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Tourism is increasingly becoming an important sector of economy in Uganda, as it contributes around 10% to the country´s GDP, which is consistent with the earlier projection by World Travel and Tourism Council that the contribution of tourism to the World´s GDP would rise to nearly 11% by 2014. Tourism industry is also considered among the first sectors to embrace Information Technology (IT) use; and in particular online access is considered crucial to the tourism industry and its success. This study sought to understand the use of online access to promote tourism products in Uganda, as relates to different levels of website development and their relative contribution to number of bookings done online and actual visitors. The study adopted an approach where questions prepared in the questionnaire format were administered to the respondents in face-to-face interviews. The respondents were employees of tour companies randomly selected to participate in the study. The variables of interest included nature of website a tour company has, level of website development, factors influencing the development of a website and the contribution websites make to the business success.

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Lunyolo, Florence
Ms. Florence Lunyolo is experienced tourism market research analyst and lecturer of Tourism and Hotel Management. She obtained BA in tourism and MSc in environment and natural resources of Makerere University, and recently completed MBA with a focus on tourism marketing strategies that can work for developing countries.

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