Digital tourism branding post-pandemic covid-19 on Twitter: Thailand dan Malaysia case study

This study aims to analyse the function of social media as digital tourism branding carried out by Thailand and Malaysia after the COVID-19 pandemic. This research method uses descriptive qualitative methods with the help of the Nvivo 12 Plus application in processing the data. This study uses data from official Twitter social media accounts in Thailand and Malaysia. In analysing the data, this study uses the integrated marketing communication theory, which consists of several stages: planning, creation, integration, and market strategy. The results of this study indicate that the analysis of the Twitter conversations of the two accounts shows that the tweets and retweets of @AmazingThailand and @TourismMalaysia are mostly still focused on accounts from their respective domestic regions. The digital tourism branding, which is analysed using marketing communication theory, shows that Thailand and Malaysia have proactive efforts in planning indicators, creation, integration


INTRODUCTION
The world's tourism industry is experiencing problems due to the socioeconomic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. On the scale of the tourism industry, countries in Southeast Asia are greatly affected by their development (Beh & Lin, 2021). Several countries in Southeast Asia suffered losses due to sluggish tourism during the COVID-19 pandemic, and even the losses reached 48% after one year (Polyzos et al., 2021). Regional economic growth in developing Asia will decline drastically in 2020 due to the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic before rebounding in 2021, according to the Asian Development Outlook (ADO) 2020, the leading annual economic publication of the Asian Development Bank. (ADB). This condition affects several countries with popular tourist destinations in Southeast Asia, such as Thailand and Malaysia. The data above shows that Thailand and Malaysia are the two highest countries in the trend of tourist visits in Southeast Asian countries. This phenomenon is one of the reasons the authors are interested in taking case studies in Thailand and Malaysia. 2019. This figure is the highest number compared to the number of visits from other countries in Southeast Asia. Meanwhile, the intensity of tourists in Malaysia, the country with the second highest number of visitors in Southeast Asia, at the same time, reached 25.8 million visits. However, the presence of the COVID-19 pandemic seemed to be a hard slap on Thai and Malaysian tourism, with a significant decrease in the intensity of visits in 2020, the year the COVID-19 pandemic began. Thailand's Gross Domestic Product (GDP) fell drastically to 6.1 per cent in 2020, even becoming the biggest contraction of the Asian financial crisis. Thailand's tourism sector, which contributes about one-fifth of the GDP and 20 per cent of employment, is the sector most affected by the implementation of social restrictions policies that affect the intensity of tourist visits in Thailand (imf.org, 2021).
In Malaysia, the tourism sector also contributes to the country's GDP. This contribution can be seen in the ability of the tourism sector to increase GDP to 18.52% in 2019, which previously decreased by 0.50 in 2015. Malaysia's GDP also increased from USD 47.2 billion in 2018 to 49.3 billion US dollars in 2019 (knoema.com, 2022). However, the COVID-19 pandemic triggered an economic contraction that was increasing previously. Malaysia's economic contraction occurred in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic at 3.1 per cent (Yusuf & Oyelakin, 2022). The COVID-19 pandemic has also had an impact on Malaysia's tourism sector. Malaysia's hospitality, aviation, and travel sectors have lost around 5.6 billion in revenue due to social restrictions during the COVID-19 pandemic (Hamid et al., 2021).
Thailand and Malaysia are also included in the top three categories with the highest number of foreign visits compared to other countries in Southeast Asia. This number of visits can be seen from the number of international air passengers from 2005-2018. Thailand has the highest intensity of foreign visitor arrivals at 81.3 thousand visits, followed by the number of foreign visitor arrivals in Malaysia, as many as 49.7 thousand visits in 2018 (ASEANstats database, 2019). The high number of foreign visits to these two countries is one of the reasons for the importance of technology involvement in tourism promotion in Thailand and Malaysia because promotion through social media can reach a wide range of consumers, including foreign tourists.
In addition, Thailand and Malaysia are among the countries with the highest internet adoption rates among other Southeast Asian countries in the 2005-2018 period (ASEANstats database, 2019). So that the implementation of digital tourism branding in the two countries can reach more domestic tourist targets along with the number of internet users in those countries, these are some of the facts that motivated the author to use Thailand and Malaysia as case studies in this research.
Promotional efforts with digital assistance have recently received attention from various stakeholders (Kalia et al., 2022) because they are considered more effective in facilitating public access (Rtelinggi et al., 2020) with a wide reach. There are even several previous studies that discuss digital tourism branding, such as research (Moturu et al., 2020), (Van & Hieu, 2020) and (Nguyen, 2018). Their research discusses digital tourism branding on tourism image development as a promotional strategy. Then it is refuted by findings (Ebrahimi et al., 2020) which reveal that digital tourism branding through social media is not enough just to spread photos or videos of tourist destinations. There is a need for government intervention in branding tourism by procuring events whose information is disseminated through social media. Meanwhile, research (Pfaller, 2021) discusses digital tourism branding, which is analysed based on the government's official tourism portal.
In contrast, this study discusses digital tourism branding analysed using Integrated Marketing Communication based on Twitter data. The focus of this research is still rarely developed by several previous studies that discuss the same context, namely digital tourism branding. Therefore, the author is interested in discussing how Thailand and Malaysia carry out Digital Tourism Branding through their Twitter accounts which are analysed using the theory of Integrated Marketing Communication (IMC).

METHODOLOGY
This study used a qualitative method with a descriptive approach. The selection of the qualitative method is the method in this research because these research data findings will be formatted in the form of descriptive analysis (Lune & Berg, 2017). The source of data in this study is secondary data taken with documentation techniques from the results of the analysis of Twitter social media accounts, namely @AmazingThailand and @TourismMalaysia. The limitations of data collection through the two Twitter accounts are only focused on conversations in the form of tweets and retweets posted in 2022. This is motivated by the purpose of this study which will analyse digital tourism branding after the covid-19 pandemic. While the post-covid-19 pandemic phase itself only started in 2022. The data in this study was processed with the help of the Nvivo 12 plus application to facilitate the display of interesting data. There are several steps taken in processing this research data using Nvivo 12 Plus, as follows: Capture data means taking data from the @AmazingThailand, and @TourismMalaysia Twitter accounts as the object of this research. Then the data is displayed with maps or cluster analysis as a visual design provided on the Nvivo 12 Plus Application. The data display produces interesting findings that can answer the problems of this research. In analysing the data, this study uses the integrated marketing communication theory developed by Iswandi (Kurniawan et al., 2021). This marketing communication theory consists of 4 indicators: planning, creation, integration, and marketing strategy.

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION Twitter Activity on Thailand and Malaysia Travel Accounts
Social media as a platform accommodates human communication with specific aims and objectives. Social networks are part of social media, and both are marketing techniques that are widely discussed (Gutiérrez et al., 2017). Based on internet reviews, social media is a practical and implicative solution in travel planning. Social media is useful in providing information about tourist destinations, products and suppliers. Research (Amaro et al., 2016) found that 90% of tourists consider online reviews when determining tourist destinations in their travel planning. To revive the tourism sector in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Governments of Thailand and Malaysia have also carried out digital tourism branding to maximise tourism promotion efforts to the wider community, both domestic and foreign.
Twitter is one of the most used and visited platforms and is even considered the most recognised microblogging in the world (Philander & Zhong, 2016). Therefore, Twitter is one of the social media platforms managed by the Governments of Thailand and Malaysia in launching

Ncapture Data
Maps / Cluster Analysis Results their tourism promotions with the account names @AmazingThailand and @TourismMalaysia. Twitter analysis in this study will highlight the intensity of tweets and retweets posted on the @AmazingThailand and @TourismMalaysia Twitter accounts ( Figure 3).  As a social media platform, Twitter offers convenience for tourists to share experiences and various recommendations that can inspire travel planning. According to Kirilenko (Curlin et al., 2019), the popularity of using Twitter is recorded as being able to score more than half a billion daily retweets. Reviews, comments, and sharing experiences from other tourists through social media affect selecting tourist destinations, especially for young tourists (Azhar & Fauzan, 2020). The popularity of using Twitter is considered an efficient tourism marketing strategy for tourism managers (Živković et al., 2014). The Figure 4 shows the intensity of tweets and retweets over the last five years. The trend of Tweets and retweets above shows that the @AmazingThailand twitter account has fluctuated activity in branding its tourism through digital from year to year. Seen from the last five years, in 2017, the intensity of tweets and retweets was only 71 conversations. In 2018 and 2019, it increased to 510 and 543 conversations. In 2020 it fell back to 431 conversations. This decline can be indicated due to the covid-19 pandemic, which requires the temporary closure of tourist destinations to minimise the spread of covid-19. Then in 2021, the number of conversations increased sharply to 664 conversations, where this year, various countries implemented new normal policies, one of which was easing the operation of tourist destinations. The year 2021 is also transitioning towards the post-covid-19 pandemic with the implementation of the covid-19 vaccination to achieve herd immunity. The Thai government is implementing the covid-19 vaccination starting 28 February 2021 with a target of achieving 70% vaccine from the population to form herd immunity (cdn.who int, 2021). Therefore, in 2022, the Thai government seems to be intensifying its digital tourism branding through Twitter to revive Thailand's tourism sector after the COVID-19 pandemic.
The Malaysian government has also done something like what other countries, such as Thailand, have done: reviving the tourism sector after the COVID-19 pandemic through digital tourism branding. The Malaysian government also carries out digital tourism branding through its Twitter account, namely @TourismMalaysia. The trend above shows that there has been fluctuating everyday activity on the @TourismMalaysia account in the last four years. In 2019 there were 509 conversations. In 2020 it increased to 1183 conversations. Then in 2021 and 2022, it decreased again to 834 and 147 conversations. This data shows that Malaysia's tourism account has not been proactive in developing its Twitter account as a forum for tourism promotion, especially ahead of the post-covid-19 pandemic in 2021 and 2022.
The Figure 5 and 6 shows that most Twitter conversations posted through the @AmazingThailand account are in the Thailand Region, with a conversational intensity of up to 1995 conversations. This indicates that local communities intensify most of Thailand's digital tourism branding. Meanwhile, conversations with coverage outside Thailand did not look as massive as in the African region, with only 31 conversations, England 50 conversations and Australia 15. This can reflect that tourist destinations in Thailand have yet to be able to attract foreign attention fully. This finding can be the basis for the Thai Government to be more proactive in intensifying its digital tourism branding, especially in preparing for tourism revival after the COVID-19 pandemic to attract the world's attention. In contrast to the conversation on the Twitter account @TourismMalaysia, it is still focused on the local area of Malaysia itself, with a conversation intensity of 2406 conversations. As for conversations with a range outside the Malaysian Region, there are only a few conversations, such as in Australia, only two conversations, the United States had five conversations, the European Region only six conversations and so on. This indicates that most of the conversations related to tourism can only attract the public's attention, especially users who come from the Malaysian Territory itself.

Analysis of Digital Tourism Branding Social Media Twitter
In the analysis of digital tourism branding through social media Twitter @AmazingThailand and @TourismMalaysia, integrated marketing communication (IMC). The adoption of IMC in tourism marketing has attracted the attention of researchers in the last decade due to its positive contribution to market promotion and performance (Porcua et al., 2019). His research focuses on the implementation of IMC on hotel promotion performance. Research (Damayanti & Rasyid, 2022) also use the IMC theory to study tourism promotion in an area, but the indicators applied to differ from the theory used in this study. (Rakib & Khan, 2020) His writing also implies IMC, and it is just that his research focuses on the challenges faced in implementing IMC in Bangladesh. (Riyadi et al., 2019) It also examines tourism promotion strategies using IMC, which focuses on analysing Instagram content in tourism promotion.
Different from this research will emphasise the IMC theory on Thailand and Malaysia tourism promotion through Twitter which uses several indicators developed by Iswandi (Kurniawan et al., 2021), including Planning, Creation, Integration, and Marketing Strategy. This analysis will determine how the Governments of Thailand and Malaysia manage their Twitter accounts as their tourism marketing media with integrated marketing communication.

Planning
The overall social media content carried out by the two countries has various contents in planning aspects. In terms of planning, the Governments of Thailand and Malaysia are seen to be very massive in intensifying their communication to the community through their tourism Twitter accounts @AmazingThailand and @TourismMalaysia to inform that tourism in Thailand and Malaysia will reopen after the COVID-19 pandemic. Planning for the reopening of tourist destinations in Thailand can be seen from the following conversations in table 1.
This conversation shows that the Governments of Thailand and Malaysia have reopened tourist destinations informed through their Twitter accounts. Some conversations are also interactive by asking potential tourists about the tours they are interested in. This shows that the Governments of Thailand and Malaysia are starting to plan efforts to improve the quality of excellent tourism services to provide a good tourist experience. Travel experience is an important aspect in shaping the image of a tourist destination (Ebrahimi et al., 2020), especially through social media it will facilitate the dissemination of information related to the experience of tourist visits, both positive and negative experiences (Singh Bhadouria et al., 2011). Meanwhile, Twitter is a social media platform that allows interactive conversations (Read et al., 2019) so that tourist satisfaction or disappointment can affect the existence of a tourist destination. Other conversations also attach a link that potential tourists can access to guide or provide recommendations for their travel plans. In reopening its tourist destinations, the Malaysian government needs references and opinions from the community regarding tourist destinations that are of interest. This shows that Malaysia has begun to plan and prepare to improve the quality of excellent tourism services. "It is time to say "Welcome" as we welcome you back to Truly Asia, Malaysia. Travel confidently and enjoy our land, sky, sea and all of its wonders.
Visit https://t.co/MVBdZrxsQm for more info. https://t.co/RwFQri01KQ via @TourismMalaysia" The Malaysian government plans to reopen its tourism sector and promote it through an attractive tagline. Attached is a link that potential tourists can access to guide or provide recommendations for their travel plans in Malaysia.

Creation
The Thai and Malaysian governments have reopened their tourist destinations in the post-covid-19 pandemic by re-procuring events that can attract potential tourists. The event was then disseminated through their respective Twitter accounts through the following conversations in table 2.

Table 2. Twitter Conversation regarding Tourism Destination Creation Post
Covid-19 Pandemic Country Creation Substance Thailand "The Tourism Authority of Thailand is pleased to invite you to experience the colourful Bun Luang and Phi Ta Khon Festival -also known as the Ghost Festival -which will be held from 1 -3 July in Loei https://t.co/Ir7lVLLsar https://t.co/Qbq5G via @AmazingThailand" The Thai government organises several events and promotes them through the registration link inserted in their Twitter account conversation as an effort to attract tourists after the covid-19 pandemic "The Thailand Travel Mart Plus #TTM+2022, the country's largest travel trade event, will be held this year during 8-10 June 2022 at Angsana Laguna Phuket. We are delighted to welcome back the attendants overseas, including buyers and media, again after the two-year pandemic. https://t.co/1h0inTSave @AmazingThailand"

Malaysia "Yesss!!! Rainforest World Music Festival is back!!!
That means more music, culture, food, and art in the jungle of Borneo again! Read more about it in the link below! Save the Dates! 17-19 June 2022 https://t.co/jAiyyosNmO. https://t.co/shWo00Zuuf via @TourismMalaysia" Organising a festival by the Malaysian government in order to attract tourists "Explore & Experience Malaysia through special packages at @MATTA_FAIR 2022. MATTA will once again be held at PWTC, KL, offering the best of Malaysia by more than 45 travel agencies. Visit Tourism Malaysia's booth at Level 4 to get the best deal &amp; meet your two celebrities. https://t.co/2kpbcLr2zU via @TourismMalaysia" Source: Author, 2022 The governments of Thailand and Malaysia are innovating to increase tourist attraction by holding back several events that were delayed during the COVID-19 pandemic. Information about the event's organisation is embedded through their respective Twitter accounts. In the Twitter conversation, the event's name is accompanied by a registration link to make it easier for potential tourists to access information and register themselves. The opening of this event is an effort to reopen tourism activities which were temporarily closed for two years due to the COVID-19 pandemic. This step is an innovation made by the Governments of Thailand and Malaysia in revitalising their tourism sector in addition to digital tourism branding and innovation through the organisation of certain events.

Integration
Integration is one aspect that is quite important in optimising digital tourism branding efforts. Cooperation between elements in digital tourism branding can be a strategy for reopening tourism destinations in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic. In the conversation of Thailand's tourism Twitter account @AmazingThailand and Malaysia @TourismMalaysia, several conversations were made to optimise digital tourism branding as follows at figure 7 and figure 8. Conversations, both tweets and retweets @AmazingThailand are still mostly centred on several accounts originating from Thailand, such as @Tatnews_org (10.84%), @tourismthailand (9.64%), @iconsiam (8.43%) and @thailandfunclub (7,23%). This data indicates that Thailand's marketing integration in digital tourism branding is more popular among the domestic community. Several conversations were posted on other Thai tourism accounts, such as @Thailandfunclub and @tourismthailand, which showed that this conversation was part of their collaborative effort to increase the existence of Thai tourism through Twitter. The conversation sent by @Amazingthailand to @Tatnews_org shows that there is a cooperation between the tourism sector and the news media to help optimise digital tourism branding in their country.
On the Malaysian Twitter account, it can be seen that the @TourismMalaysia account is more active in having conversations in its account with a percentage (25.84%), while conversations with other accounts such as mymotac (5.70%), mas (4.36%) and gayatravel ( 4.03%. There are conversations, tweets and retweets posted by @Tourismmalaysia @mymotac or the official Twitter account of the Ministry of Travel, Arts and Culture of Malaysia. This conversation shows the integration between the Malaysian tourism account and the Malaysian Ministry of Travel, Arts and Culture account in optimising digital tourism branding efforts through Twitter. Likewise, the conversations posted on several other accounts can help actualise Thailand and Malaysia's digital tourism branding.

Marketing Strategy
Social media has played a significant role in digital marketing in recent years. According to (Cham et al., 2022), using social media platforms can help quickly improve communication with the public as consumers as a marketing strategy. The definition of marketing strategy, according to Abrahan, Magid, Leonard and Lodish (Kanabi, 2022), is a procedure to increase the value of a service or product through communication, initiative, advertising or delivery related to that value. In this case, the marketing strategy carried out by Thailand and Malaysia is one of them utilising social media Twitter @AmazingThailand and @Tourismmalaysia. This marketing strategy is implemented through the involvement of several hashtags. Hashtags help increase popularity, describing an attractive tourist destination based on user conversations (Filieri et al., 2021). Here are some hashtags that have become media in marketing strategies in @AmazingThailand and @TourismMalaysia during 2022 (Figure 9 and Figure 10). @AmazingThailand uses several hashtags as media in its marketing strategy, namely #amazingthailand (1227 hashtags), #reviewthailand (242 hashtags), #thailand (140 hashtags), #opentothenewshade (75 hashtags). It can be seen that the Thai tourism Twitter account uses several hashtags with general vocabulary, such as #reviewthailand and #thailand. This hashtag aims to make it easier for Twitter users to find information related to Thailand, including tourism information in that country. Other hashtags, such as #opentothenewshade, mostly discuss tourist destinations in Thailand equipped with these destinations' advantages. This hashtag will make it easier for potential tourists to plan their travel in Thailand based on references related to tourist destinations presented in it.
@TourismMalaysia also uses several hashtags as a medium for its tourism marketing strategy, namely #malaysiatrulyasia (1243 hashtags), #cuticutimalaysia (690 hashtags), #stafsafe (613 hashtags), #vm2020 (2998 hashtags), and #visitmalaysia2020 (295 hashtags). Some of the hashtags used mostly use vocabulary still within the scope of tourism, such as #cuticutimalaysia, #visitmalaysia2020 and #vm2020. This hashtag is used to make it easier for potential tourists to find information related to tourism in Malaysia. Other hashtags, such as #staysafe, mean Malaysia is still paying attention to health protocols amid the country's reopening tourism sector. This hashtag aims to appeal to tourist destination managers and tourists to maintain health protocols while travelling, considering that 2022 is the first year the tourism sector has reopened after the COVID-19 pandemic. The use of hashtags in social media content can help build an image through the images presented (Acuti et al., 2018) and have the potential to be a branding strategy for a tourist destination. In this case, Thailand and Malaysia have implemented their tourism marketing strategies through digital assistance, which in the 4.0 era, the Internet of Things (IoT) began to penetrate various sectors, including integrated marketing communications (IMC). This is also reinforced by (Jerome M. Juska, 2021), who stated that the development of social media, websites, brand promotion events, and mobile marketing is important, especially in building IMC. (Rosário et al., 2022) added that the collaboration between IMC and information and communication technology can optimise the tourist experience. His research also describes the contribution of technology to play an active role in improving marketing communications in various ways.

CONCLUSION
This study examines Thailand and Malaysia's digital tourism branding through their Twitter tourism accounts. This study uses the theory of Integrated Marketing Communication (IMC) theory, which has often been discussed in promoting tourism in this decade. Implementing IMC in tourism promotion is considered quite effective in tourism marketing performance with a wide, efficient range of promotions and can target the 4.0 generation through the tourism experience presented. Various tourism managers are pursuing integrated tourism promotion, and some researchers are conducting the same study. It is just that some previous studies have examined IMC on implementation on Instagram. So that it will be a novelty for this study to examine IMC on tourism promotion based on Twitter content analysis. Thus, this research can enrich the literature on the implications of IMC on tourism promotion through Twitter.
Then for digital tourism branding, which is analysed using IMC theory, it shows that Thailand and Malaysia have proactive efforts in planning indicators, creation, integration and marketing strategies. Although each account has its way of doing digital tourism branding, overall, the digital tourism branding efforts carried out by Thailand and Malaysia are quite optimal. This can be seen from the active conversation on their respective Twitter accounts in digital tourism branding efforts to revive the tourism sector after the COVID-19 pandemic. Interesting findings in this study can open up opportunities for further research on the evaluation of the implementation of digital tourism branding through social media.