Travel searches via smart phones increased 1,200 per cent just in the last year. This fact may point at the importance of online technologies to travel and tourism, the focus of the first International Travel and Destination Expo (ITDE) that took place at the Meridien Lav hotel in Podstrana near Split.

Vedran Bajer from Google Adriatics said the internet played a very important role in selection of destinations.

"Forty per cent of tourists – when they choose the destination – go by what other people have written about it on the internet. The number of reservations made with so-called "smart phones" increased 175 per cent just in the last year."

Some 62 per cent of tourists look for information on the internet before choosing their destinations. The participants learned useful tips and strategies they could later implement in their work.

"This is the future of travel and tourism," Josko Stella from Split-Dalmatia county said. The director of the fair Josko Nikolic said the feedback from the participants was very positive and many presenters such as Google and Tripadvisor will be returning next year.

This year's partner nations India and the Czech Republic will be coming again as well.