Tourism Marketing for small businesses

Chapter 9

Promoting Tourism
Services to Consumers
Chapter learning aims

To enhance your understanding of:

• the role of promotion in the marketing plan

• the six-step marketing communications process
• the main approaches used in promoting tourism services to
consumers
Key terms
Promotion
• Promotions are communications in the market, aimed at stimulating demand to
generate customers (sales).

Marketing communications
• Also referred to as MarComs or Comms, and often used interchangeably with the
term promotion, this represents the integration of the message and the media used
in the promotional mix to communicate with target consumers.

Hierarchy of needs/AIDA
• A theory proposing advertising should lead consumers through a process from
reminding them of their needs though to making a purchase. A variation of this is the
AIDA model of enhancing Awareness, stimulating Interest, creating Desire, which
leads to Action (purchase).
The role of promotion
• To stimulate demand and generate customers (sales)

• Key goals involve informing consumers (awareness), and then

persuading and reminding them to act (purchase)

• Effective marketing communications require creative ideas to be

developed from the critical objective setting in the marketing
planning stage
• Eg What objective will this promotion achieve?
Promotion budget setting approaches
• Affordability. The simplest approach is to set a budget based on what
the business can afford. Most small tourism businesses operate with
an uncertain future cash flow and so this approach does actually
represent reality rather than what might be ideal.

• Industry average. This approach results in a promotion budget based

on analysis of what competitors are spending. Similar to going rate
pricing, where prices are set to match the competition, the
assumption is there is a collective wisdom within the sector.
Promotion budget setting approaches
• Ratio of sales. This is based on a percentage of past or projected
sales, and might be flexible to adjust to actual sales on a monthly
basis for example. In this way promotion budget levels are a result of
sales, as well as the cause.

• Marketing objectives. An assessment is made of the range of

initiatives best suited to achieve the objectives, and these are then
costed. If there are clear performance measures, this approach makes
the most sense, particularly in terms of justifying the budget rationale
to stakeholders such as financiers and investors.
The marketing communication process
1. Select the marketing objective being addressed
• The situation analysis (where are we now?) enables the development
of the marketing objectives (where do we want to get to?). The first
step in designing a specific promotion is to determine which
marketing objective is being addressed.

2. Specify the target segment

• Most businesses cater to more than one segment, which by definition
means groups of consumers sharing similar needs and/or
characteristics. The differences between segments influence the type
of message to be communicated, and the media to be used.
The marketing communication process
3. Determine the desired response
• The overall aim of promotion is to stimulate demand to generate sales.
However, different objectives might be related to leading different segments
through varying stages of a process based on the Hierarchy of Needs theory
(see Lavidge & Steiner, 1961:

• Stimulating recognition of their needs, to create a want for our type of service.
• Increasing brand salience, which represents top of mind awareness of our
service when a tourism situation is being considered to satisfy a want.
• Enhancing the brand image, so they develop a favourable attitude towards our
service, relative to competitors.
• Stimulating intent to purchase, through a call to action.
The marketing communication process
4. Design the message
• All marketing communications should be aimed at stimulating
purposeful dialogue with the target consumers.
• Therefore the message must be meaningful to them, by communicating
a value proposition that addresses their needs and wants.
• To cut through the clutter of the noise of competing tourism services
and substitute products means messages must be distinctive, and
focused on stimulating the desired response.
• The message also needs to be easily understandable, realistic and
believable. No matter how incredible the offer, if it’s not backed by a
good service at a good price it’s not going to work in the long term.
The marketing communication process
5. Select the type of promotion
• Different objectives related to the AIDA process require different
promotional tactics and media. For example, advertising can be
effective in enhancing awareness, whereas personal selling is more
effective at closing a sale.

6. Monitor the impact

• How will we know if we have achieved the objective? The results of
some types of promotions (eg coupons) are easier to monitor than
others (eg roadside billboard). This topic is discussed fully in Chapter
14 – Tourism Marketing Performance Measurement.
Advertising
• One big idea
• Attention grabbing, with a meaningful value proposition
• Reinforce the brand identity
• The image aspired to in the market
• Well scripted
• To the point, short and snappy
• Call to action
• Let the target know how you want them to respond
Advertising
Potential advantages
 High reach at a low cost per reader
 Enables visual creativity
 Useful for enhancing brand salience and
brand image
 Opportunity to reach new consumers
 Opportunity to include a call for action
 Non-invasive contact
 Many available media formats
 Ability to target segments through niche
media
 Short lead times possible
Potential disadvantages
 Lower credibility and believability
 Easy for consumers to not pay attention
 Difficult to get noticed in the advertising
clutter
 Difficult to close a sale
 Difficult to measure effectiveness
 High wastage
 High cost of prime media space
 Short life span
Sales promotions
• Essentially incentivised offers
• Eg discount coupons

• Short term initiatives when there is an urgent need to boost sales and
cash flow

• A key advantage is the ability to track responses

• A disadvantage is stimulating potential price war with competitors

Personal selling
• The most effective means to build trust, reduce perceived risk, and
close a sale
• Eg at consumer expos
• The art of selling is to take the fear out of saying yes

• Ability to hold the consumer’s attention and gain feedback

• Ability to measure effectiveness

• One of the most expensive forms of promotion

Direct (e)mail
• Communicating directly with consumers via mail, email and SMS
• Enables high audience selectivity
• Eg a data base mailing list
• Messages tailored to appeal to the needs of target audience
• Useful for following up after other forms of promotion
• Ethical and legal implications
• Difficult to stand out from the clutter of other direct marketers
• Ability to monitor responses
Point of sale
• Situated on-site at the point of payment
• Eg cash register, restaurant table
• Aims to stimulate impulse buying
• Typically sales promotion offers
• Eg competition, bundle discount, giveaways
• Often offers are made for certain times of the day/week
• Eg daily happy hour, mid-week specials
Consumer expos
• Manning a physical presence at:
• Travel expos
• Lifestyle expos eg boating, camping, fishing, food & wine, home & garden
• Cultural festivals
• Major sporting events featuring expos eg major marathons
• Participation can be expensive
• Ability to combine personal selling with other forms of promotion
• Eg sales promotions, brochures
• Ability to gain contacts for direct mail database eg through a competition
• Difficult to monitor effectiveness
Experiential
• AKA events marketing and engagement marketing
• Staging promotional event in high traffic areas
• Passers-by encouraged to participate in an activity
• Aim is to get consumers to engage with the brand
• Creative promotions can attract media publicity on viral publicity on
social media
• Difficult to monitor effectiveness
Networking and cooperating to compete
• A key aim of DMOs is to foster a spirit of cooperating to compete
• Small businesses, who might compete locally, working together to
attract more visitors
• To stretch promotional resources
• To create a bigger market impact than could be achieved by individual
businesses working in isolation
• Particularly effective at consumer expos
• Networking events enable information sharing
Discussion questions
• What is the purpose of promotion?

• What is the difference in meaning between the terms promotion and

marketing, and why is promotion sometimes incorrectly referred to as
marketing?

• With so many different forms of promotion and types of media

channels, on what basis should a particular approach be selected?