Development of Tourism Village Applications for Competitive and Comparative Branding Case Studies in West Java and Banten Provinces with Qualitative Methods and Design Thinking

Tourism villages in Indonesia welcome many tourist students, students, teachers, and lecturers for comparative study activities, internships, and community service. Tourism villages in Banten province, Margaluyu village and Lebakmuncang village in Bandung Regency are the objects of this research. The three tourist villages are representations of those often visited by academics. Academics want to enjoy the beauty of natural resources in the village while enjoying educational services on agriculture, animal husbandry, plantations, local arts and culture. This study aims to develop a tourism village application so that it can be used as a branding promotion of competitive advantages and comparative potential in a village. The research method used is qualitative and design thinking. Qualitative methods for formulating competitive and comparative advantage variables. The design thinking method consists of 5 stages: empathize, define, ideate, prototype and test. In general, this design thinking method consists of 2 groups of stages: the research stage and the group of stages of developing solutions. This research results in the formation of a prototype tourism village application that can be used by several users, namely prospective tourists, tourists, tourism village managers, guides, educational tour managers and MSME actors. The empathy map shows the results of interviews that describe the wishes and expectations of tourists to visit tourist villages. The results of the empathy map become the basis for needs analysis and prototype design. The prototype of the tourism village application was tested on 50 people, and the result was that 35 people suggested the application needs to be revised to support more complete features, and 15 people said the application is good enough.