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  • The role of higher education institutions as promoters of regional competitiveness: a case study
    Publication . Fernandes, Joana; Pires, Luís; Nogueira, Sónia P.
    This paper describes a specific situation where the involvement of a Higher Education Institution (HEI), the Polytechnic Institute of Bragança (IPB) acted as a booster for region-al competitiveness. The HEI implemented a project named “creation of business coopera-tion networks in rural cross-border regions between companies in the gourmet agri-food and tourism sectors”, with the Portuguese acronym CRECEER, The main objective of this project was to develop and implement measures to increase the companies’ competitive-ness, by enhancing certain areas, such as quality, design, Information and Communication Technologies (ITC), and marketing, along with the creation of a common framework that jointly commercialized products and services, specifically from rural accommodation enterprises and companies producing endogenous products with gourmet potential. It is our intention to describe the activities developed by the HEI involved in the implementa-tion of the project, and to show the crucial part the education institution took in the crea-tion and enhancement of online marketing strategies, in two regions, Douro and Alto Trás-os-Montes (Portugal), that include a total of 28 municipalities.
  • Are rural accommodation enterprises efficiently present online?
    Publication . Fernandes, Joana; Nogueira, Sónia P.; Pires, Luís
    This study regards rural accommodation enterprises (RAE) and how much of their business is made online and what can be done to improve it. This work focus on 10 enterprises from the northeast of Portugal, since it is a more deprived and isolated region and far from the touristic centres. As such, these companies need to attract the visitors through their online presence. We analysed their use of ICT, if they had a digital marketing strategy and what could be done to improve their presence and their results through online marketing tools. It was possible to understand that the majority of the companies only have a minimal investment in online presence through the Booking platform and with their website. They do not work efficiently the social networks and they do not use, or know, most of the marketing online tools. As a result, even though the studied companies are willing to evolve digitally and to enhance their presence in a more efficient way, this is limited to the investment that is required since they all feel they cannot invest at the time. It is clear that for these companies and specially in these regions it is vital to bring European funds to help them evolve to the digital market in a knowledgeable and efficient way.