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Social media (SM) has become one of the largest environments of human interaction. Growth in social network use is evident in developed countries, and to an even greater extent in developing countries (Internet World Stats, 2020). In 2019, 53% of EU enterprises used at least one type of SM and 86% of these used SM to build their image and market their products. Additionally, more than 54% of the people (16–74 years old) living in the EU used the Internet for participating in social networks (Eurostat, 2020a, b). DESI (2020) found that over 65% of all EU citizens use at least one form of SM, the most popular being Facebook and Instagram, especially among young people. Consequently, as the use of SM becomes increasingly common, companies seek to reach and interact with current and potential customers through SM platforms (Shanahan et al., 2019; Wang & Kim, 2017).

Over the previous two decades, festivals have gained a prominent position within the world’s tourism and leisure industry. Festivals are regarded as an effective strategy for the promotion of the tourism industry and the local economy. Hosting a festival may attract tourists who otherwise would not choose to visit the destination and whose expenditures contribute to income and tax revenues in host communities (Getz & Page, 2016). Festivals and events facilitate the positioning of a locality as a tourism destination (Hudson et al., 2015) and can be effective tools in combating the seasonality of tourism demand (Tkaczynski & Rundle-Thiele, 2011; Yolal et al., 2016). Festivals play an important role in preserving cultural heritage and reinforce residents’ pride of being members of host community (Yolal et al., 2016; Yoon, Lee, & Lee, 2010). Due to a number of benefi ts brought by hosting festivals, signifi cant attention has been paid to festival studies over previous years. The vast majority of previous studies focused on the importance of visitors’ motives, dimensions of motivation and differences in the importance of motivational domains based on visitors’ socio-demographic characteristics, previous visitations, types of event being studied, etc. (Crompton & McKay, 1997; Kang et al., 2014; Lee, 2000).

The tourist services market is a very variable and difficult to predict market (Chen & Kang, 2015) that reacts quickly to factors and turmoil occurring in the international, national and local environment. Impact of these factors is evident both on the supply and on the demand side (Zdon-Korzeniowska & Rachwał, 2011). Studies by Millana and Esteban (2004), Silva and Gonçalves (2016) and Chih-Wen (2016) showed that customers are not loyal to their travel agencies. Changing the organizer of tourist services is not a problem for tourists, nor does it raise any resistance such as may occur, for example, when changing the telephone operator, bank or energy supplier. Thus, it is more difficult for travel agencies to acquire regular customers than for other service companies. In addition, they must adapt the offer more precisely to the needs of customers to convince them to purchase the services offered (Rudawska, 2010), therefore it is so important to know the main goals of tourist trips, customers’ needs and determinants, that guide the selection of the organizer of a tourism. In order to gain their trust, they must choose appropriate communication channels to establish a dialogue with the customer, promote their own brand and the tourist products they sell.

A prerequisite for creation and implementation of communication strategy of any subject is a thorough market analysis. That is why this paper will also first briefly analyze the market of tertiary education in Slovakia and the Czech Republic.

Not surprisingly, 21st century is quite frequently referred to as the century of information. Informational needs currently represent such an important category that they are comparable with the saturation of physiological needs. Less attention is usually devoted to the territorial patterns of information.