Ethnographic Study of Entrepreneurial Marketing in Rural Tourism (Case Study: Dolab Village in Kurdistan Province)

Rural tourism has grown exponentially in recent decades. Meanwhile, Doolab village is one of the nationally approved villages in Kurdistan province, which is considered as an attraction according to studies conducted in terms of rural tourism and has attracted 62% of the tourists to its residences. Therefore, in order to investigate the reason behind their success, the researcher intends to examine the entrepreneurial marketing dimension model – a concept that seeks to describe marketing processes and identify opportunities in a fluctuating environment for small businesses with limited resources – among the entrepreneurs of Doolab village. Hence, the main purpose of this study is to determine the ethnographic status of entrepreneurial marketing in rural tourism in Doolab village.

The present study is interpretive in terms of philosophical approach. Therefore, this study is a qualitative research based on ethnography. The statistical population includes all the residents of Doolab village who were active in the field of rural tourism as entrepreneurs. According to the purposeful sampling method, 10 entrepreneurial villagers were selected for this study. Moreover, validity, transfer, trust, approval and authenticity were examined by university professors for validity and reliability of the data. Observation, interview and note-taking methods were also used to collect the data. Finally, the extracted concepts were modeled based on schematic analysis technique using Max QD software version 18 through open coding method.

The results of entrepreneurial marketing conceptualization coding showed that a total number of 286 key points were extracted from the content of the interviews, which according to their concept which were devided into 158 common initial codes (concepts). The results of categorization related to entrepreneural marketing showed that a total number of 44 categories were extracted from 158 open source interviews. Finally, the results of the coding within core categories related to entrepreneurial marketing showed that among the total number of the interviews with the samples under study within the 44 categories, 10 core categories were extracted including opportunity-oriention, predictive, value creation, resource leveraging, customer-orientation, innovation, risk-taking, content-oriented, guidance and leadership, and goal-oriented.

In the present study, it was concluded that entrepreneurial marketing has 10 dimensions and rural tourism in Doolab village proposes economic, ecological, cultural, environmental, social, agricultural, services and measures, experience-oriented dimensions. Entrepreneurs in Doolab village, based on the tourism nature of the village as a tourist destination, have long been known for their history, religion, politics, and agriculture, and they have the best visual perspective as well. Preservation of values ​​and customs and the intact nature of the village due to the existence of new style houses in cities and gardens have led to fewer constructions. Most of the people who are involved in ecotourism in this village were familiar with the tourism industry and had built their buildings in the old texture of the village and had used original decoration and interior architecture.