The effect of the marketing mix on the demand of Thai and foreign tourists

Article history: Received: March 12, 2020 Received in revised format: March 27 2020 Accepted: March 29, 2020 Available online: April 2, 2020 This research aimed to analyze the influence of the marketing mix on the demand of Thai and foreign tourists along the Mekong Riverside in Nong Khai and Bueng Kan provinces, Thailand that linked to the Lao People's Democratic Republic (Lao PDR), in particular the Vientiane Capital and Bolikhamxay province. Questionnaires were used to collect the data from 410 samples selected by convenience sampling. The data were analyzed via structural equation modeling (SEM) with the WarpPLS 6.0 program. The results showed that the marketing mix comprising product, price, promotion, and process affected the demand of tourists. In consequence, the tourism-related units of Thailand and Lao PDR should focus on a touristic marketing strategy by conserving the standard of the tourist attractions, touristic marketing promotion, and an appropriate price. Moreover, the related stakeholders should become aware of providing services to tourists as means to respond to the demand of Thai and foreign tourists. © 2020 by the authors; licensee Growing Science, Canada


Introduction
The tourism sector is an industry that plays a major role in the economic system in every country worldwide, as it connects to several types of businesses including tour guides, accommodation, transport, food and entertainment, and souvenirs. When tourism expands, this would positively affect the economic and social systems resulting in increased employment. Moreover, this leads to economic development and supports a country's overall growth. With regards to the tourism economic review of Thailand for 2018, the number of foreign tourists totaled 38.27 million, an increase of 7.54% compared to the previous year generating two trillion Baht in income, or a growth rate of 9.63%. Simultaneously, Thai tourists created income of 1.06 trillion Baht. Thus, the total income for 2018 was 3.07 trillion Baht (Ministry of Sports and Tourism, 2019). As for tourism in the Northeastern region in 2016, there were 37.2 million visitors (Ministry of Sports and Tourism, 2017) due to the fact that the province cluster in this region had many tourist attractions. Furthermore, on 12 May, 2016, the National Tourism Policy Committee announced the tourism development area of Nong Khai, Loei, Bueng Kan, Mukdahan, and Nakhon Phanom provinces as a local lifestyle tourism development in the Kong River zone, as these provinces are located opposite the Lao People's Democratic Republic and the Kong River is the boundary (National Tourism Policy Committee, 2016). This zone has since been elevated as a strategy of the provincial cluster Ka -Kan -dee & Nonthapot, 2020) since it demonstrates a superior position in the tourism development of the two countries. When considering the tourism capacity of this region, it is obvious that the provinces in which their territory connects to the Kong River, especially Nong Khai province, Thailand and Vientiane Prefecture, Lao People's Democratic Republic., and Bueng Kan province, Thailand and Bolikhamxay province, Lao People's Democratic Republic, there are tourist attractions related to nature, outstanding culture with eye-catching itineraries. As such, this prompts the opportunity in developing the locations of Nong Khai province and Vientiane Prefecture, and Bueng Kan province and Bolikhamxay province to have the tourism capacity to link the two countries together. Fig. 1 demonstrates the number of Thai and foreign tourists traveling to the four areas of the two countries in which the trend shows an increase every year. This reflects that these locations have good tourism competency and can respond to the demand of tourists. Additionally, tourists are eager to go out for entertainment and travel, as they intend to discover new different experiences, have an adventure, and to use new technology and innovations while traveling; as a consequence, this is in response to the demand for traveling (Kritsanaprakornkit, 2016 In the development of a tourism zone, there is a need to study the demand of tourists. Therefore, the related units could appropriately respond to that demand. Nevertheless, the aforementioned areas were never studied in terms of touristic marketing and the demand for tourism by applying these aspects as the guidelines to promote tourism in the two countries. The marketing tools that are often used in studying the demand of consumers are the 7Ps marketing mix (Barghi et al., 2 0 1 2 ; Magatef, 2015;Suphanthong, 2008;Taburi, 2006). This is the main factor that is often applied to respond to the demand of Thai and foreign tourists for traveling in Thailand and the Lao People's Democratic Republic. Simultaneously, the demand of the new generation of tourists in the future will rely more on new technology and innovation. At present, the tourist group consisting of a large population that will greatly influence tourism is the millennials (Burkhard, 2017). Hence, a study should be undertaken on the influence of the marketing mix on the demand of Thai and foreign tourists in Nong Khai and Bueng Kan provinces that link to Vientiane Capital and Bolikhamxay province, Lao People's Democratic Republic, as the guidelines for planning strategy that could promote the tourism marketing on the two sides of the Kong River and also codevelop tourism.

Literature Review
Most past research studies about tourism marketing applied the 7Ps marketing mix strategy to analyze the market. Various studies that focused on tourism marketing strategy (Barghi et al., 2 0 1 2 ; Magatef, 2 0 1 5 ; Suphanthong, 2008;Taburi, 2006) found that it was comprised of the following components: 1. Product: the tourist attraction would be developed appropriately to support tourists and the new places would be urgently improved for gaining the competency in further supporting tourism. 2. Price would be set in compliance with the product and service quality and significantly concern generating income from tourism. 3. Places for buying tourism products and services of each province through the Internet would not only offer facilities, but also conduct the public relations and promotion. 4. Promotion would be the added information of each province by Year Nong Khai Bueng Kan Vientiane Capital Bolikhamxay organizing special activities. 5. People who provide services to tourists would have the trained skills for standard services and creating the satisfaction of tourists. 6. Physical evidence and presentation would add public relations through press media domestically and internationally. 7. Process would connect the provincial tourism management of a local administrative organization, the state sector, and the private sector altogether. In terms of the concepts relating to the demands of tourists, Wannathanom (2009), and Singsaktrakul and Sermkarndee (2013) found that the demand of tourists consisted of tourist attractions, tourism management; such as, facilities and security, activities and tourism processes; such as, a tour guide, and tourism participation. While, Burkhard (2017) considered the inclination of tourists' future demand, it was found to have originated from the following factors: (1) new technology and innovation link to tourism.
(2) The lifestyle of the millennials considerably influences tourism because they are a large population group.
(3) The interest of adventure tourism to find experience by themselves. (4) Women are deciding to travel more. (5) Gastronomy tourism is showing a popular trend. (6) Work and travel tend to continuously increase. (7) Health tourism. (8) Tourism that concerns the human relations of employees and the local people. (9) Tourists tend to view nature conservation as important. Nevertheless, Nonthapot et al. (2019) applied a confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) in a study of Thailand and the Lao People's Democratic Republic and found that the demands of tourists could be divided into three components: 1) Human relations, 2) Life experience, and 3) Recreation. Additionally, Pengprapai (2013)'s study on the marketing mix that influenced Thai and foreign tourists discovered that the aspects of the tourism marketing mix comprising product, people, and promotion had a positive influence while price and process had a negative influence with statistical significance toward the demand of social tourism activities of Phangan Island. Kamau et al. (2015) studied the effect of the marketing mix toward the accommodation selection of tourists in Kenya. They realized that the price of the product/service, place, process, and physical appearance were a priority in the tourist's decision when selecting accommodation in Kenya. Matchariyakul (2016) studied the factor affecting the independent travel decision of Thai tourists selecting Taiwan as a destination, and this demonstrated that the marketing mix that affected their decision was various products, appropriate price, promotions, good experience with the people, process about travel convenience and facilities in Taiwan, and physical evidence of Taiwan's overview. Simultaneously, the study of the behavior and marketing mix affecting Thai style tourism of foreign tourists represented that the overall marketing mix affected their decision at a good level (Pongwiritthon et al., 2016). As aforementioned, this demonstrated that the demand of tourists was set by the main factors of the global tourism trends (Burkhard, 2017;Vinaisatien, 2017), and it would influence the tourism marketing mix (7Ps) (Kamau et al., 2015;Matchariyakul, 2016;Pengprapai, 2013). As a result, the tourism marketing mix concept and the demand of tourists in Nong Khai and Bueng Kan provinces that linked to the Lao People's Democratic Republic could be concluded as shown in Fig. 2.

Methodology
The population in this study were Thai and foreign tourists who visited Nong Khai province, Thailand and Vientiane Prefecture, Lao People's Democratic Republic and Bueng Kan province, Thailand and Bolikhamxay province, Lao People's Democratic Republic. From the statistics reports of 2018, the number of Thai and foreign tourists visiting these locations totalled 5,071,244 (Ministry of Information, Culture and Tourism, 2018; Thailand's Department of Tourism, 2019). The sample group in this research included Thai and foreign tourists who visited Nong Khai and Bueng Kan provinces, Vientiane Prefecture, and Bolikhamxay province in 2018. The reliability of the sample group was set at 95%, which was a result from 400 samples (Yamane, 1967cited in Tanmavad, 2002. Nevertheless, to obtain a reliable statistical assessment from a higher power of test (Gravetter & Wallnau, 2007. Therefore, this study fixed the sample size to be 410 samples. The convenience sampling

Relation
Product selected the samples randomly in the tourist attraction area regarding the proportion of the population as shown in Table 1. Additionally, the zones for sampling consisted of natural tourist attractions, artificial tourist attractions, and other tourist attractions. The tourist attractions were selected from the tourism database of Thailand 2017 and the 2016 list of the Ministry of Information, Culture, and Tourism of Lao PDR. The selected attractions were located along the two sides of the Kong River in the four locations.  The author used a questionnaire to collect the data from Thai and foreign tourists who visited Nong Khai province and Vientiane Prefecture, and Bueng Kan and Bolikhamxay provinces. The data from the 30 samples were tested to find the completeness of the questionnaire and to validate the reliability by using Cronbach's alpha and validity. The index of item-objective congruence (IOC) from five experts was taken into consideration for consistency. Every question had to have an IOC higher than 0.80. After testing, the questions were checked for reliability by using Cronbach's alpha; the result was 0 . 9 3 3 ( Hair et al., 2014). In consequence, this represented that the tool was reliable. After that, the author collected 410 samples from men and women aged 18 years and over. The analysis of the influence of the marketing mix on the demand of Thai and foreign tourists in Nong Khai and Bueng Kan provinces that linked to the Lao People's Democratic Republic applied the data from the questionnaire asking to evaluate the marketing mix that consisted of 1. Product, 2. Price, 3. Place, 4. Promotion, 5. People, 6. Physical Appearance, and 7. Process. As for the opinion relating to the demand of tourists, this consisted of 1. Life Experience, 2. Recreation, and 3. Human Relations. Thus, Life Experience was composed of 1. presenting one's knowledge, lifestyle, and traveling experience, and 2.experiencing the diversity of food or local foods. Recreation was composed of 1. using new technology and innovation in tourism activities, 2.working and traveling, and 3.traveling for better health and better mind. Human Relations were composed of 1.the tourism that focused on human relations with the local people, and 2.new friendships with other travelers. The data were processed to find the confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) from the structural equation modeling (SEM) by using the Warp PLS 6.0 program.

Results
The demographic overview of Thai and foreign tourists who traveled in the mentioned areas demonstrated the majority of Thai tourists were female aged 20-30 years. Most traveled from the Northeastern region of Thailand and traveled by themselves. Most of them had graduated with an undergraduate degree, and more than half were employed as government officials or state enterprise officials. The mean of the tourists' income was THB 10,000 per month. On the other hand, most foreign tourists were female aged 20-30 years. Most travelers were from France and without a tour guide. The majority of them had graduated higher than an undergraduate degree and were employed in a private company. More than half earned THB 50,000 per month. According to the CFA of the influence of the marketing mix on the demand of Thai and foreign tourists in Nong Khai and Bueng Kan provinces that linked to the Lao People's Democratic Republic, the result of the model showed that the average path coefficient (APC) = 0 . 2 9 (P<0.00 1), average R-square = 0.46 (P<0.0 1), average block VIF (AVIF) = 1.78, GoF = 0.53, SPR = 1.00, RSCR = 1.00, and SSR =1.00, which represented the appropriateness of the model as shown in Table 3. The appropriateness of the model to create the reflective model required convergent validity and discriminant validity by convergent validity. The criteria were the indicator loading that had to be higher than 0.60, and every statistical significance (as at 95% of reliability) reflected the convergent validity (Henseler et al., 2009;Lauro & Vinzi, 2004). The analytical result is displayed in Table 4.   Table 4, Life Experience was composed of presenting one's knowledge, lifestyle, and travel experience, as well as experiencing the diversity of food or local food. Recreation was composed of using new technology and innovation in tourism activities, going for work and travel, and traveling for better health and better mind. Human Relations were composed of tourism that focused on human relations with the local people and new friendships with other travelers. The Demand for tourism consisted of life experience, recreation, and human relations. Product consisted of the following variables: beautiful tourist attraction, diversity of tourist attractions, reportative sites of history, culture, and traditions, popular natural tourist attractions in the area, and sufficient full facilities for tourism. Price was composed of the following variables: appropriate price/fee, appropriate price of the travel program, appropriate room rate, appropriate food price, appropriate souvenir price, and appropriate transport price. Place consisted of the following variables: ability to purchase a travel program directly with a tour agency, to purchase a travel program with a representative, and to book a travel program and accommodation through the Internet. Promotion was composed of the following variables: to advertise through the Internet, television, newspaper, and brochure, to obtain a discount from a tour agency, to do public relations in the local area, to organize a festival for promoting tourism, to study the information from the rating, score, and review about the site, and to do public relations through the media, television, and radio for persuasion. People consisted of the following variables: sufficient security guards and service providers, received good service from the security guards and service providers, the ability to communicate with tourists in the tourist attractions, good personality, and readiness of food sellers or restaurants/souvenir shops. Physical Appearance comprised the following variables: large and sufficient parking lots, clear signage, sufficient, clean, and convenient toilets, unambiguous and understandable itinerary signs, easy-to-find public relations and tourism information center, and sufficient accommodation to support tourists. Process consisted of the following variables: manners and friendliness of the local people, security of life and property, facility management in tourist attractions; for example, provide parking lots, having a public relations staff management process to help tourists, having a fast security management process for tourists, and having natural/cultural management and conservation processes. The measurement of the latent variables had loading starting from .60 and significance at 99% of the reliability. Thus, it was regarded that the model contained convergent validity. For the discriminant validity of the latent variables in the reflective model and correlation of the variables, the reliability of the measurement was considered from the composite reliability (CR) > 0.60, average variance extract (AVE) > 0.50, Cronbach's alpha > 0.60, Q 2 > 0 and R 2 > 0.20 (Henseler et al., 2009;Lauro and Vinzi, 2004). As can be seen in Table 5, the CR was higher than 0.60. All the variables had an AVE higher than 0.50, Cronbach's alpha was higher than 0.60, and Q 2 was higher than 0. As a result, this indicated that the model could predict the endogenous variable (Chin, 1998a). Moreover, when R 2 was higher than 0.30, this demonstrated that the R 2 values for the endogenous latent variables were assessed to be substantial (Chin, 1998b). Therefore, this could explain that the assessment result by PLS-SEM was reliable.  Table 6 reveals that the cross construct correlation as the square root of the AVE in the parentheses had a higher value than every other AVE. As a result, the table showed the discriminant validity in every construct as the square root of the AVE to be higher than every other measurement. In consequence, the measurement with a discriminant validity in this research was reliable. According to the analytical result in Figure 3, the tourism marketing mix influenced the demand of Thai and foreign tourists in Nong Khai and Bueng Kan provinces that linked to the Lao People's Democratic Republic. The factors of the marketing mix were Product, Price, Promotion, and Process, which affected the demand of tourists while Promotion had the most influence, as it had a coefficient of 0.25. This was followed by Product that had a coefficient of 0.20 with a significance of 0. 0 1 . The second order confirmatory of the tourists' demand was composed of Life Experience (Lifeexp), Recreation (Recreati), and Human Relations (Humanre). The highest demand of tourists was Human Relations, as it had a coefficient of 0.78. This was followed by Recreation that had a coefficient of 0.69 with a significance of 0.01.

Discussion and Recommendations
In conclusion, in regarding the first order confirmatory, the marketing mix consisted of Product, Price, Promotion, and Process that affected the demand of tourists. Promotion had the most influence, as it had a coefficient of 0.25 while Product had a coefficient of 0.20. The second order confirmatory comprised Life Experience, Recreation, and Human Relations. Human Relations had the most influence, as it had a coefficient of 0.78 while Recreation had a coefficient of 0.69 with a significance of 0.01. The result of the empirical data analysis could support the hypothesis to be accepted that the tourism marketing mix affected the demand of tourists. The study also revealed the marketing promotion strategy due to the fact that current tourists mostly gave interest to online trends; for example, traveling by following the information about the rating and travel reviews. This conformed to the study of Chiwakunanan (2018) that tourists search for information about traveling in Thailand via online media, mainly Google, Facebook, and websites, respectively. Tourists use online media to search for attractions the most. This was followed by accommodation and the route or vehicle, respectively. Most of them enjoyed the information in the format of a blog or review post by previous users with details, and a blog or picture reviews.
The second was Product that comprised a beautiful product, various types of products, the popularity of tourist attractions, activities in the tourist attraction, facilities, tour service, and many other activities, tourists would be very interested. In compliance with the study of Kerdrit (2017), the marketing mix that tourists paid attention to the most was product and service while price and process took a major role in driving their supply once visiting in the area (Nonthapot, 2019;Nonthapot et al., 2019). For the marketing mix on Price, tourists gave importance to the appropriate and value-for-money price in their travel. Therefore, the activity of price setting for tourists would concern the travel behavior. The travel behavior of modern-day tourists tends for them to be backpackers, as they focus on simple living, saving, and worthiness. As for Process, at present, tourists give priority to travel that provides them with full comfortable facilities for relaxing. Furthermore, technological management takes an important role in tourism, as it acts as an assistant in planning a trip. Moreover, tourists become aware of their security of life and property, including facilities in the tourist attractions. Consequently, tourism marketing in terms of Process is totally important as well. The safety should be standardized with the installation of an advanced tourism management system, which would respond to the taste of modern tourists. Smartphones and the Internet world also have an important role in tourism by increasing the efficiency of products and services; for example, travel guide application, restaurant recommendation application, and QR code to introduce tourist attractions. In conformance with the study of Nonthapot (2019), from the marketing strategy direction for services, the price for a travel service must not be expensive, and process means to have good working and service processes including the use of technology for traveling.
On top of that, the 4Ps marketing mix comprising Product, Price, Promotion, and Process would affect the demand of tourists in the dimensions of Life Experience, Recreation, and Human Relations. Therefore, this would reflect the importance of tourism marketing on the demand of the behavior of tourists, whether it be the demand to travel for life experience; for instance, solo travel and exploration. Tourists desire to experience diverse environments to respond to their demand for making them enjoy the activities and to befriend the local people. The influence of the tourism marketing mix on the tourism demand nowadays has seen an emergence in quality and standard conservation in the tourist attraction and supply chain. As aforementioned, the related units in Thailand and the Lao People's Democratic Republic should proceed with these following activities: 1. The tourism sector of the state, private sectors and the tourism entrepreneurs in Thailand and the Lao People's Democratic Republic should have a marketing promotion for the various products; for example, development of infrastructure, landscape improvement, and appropriately creating diversity in the tourist attractions for greater tourism support. This would cover basic public utilities and convenient facilities for the better support of the tourism activities.
2. Give importance to the tourism market, particularly the marketing promotion that could influence the demand of tourists to visit the area. The budget for advertisements through the Internet, television, press, pamphlet, and brochure, should be arranged and to promote tourism through online media; such as, Facebook, Instagram, and bloggers. Furthermore, organize festivals with the intention to promote tourism in the provinces and attract tourists which would stimulate Thai and foreign tourists to travel more.
3. The price measurement should be appropriately regulated; for example, the entrance fee for attractions, price for the travel program, food price, accommodation price, and transport vehicle price to access the location. The worthiness of a reasonable price would directly impress tourists.
4. Management measurement should be supported. The measurement should cover security, good management, the administration and control systems in the tourist attractions in order to facilitate them and attract them to use the services.