Latvia. For many aspects in evaluation of opinion of respondents it was used evaluation scale 1–10, where do not agree with the statement; 10 – fully agree with statement. For data analysis there were used indicators of descriptive statistics, cross – tabulations, statistical tests of hypotheses, analysis of variance (ANOVA) and correlation analysis. Main results and findings of the study reveals that the most commonly used payment methods for online purchases in Latvia are paying with debit or credit card at the moment of purchase and paying at the store, but the least used payment methods for online purchase is cryptocurrency and at the pick-up box place. Also, there is no statistical difference between female and male customers on use of credit or debit card usage for online payments.

The article is devoted to marketing decision making by different generations. Author have analysed generations, its different formulationsin the world and Latvia. Author described generations of Latvian consumers, analysing statistical data and research results ofadvertising agency DDB Latvia and Gfk. The Development of Generations has significantly influenced the consumption, consumerbehavior, buying process. Very special role in the article is devoted to the generations what will help companies and individuals towork more efficiency in distribution of goods and services in the market. Relevant information about the consumer obtained in atimely manner enables an enterprise to plan their work on the market more successfully.

Innovation development process in companies is described by several challenges. One major problem is that there is much confusion about what it takes to develop innovations and what factors affect the innovation development process. The paper focuses on innovation process’ affecting factors in Latvian market. The paper’s goal is to identify main factors that affect the innovation process the Latvian companies. After surveying 128 companies, authors concludes that many factors affects innovation process and none of them should be ignored. Following factors affect innovation process the most and therefore should be analysed more deeply: 1) The company’s own resources; 2) High employees knowledge, competencies, skills and experience; 3) Investors’ attraction opportunities. Research also emphasises importance of company’s human resource, therefore authors suggest companies to look at their employees from different paradigm and approach them as the most valuable company’s asset.

The aim of the article is to analyze the prevalence of retail stores in Latvian regions and consumer behavior in Latvia. The authors have analyzed the prevalence of largest retail stores in regions and consumer behavior in retail using available statistical data and research done by the authors. As a result of the study, the role of shop assistants was determined during the purchasing process, and the results of the study have been compiled from the viewpoint of generations. These results can help retail companies to work more effectively by choosing the most appropriate retail store types

Knowledge about consumer needs, factors and motives affecting behavior is one of the ways of ensuring entrepreneurship competitiveness. Authors present the results of the study on the A. Maslow’s hierarchy of needs within the context of consumer behavior components affecting consumer behavior from a perspective of entrepreneurial decision making. Authors employ well known methods of research – statistical analysis, grouping, evaluation, predicting etc. In the course of the present research by synthesis of theoretical developments and practical experience decision making model is made. A. Maslow’s theory serves as the basis for developing a range of theories dealing with consumer behavior, therefore, when developing the consumer behavior model in Latvia, the author decided to integrate the better known theories. The use of models prepared by the authors in sales, entrepreneurship, and other sectors of economy provide an opportunity to reasonably plan investments for the relevant time period, to avoid mistakes, and to improve the overall economic effectiveness of the company’s operations and usefulness of resource utilization.

The prospective health care consumers are increasingly using the Internet websites for communication with potential health care service providers and decision-making regarding choice of the travel destination for receiving particular health care services. Therefore, it is important for health care providers to present themselves and their services efficiently online in order to attract foreign patients and thus facilitate medical tourism. The objective of this study is to evaluate the website content of Latvian health care providers who offer services to medical tourists in order to evaluate their status-quo and identify opportunities to improve website design. Authors used the framework by Huerta et al. (2016) as a basis to develop a modified framework suited for medical tourism-related website evaluation. 21 active websites associated with a medical tourism and provision of health care services to foreign patients were identified and selected for analysis. Each website was evaluated using a 10-factor assessment on 4 dimensions that include website accessibility, content, marketing, technology on a scale ranging from 0 to 10. Results: Scores of 21 website evaluation ranged from 54 to 91 point across all 4 dimensions with 80 and above points being considered as excellent result. Conclusions: Study findings indicated that the main improvements should be related to accessibility dimension and enabling text resizing function for improving experience for patients with poor sight, information dimension in terms of developing a separate main level section with information exclusively for foreign patients, and marketing dimension to improve effectiveness of search engine optimization (SEO) for medical tourism related keywords.