26 Destination Marketing

Hi. On Unit 19, Reseasch Project, I have to write 6000-6500 words.

DESTINATION
MARKETING

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION .........................................................................................................................3
TASK 1............................................................................................................................................3
P1 Evaluate the manner through which principles of marketing planning favours destination
marketing including some example............................................................................................3
TASK 2............................................................................................................................................5
P2 Analyse elements of destination marketing campaign examples to evaluate how campaign
objectives are met successfully...................................................................................................5
TASK 3............................................................................................................................................7
P3 Various digital marketing tools required for advertising and promoting a specific
destination...................................................................................................................................7
TASK 4............................................................................................................................................9
P4 Roles and services of destination marketing organisations in marketing a destination.........9
P5 Mention the challenges faced by DMOs while marketing of destinations including
different examples.....................................................................................................................10
CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................11
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................13

INTRODUCTION
Destination marketing is stated as promotional activity. This activity is performed by
those companies which promotes a specific destination so that their tourism activities can be
carried out efficiently (Abou-Shouk, 2018). This assignment report is going to cover the
destination marketing organisations DMOs, which can be considered as visitors bureau
convention or tourist board. These DMOs focuses over public image as a dynamic place to live
and work. Main destinations which will be covered in this assignment are France, Italy and
Turkey. This report is going to include about principles of marketing planning and various
elements of destination marketing to attain campaign objectives. Also, information about digital
marketing tools is given along with services and role of DMOs in destination marketing is
discussed. At last, different challenges faced by a DMO in marketing of a destination is
mentioned including some examples.
TASK 1
P1 Evaluate the manner through which principles of marketing planning favours destination
marketing including some example
Marketing planning is referred to the procedure of defining and organising the marketing
objective of a business firm and formulating strategies to attain them. An appropriate marketing
planning includes information, proposition, value and knowledge about the customers which are
going to be targetted by a company. There are different kind of market planning principles which
helps in performing destination marketing. Some of these principles are stated below:
 Acknowledging opinion and requirements of customers: This is one of the basic
principle associated with marketing planning in which needs and perception of customers
is acknowledged so that they can be given satisfactory services in a systematic manner.
One example in this context is that DMOs perform marketing activities to show France as
world's leading leisure destination. For this, they carry out market research so that
expectation of customers while site visiting can be fulfilled properly (Al-Ansi and Han,
2019).
 Understanding market: This is another principle associated with marketing planning.
This principle allows a business firm to acknowledge the concepts and elements of a
specific market. In order to formulate an effective plan, manager of a company is needed

to analyse market in a detailed manner. For example, Destinations in France like Eiffel
tower are able to gain the attention of maximum customers than their rivals by analysing
market and offering more facilities while visits to their customers.
In case of different destinations like France,Turkey and Italy, principle of marketing
planning plays an important role in destination marketing. Information in this context is shared
below:
France: To fulfil the needs and wants of customers, it can be said that this tourist
destination's marketing first analyse the whole situation and then develop an effective
promotional program. If it is talked about France, then most of the destination marketing
organisations has kept their focus over bringing innovations within their promotional activities,
in order to fulfil the requirements of customers, considering the feedbacks given by them (Al-
Ansi and Han, 2019).
Italy: This is one of the famous tourist destination in all over the world, where most of
the agencies has developed their packages in regards to their cultural history. Therefore,
considering the Destination marketing would help them in evaluating the needs of visitors, where
they could effectively manage the change required by them. DMOs are needed to understand
Italy market, and then try to make alterations within the overall performance level. This nation's
tourism industry has managed to develop different range of plans and procedures considering
various strategies (Saraniemi and Komppula, 2019).
Turkey: Destination marketing would help this nation in promoting the different coastal
areas, in all over the world. Bargaining power of tour operators has grown within this nation and
so as the requirements of customers. Considering the fact that change is necessary, it has become
vital for DMOs to bring alterations for improvising the sustainability of tourism industry.
Adopting right type of technology, while developing a promotional program is said to be one of
the weak point of this tourist destination.
In context with these destinations, main requirements and needs of customers is smooth
visiting journey so that their family and Friends can feel comfortable. Also, customers wants
travelling packages to these destinations in genuine price so that they do not feel any type of
financial burden on them (Almeida-Santana and Moreno-Gil, 2017). Other requirements of
customers is to go for vacations to those places where risks associated with landslides, floods,
earthquakes etc. will be less. Also, people feel reluctant to visits those places which are prone to

attack or already faced attack. Hence, manager in DMOs are needed to chose those places as
their marketing destinations which are safe so that no crisis and danger can be faced by people
while people visits at different locations.
TASK 2
P2 Analyse elements of destination marketing campaign examples to evaluate how campaign
objectives are met successfully
Destination marketing campaigns are performed to advertise a service or product with the
help of radio, newspaper or any online medium. Main objective associated with destination
marketing campaign is to appeal large number of individuals . Another element of destination
marketing campaigns is to target right kind of people so that best results can be attained from the
promotional activities. In this context, different range of promotional campaigns for France and
Italy are stated below:
Basics France Italy
Mission/vision statement Vision statement of France
destination is to formulate a
better world for every visitor
through cultural experience.
Mission of France Tourism us to
provide reliable and safe tourism
experience (Avila-Robinson and
Wakabayashi, 2018).
Vision of Italy destination is to
provide comfortable visit to their
visitors. Mission of this
destination is to became one of
the renowned place to be visited
by the customers in terms of
repeated visits.
SWOT Strength: France is a developed
nation where issues like robbery,
theft, threat to life are not
encountered by customers.
Weaknesses: Visiting France
require high amount of finances
which are not easy to manage
for an average income person.
Opportunity: Visitors can visit
Strength: Main strength of
country is nice geographical
positioning between mountains
and sea along with mild climate.
Weaknesses: Main weakness in
Italy is inadequate bus
connection to the near by towns
and cities.
Opportunity: Mountain tourism

beautiful places like Eiffel
Tower, Louvre Museum, Palace
of Versailles, Mont Saint-
Micheal etc.
Threats: Current elevated threat
of terrorism is main threat of
visiting France (Bigne, Ruiz
and Curras-Perez, 2019).
of the country has high potential
to serve the demands of
customers.
Threats: Italy is mainly a
coastal area where coasts are not
well protected. This can be a
threat for customers at the time
of Powerful sea storms.
Competitors (by target
market)
Main competitors of France are
Germany, Italy and Spain.
Major competitors of Italy are
France and Spain.
Positioning Positioning strategy of France is
based on Pricing.
Positioning strategy for Italy is
dependent on cultural symbols.
Destination marketing
goals/objectives
To became one of the most
popular visiting destination.
To stabilise country economy by
earning high revenues.
Branding:
Icons/landmarks
Paris is branding icon for France Venice is icon for Italy.
Brand elements logo &
slogan
For France brand slogan is
Liberty, equality and fraternity
Italy has brand slogan “ Italy is a
democratic Republic, founded on
labour."
Promotional mix: DMOs in France carry-out
promotional mix via
advertisements through digital
media.
Italy carry out promotional mix
through campaigns, media
promotions etc.
Performance indicators This destination use KPI to
acknowledge their performance
indicators.
It uses Benchmarking as their
performance indicators.
Tourism area life cycle concept

This concept is given by Butler in 1980 to define the evolution for a tourism place over
time. According to this concept, there are five stages through which a tourist destination
progresses. In context with France and Italy, this concept is discussed below:
 Exploration: In this stage limited persons visits a destination or area and due to
individual travel arrangement, pattern of visitation becomes irregular. In this stage,
people will be attracted by destination due to their scenic beauty and culture like Hawaii,
Malta etc.
 Involvement: In this stage, people visiting France and Italy will encounter a rise. Thus,
local people of these place start accommodation, food, transports to the visitors to earn
some money form them (Choe, Stienmetz and Fesenmaier, 2017).
 Development: During this stage, destinations like France and Italy will become
recognised tourist attraction. One reason for it is the service which are offered by local
people. Other reason is high promotion and advertisements by DMO. Other example of
this are India, Philippines, Indonesia, Turkey etc.
 Consolidation: At this stage, number of visitor in a region exceeds than their permanent
residents. Due to this, local people feel suffocated and prefers less visitor. This situation
is not faced by both France and Italy. Regions which face this issue are Goa in India,
Barcelona in Spain etc.
 Stagnation: Here, tourists reaches maximum capacity and their number do not rise
further. Here, destination economy is dependent on repeatable visit of customers. Both
Italy and France do not encounter this situation. Example of stagnation is Singapore.
 Decline: In this stage, destination is not able to compete with other destinations. Also,
day trips and weekends of these regions will lost its appeal. France and Italy are popular
destinations which are not going to face this situation in next few years.
TASK 3
P3 Various digital marketing tools required for advertising and promoting a specific destination
Tools associated with digital marketing benefits a company in promoting and advertising
the services or products with the use of internet and other digital services (Ghosh and Sarkar,

2016). By using this tool, destination in France can be promoted as a leisure tourism place.
Information in this context is stated below:
Digital marketing
tool
Description
Video and
photography
Photography and videos are good ways by which a DMO can advertise
about a place or destination in a proper manner. This will help the
customers in getting reality check about a destination in terms of beauty
and comfortableness. By using this marketing tool, efficiency associated
with digital promotional campaigns or reviewing the performance of a
DMO Within France can be carried out in a proper manner.
Website
In case of destination advertising and promotions, Websites plays a vital
role as millions of people can be targeted at a single time so that
destination can be promoted in a proper manner. In this context, official
website of DMOs will help them in advertising about different
destinations in proper manner (Heeley, 2015).
Social media
This form of digital marketing includes the use of different social
platforms like YouTube ,Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram etc.
so that services and products can be promoted in a proper manner.
Social media is common platform for advertising and marketing.
Destination marketing companies within France can use this form of
marketing for connecting with million of customers so that high brand
image of company can be sustained in market of Britain (Séraphin and
et. al., 2016).
SEO
It is known as search engine optimisation. With the help of this tool,
copies of web pages are stored. Due to this, when people search a query
on search engine, all the pages are looked and most relevant results are
shown. In order to do this, SEO uses a program named as algorithm.
Best search engine which can be used by DMOs are Google, Yahoo etc.
There are various kind of applications like Google analytics, Google
Map etc. which is used by DMOs so that website traffic can be reported

Applications and tracked in a proper manner. This can be considered as an important
tool for advertisement purpose in a digital manner (Hudson and et.al.,
2019).
Other digital tools
As people are much relying on technology, most of the business firms
uses digital promotions and advertisements to popularise their services
and products. In context with promotion of British destinations,
manager of DMOs can also use Virtual Reality and Augmented reality.
These are digital tools which enhances the experience of customers of
watching a video. VR and AR will help DMOs in creating immersive,
interactive and rich user experience.
Effectiveness of digital marketing tools:
 Digital Marketing Levels the Online Playing Field, for individuals (visitors) who are
seeking to visit Francein nearby time.
 Another effectiveness i.e. digital marketing tools has helped DMOs in Francein becoming
much more Cost-Effective than Traditional Marketing.
 It has also helped DMOs in Francein increasing the percentage rate of incoming traffic
gets converted into leads, subscribers or sales, depending on the intended purposes of
your website.
TASK 4
P4 Roles and services of destination marketing organisations in marketing a destination
Destination marketing companies are those firms which are responsible to advertise a
location or community as an appealing destination so that maximum number of people can came
there and services or products of tour operators can be purchased in a considerable manner.
There exist different roles and services which are played by DMOs so that customers can be
satisfied in a proper manner, these roles are stated below:
 Devising a marketing campaign promotion: It is a basic service and role for a
destination advertising firm so that maximum number of people can identify about a
location or destination. In this context, DMOs can prepare campaign marketing

promotion so that visitors can be aware about the British destination and prefers to come
there to spend their leisure time (Kladou and Mavragani, 2015).
 Building of brand identity: It is another role which is played by a DMO so that a
destinations can be promoted and maximum number of people can be diverted towards it.
To perform this role, an organisation requires an expert team which is able to carry out
digital promotion in a considerable manner. By this, strong brand identify of company
will be sustained in marketplace.
 Positioning destination: This role is very important for DMOs as it will not only allow
them to deal with national audience but this platform will allow them to provide services
to international audience also. Positioning of destination will helps the concerned
company in enhancing the number of visitors for that specific location or destination.
 Portraying image: It is a basic role which is played by every destination marketing
company. These firms develop a proper and effective image in market so that their
potential customers can be targeted in a proper manner. Without any good image,
promoting a destination and targeting required number of people is not possible (Kozak,
2019).
 Conducting market research: To perform their work in a desired manner, manager in
DMOs can initiate some market research with the help of Instagram, Twitter or
Facebook so that preference and opinion of people can be acknowledge effectively. By
this, providing right kind of service to customers will be easy.
P5 Mention the challenges faced by DMOs while marketing of destinations including different
examples
DMOs have the responsibility to advertise and promote a place as an attractive travelling
destination. By performing their business activities, these organisations helps in strengthening
the economic position of a country along with offering work opportunities for people in that
region (Litvin and Romo, 2019). But there exist different kind of challenges that are faced by a
destination marketing firm while advertising about a destination. Some of these challenges are
stated below:
 Lack of control over marketing mix: Major challenge which is faced by DMOs is high
rivalry from competitors in terms of revenues and profits. To promote and advertise their
packages, these firms needs frameworks like marketing mix. Travel and tourism is a vast

sector in which thousands of tour operator and travelling companies are offering visiting
packages to the customers (Litvin and Romo,2019). In this context, a DMO is needed to
control their marketing mix strategies. But, to counter their rivals, these company
perform multiple activities and lose control over their marketing mix.
 Access to funding: This is one of the main challenges that are faced by a destination
marketing organisation while performing their business operations and activities in
working environment. In order to perform their work, these companies require funds and
capital for it in high amount. But, accessing heavy amount of funds is not possible for
company. In this context DMOs can take bank loan, crowd funding, Angel investing etc.
 Politics and diverse requirements of stakeholders: Biggest challenge faced by
destination marketing organisation is diversified needs of stakeholders and their
activities. It is the responsibility of DMOs to provide security to customers from political
scenario of a destination and other required facilities to their stakeholders so that they can
enjoy their visits in a comfortable manner (Pestana, Parreira and Moutinho, 2019).
 Fragmentation: It is related with the division of a destination into several fragments. As
hundreds of tour operators are performing their work at a single destination, business
prevailing there gets fragmented. Due to this, number of companies dealing in this work
are increasing rapidly. Main threats of DMOs are Reve tourism marketing, Accord,
DANA etc. For example, if government in UK offers a contract to DMOs to promote
destinations in London, all the companies will also try to gain that contract due to which
productivity and effectiveness of company on individual basis while performing their
work can suffer considerably.
 Creating differentiation: In recent times, change in demand of people is increasing
while visiting different places. Due to this, people feel reluctant to visits those places
which do not allow them to feel comfortable. Hence, manager in DMOs needed to chose
those places as their marketing destinations which have uniqueness so that differentiation
can be felt while people visits at different locations (Pike, 2015).
CONCLUSION
From this project report, it can be concluded that destination marketing is essential while
promotion of destination or a tourist place like museum, monument etc. Distinct principles of
marketing planning like identifying internal environment, external region etc. helps in carrying

out marketing of a specific destination in appropriate manner. Marketing campaigns like family
campaign, adventure campaign etc. are different in their characteristics but they have same key
elements. Varied digital advertising tools like emails, social media are utilised to advertise about
a place or destination in appropriate manner. DMOs benefits in attracting customers to a region
but main challenges which are fed by DMOs in performing their work are natural disaster, threat
from terrorism, competition with rival firms etc.

REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Abou-Shouk, M. A., 2018. Destination management organizations and destination marketing:
adopting the business model of e-portals in engaging travel agents. Journal of Travel &
Tourism Marketing. 35(2). pp.178-188.
Al-Ansi, A. and Han, H., 2019. Role of halal-friendly destination performances, value,
satisfaction, and trust in generating destination image and loyalty. Journal of
Destination Marketing & Management. 13. pp.51-60.
Almeida-Santana, A. and Moreno-Gil, S., 2017. New trends in information search and their
influence on destination loyalty: Digital destinations and relationship
marketing. Journal of destination marketing & management. 6(2). pp.150-161.
Avila-Robinson, A. and Wakabayashi, N., 2018. Changes in the structures and directions of
destination management and marketing research: A bibliometric mapping study, 2005–
2016. Journal of Destination Marketing & Management. 10. pp.101-111.
Bigne, E., Ruiz, C. and Curras-Perez, R., 2019. Destination appeal through digitalized
comments. Journal of Business Research. 101. pp.447-453.
Choe, Y., Stienmetz, J. L. and Fesenmaier, D. R., 2017. Measuring destination marketing:
Comparing four models of advertising conversion. Journal of travel research. 56(2).
pp.143-157.
Ghosh, T. and Sarkar, A., 2016. “To feel a place of heaven”: examining the role of sensory
reference cues and capacity for imagination in destination marketing. Journal of Travel
& Tourism Marketing. 33(sup1). pp.25-37.
Heeley, J., 2015. Urban destination marketing in contemporary Europe: uniting theory and
practice (Vol. 66). Channel View Publications.
Hudson, S. and et.al., 2019. Persuading tourists to stay–Forever! A destination marketing
perspective. Journal of Destination Marketing & Management. 12. pp.105-113.
Kladou, S. and Mavragani, E., 2015. Assessing destination image: An online marketing approach
and the case of TripAdvisor. Journal of Destination Marketing & Management. 4(3).
pp.187-193.
Kozak, N., 2019. Tourist Destination Management: Instruments, Products, and Case Studies.
Springer.
Litvin, S. W. and Romo, S. L., 2019. Hotel saturation and its impact upon destination
marketing. Journal of Vacation Marketing. 25(2). pp.239-251.
Pestana, M. H., Parreira, A. and Moutinho, L., 2019. Motivations, emotions and satisfaction: The
keys to a tourism destination choice. Journal of Destination Marketing & Management.
Pike, S., 2015. Destination marketing: essentials. Routledge.
Saraniemi, S. and Komppula, R., 2019. The development of a destination brand identity: a story
of stakeholder collaboration. Current Issues in Tourism. 22(9). pp.1116-1132.
Séraphin, H. and et. al., 2016. A marketing research tool for destination marketing organizations'
logo design. Journal of Business Research, 69(11), pp.5022-5027.
Tung, V. W. S., Lee, S. and Hudson, S., 2019. The potential of anime for destination marketing:
fantasies, otaku, and the kidult segment. Current Issues in Tourism. 22(12). pp.1423-
1436.
Online

Seven of the best travel and tourism marketing campaigns from 2018. 2019 [Online]. Available
Through: <https://econsultancy.com/seven-of-the-best-travel-and-tourism-marketing-
campaigns-from-2018/>