Aims

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The Journal of Tourism, Heritage & Services Marketing is an open-access, international, multi-disciplinary, refereed (double blind peer-reviewed) journal aiming to promote and enhance research in all fields of marketing in tourism, heritage and services management. The journal is intended for readers in the scholarly community who deal with different marketing sectors, both at macro and at micro level, as well as professionals in the industry. The Journal of Tourism, Heritage & Services Marketing provides a platform for debate and dissemination of research findings, new research areas and techniques, conceptual developments, and articles with practical application to any tourism, heritage, and services marketing segment. Besides research papers, the journal welcomes book reviews, conference reports, case studies, research notes and commentaries. The Journal of Tourism, Heritage & Services Marketing aims at:

  • Disseminating and promoting research, good practice and innovation in all aspects of marketing in tourism, heritage and services to its prime audience including educators, researchers, post-graduate students, policy makers, and industry practitioners.
  • Encouraging international scientific cooperation and understanding, and enhancing multi-disciplinary research across various marketing sectors.

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Scope:

The scope of the journal is international and all papers submitted are subject to an initial screening by a member of the journal’s Senior Advisory Board, and subsequently by strict blind peer review by 3 anonymous international reviewers. The journal features conceptual and empirical papers, and editorial policy is to invite the submission of manuscripts from academics, researchers, post-graduate students, policy-makers and industry practitioners. The Editorial Board will be looking particularly for articles about new trends and developments within different sectors of marketing and the application of new ideas and developments that are likely to affect tourism, heritage and services in the future. Journal of Tourism, Heritage & Services Marketing also welcomes submission of manuscripts in areas that may not be directly tourism or heritage-related but cover a topic that is of interest to researchers, educators, policy-makers and practitioners in various fields of services marketing.

Manuscripts published in Journal of Tourism, Heritage & Services Marketing should not have been published previously in any copyright form (print or electronic/online), unless the author(s) explicitly hold the copyright under a CC-BY Licence. The general criteria for the acceptance of articles are:

  • Contribution to the promotion of scientific knowledge in the greater multi-disciplinary field of marketing.
  • Adequate and relevant literature review.
  • Scientifically valid and reliable methodology.
  • Clarity of writing.
  • Acceptable quality of English language.

Journal of Tourism, Heritage & Services Marketing is published twice per year (in Spring and in Autumn). Each issue includes the following sections: editorial, full papers, research notes, case studies, book reviews, conference reports, industry viewpoints, and forthcoming events.

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Peer-Review Policy & Process:

Each submission to JTHSM (including Full Papers, Case Studies and Research Notes, but excluding Book Reviews) is first reviewed for completeness by the journal’s Secretariat, and only then is allocated to one of the two Associate Editors who will assess it and subsequently suggest to the Editor-in-Chief whether it is suitable for peer review; final decision on suitability for peer review has to be taken unanimously by both the Associate Editor assigned to the manuscript and the Editor-in-Chief. If a manuscript is considered suitable for peer review, then it is subsequently assigned to 3 anonymous international reviewers (the double-blind peer review process is strictly followed; identities of neither authors nor peer reviewers are disclosed).

Peer review reports are in English, are submitted through the journal’s online submission and reviewing system, and provide constructive critical evaluations of the authors’ work, particularly in relation to the appropriateness of methods used, whether the results are accurate, and whether the conclusions are supported by the results. Editorial decisions are based on peer reviewer comments that meet these criteria rather than on recommendations made by short, superficial peer reviewer reports which do not provide a rationale for the recommendations.

Potential peer reviewers are asked to inform the Editor-in-Chief of any possible conflicts of interest before accepting an invitation to review a manuscript. Communications between Editors and peer reviewers contain confidential information and are not shared with third parties. 

The primary purpose of peer review – as employed by JTHSM – is providing the Editors with the information needed to reach a fair, evidence-based decision that adheres to the journal’s editorial criteria. Review reports are also expected to help authors revise their paper such that it may be accepted for publication. Reports accompanied by a recommendation to reject the paper are expected to explain in details the major weaknesses of the research; this will help the authors prepare their manuscript for submission to a different journal. 

Peer reviewers used by JTHSM are requested to adhere to the principles of COPE’s Ethical Guidelines for Peer-reviewers.

Peer reviewers are requested by the Editor-in-Chief to assess papers exclusively against JTHSM’s criteria for publication. The following conventions should be respected for effectively administering JTHSM’s double-blind peer review process:

  • Reviewers should review the peer review policy of JTHSM before accepting their reviewer role.
  • Reviews should be conducted objectively.
  • Personal criticism of the author(s) is inappropriate, as are defamatory/libelous remarks. 
  • Reviewers should express their views clearly with supporting arguments and references. 
  • Reviewers should declare any potential competing interests.
  • Reviewers should decline to review manuscripts with which they believe they have a competing interest resulting from competitive, collaborative, or other relationships or connections with any of the authors, companies, or institutions connected to the papers.
  • Reviewers should respect the confidentiality of material supplied to them and not discuss unpublished manuscripts with colleagues or use the information in their own work.
  • Any reviewer who wants to pass a peer review invitation onto a colleague must contact the journal in the first instance.

Where an Editor is on the author list or has any other competing interest regarding a specific manuscript, another member of the Editorial Board will be assigned to oversee peer review. Editors will consider the peer-reviewed reports when making a decision, but are not bound by the opinions or recommendations therein. A concern raised by a single peer reviewer or the Editor himself may result in the manuscript being rejected. Authors receive peer review reports with the editorial decision on their manuscript.

Book Reviews published in JTHSM are not peer reviewed articles. Each manuscript submitted to JTHSM as a Book Review is first checked for completeness by the journal’s Secretariat, and only then is allocated to the Book Reviews Editor who will assess it. Subsequently, the Book Reviews Editor may send comments to the author(s) of the Book Review. When satisfied by author(s) response, the Book Reviews Editor will suggest to the Editor-in-Chief that the manuscript is suitable for publication; final decision on suitability for publication has to be taken unanimously by both the Book Reviews Editor and the Editor-in-Chief.

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Open Access Policy:

Journal of Tourism, Heritage & Services Marketing is a Platinum Open Access journal, conforming fully to the Budapest Open Access Initiative (BOAI) and all of its content is available for free immediately after publicationthe journal does not charge authors article processing charges (APCs) or any other charges, hence its designation as a “Platinum Open Access journal”. Journal of Tourism, Heritage & Services Marketing has adopted the BOAI policy of “free availability on the public internet, permitting its users to read, download, copy, distribute, print, search, or link to the full texts of its articles, crawl them for indexing, pass them as data to software, or use them for any other lawful purpose, without financial, legal, or technical barriers other than those inseparable from gaining access to the internet itself. The only constraint on reproduction and distribution, and the only role for copyright in this domain, is to give authors control over the integrity of their work and the right to be properly acknowledged and cited”.