When you think of your favourite holiday experience, think of what drew you to that destination, how you chose your accommodation and the lasting experience you’ve been left with?

Most likely, it was tourism marketing that helped you plan your holiday away. Creative content, imagery, advertising and social media were all at play to help you build your trust, make your decision and secure your booking.

So, what is tourism marketing?

Tourism marketing is a marketing strategy used in the tourism industry to generate brand awareness, sell the destination, stand out from competitors and attract customers. It’s about selling the intangible experience to potential visitors.

The tourism industry is a competitive ball game and it can be seasonal. To overcome these hurdles, business operators in this industry need to clearly highlight what makes them different from their rivals and what makes them relevant.

Less dependency of Online travel booking agents (OTAs)

More than ever, tourism marketing is more complicated and more dependent on online marketing, PR, social media and online travel booking agents (OTAs) like Bookings.com, Trivago and Wotif, to name a few.

Tourism operators need to be running tourism marketing to compete with the OTAs, resulting in less dependency on OTAs and more profitable direct bookings.

For our client Equeva, who is the largest 3.5-star group of accommodation properties in the Blue Mountains, we used integrated marketing campaigns throughout the calendar year to elevate their brand. This included print ads, public relations and editorials, online advertising, newsletters and social media.

The Destination:

Visitors are the lifeblood of the tourism industry, so it’s important to understand their wants and needs. What first drew them to your accommodation was the destination. Just as much as it’s important to use tourism marketing to sell your business, you first have to sell the region. For Equeva, we continued to use social media to highlight the beauty and appeal of the Blue Mountains. Facebook posts regularly highlight the wonderful things you can do in the mountains, the hidden gems and the outstanding views over the iconic Three Sisters. In a monthly newsletter we also provided a what’s on in the Blue Mountains, providing a travel itinerary for potential guests.

Moreton Bay Beach Lodge

As well as social media, a well-constructed website will help bring visitors to your accommodation. For our client, the Moreton Bay Beach Lodge, we repositioned the destination brand, created a digital strategy and a new website (built by Propeller), to sell their waterfront location. We also included a What’s On guide for potential customers, getting them excited about coming to the Redlands Coast, highlighting the beauty and outstanding location.

Another way to sell the destination is through videos that showcase things to do in the area. The videos can offer helpful travel tips, locally-only hidden gems and fun facts. Videos provide a large amount of information in a short amount of time. These videos can be shared across social media and on the website.

Marketing the experience

What makes tourism marketing different from other marketing strategies is that visitors aren’t just paying for a service or product, they are paying for the experience. It’s about promoting the superior experience and having guests share their positive experience with others. And there’s nothing more that people enjoy reading than real-life travel experiences as they build a level of trust in your brand. For Equeva, we created a discussion platform on Facebook where we respond to questions about the area and the accommodation. We also regularly post about people’s experiences when staying with Equeva.

Seasonal Tourism

The challenge that tourism marketing faces, is that it is seasonal. To overcome this with Equeva, we have marketing campaigns in the market throughout the year, to raise awareness of the destination but also build brand trust and loyalty, staying at the forefront of people’s minds. These events help smooth out the seasonality in the industry.

We promote various events throughout the year in advertising, PR, online marketing, newsletters, and social media to attract locals from Sydney, as well as visitors. Some of these events include Easter, Valentine’s Day and Christmas in July. These events not only raise awareness of the brand but also encourage people to stay and come back again.

The Little Ship Club

We worked with the Little Ship Club on North Stradbroke Island, an absolute waterfront boating club. The club was looking to create additional revenue resources on top of their membership revenue.

To achieve this, we ran a marketing campaign to promote their Australia Day Seafood Spectacular event, using marketing, PR and social media, while also selling their waterfront destination venue. This campaign was designed to build brand trust and generate exposure for the club. Read our Little Ship Club case study here.

The event was a great success, with more than 800 people attending (235%+ increase on 2019). Events are a great way to raise awareness of a destination and encourage people to visit the club, buy meals and drinks and have an amazing time at the destination.

How can Sustainable Marketing Services help?
Sustainable Marketing Services is a multi-award winning, strategically led Brisbane marketing and public relations services company.

We have specialist expertise in destination marketing and public relations.

We use our know-how to deliver practical, reliable and results-orientated integrated marketing, public relations, digital and social media strategies for growing businesses in Australia and internationally.

Meet us for coffee, we're happy to share our knowledge and understand how we can help your business build its brand and attract visitors and bookings.

Sustainable Marketing Services is an award-winning Brisbane digital marketing agency with a long history of delivering sustainable success for our clients.

Book a complimentary meeting on 07 3446 5837 or via email us here.