Destination Marketing Report: Digital Tools, DMOs, and Challenges

This report examines destination marketing, focusing on the strategies and tools used to promote specific locations and increase tourism. It begins by evaluating marketing planning principles, such as product/service, price, place, and promotion, within the context of Acorn Tourism Developments. The report then analyzes various destination marketing campaign examples, including those targeting families, pilgrimage, and adventure seekers. It reviews digital marketing tools like content marketing, social media marketing, Google Analytics, and email marketing, highlighting their application in promoting destinations like Turkey. Furthermore, the report delves into the roles and services of Destination Marketing Organizations (DMOs), exploring their functions in developing tourism strategies. Finally, it assesses the challenges DMOs face, providing a comprehensive overview of the destination marketing landscape. This report is designed to provide insights into the practices and issues in destination marketing, helping readers understand how destinations are promoted and managed to attract visitors and boost tourism.

Destination Marketing

Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
TASK 1............................................................................................................................................1
P1. Evaluation of marketing planning principles for supporting marketing of a particular
destination...............................................................................................................................1
TASK 2............................................................................................................................................2
P2. Analyse the key elements of a range of destination marketing campaign examples to
analyse the success of objectives............................................................................................2
TASK 3............................................................................................................................................3
P3. Review of different digital marketing tools used for promoting and advertising a specific
destination...............................................................................................................................3
TASK 4............................................................................................................................................5
P4) Role and Services of DMO in marketing a destination...................................................5
P5) Challenges Faced by DMO..............................................................................................6
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................8
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................9

INTRODUCTION
Destination marketing is a part of marketing which is associated with promotion of a
particular destination. It is done for the purpose of increasing the number of visitors. In simple
terms, destination marketing is tourism advertising for a specific location (Almeida-Santana and
Moreno-Gil, 2017). In this report, Acorn Tourism Developments Consultants have been chosen
which provides services such as research, statistics, planning, development and marketing for
tourism destinations. The headquarter is located in Flimwell, United Kingdom. Furthermore, this
report covers evaluation of marketing planning of a specific destination, key elements of a range
of destination marketing campaign, and review of different digital marketing tools for promotion.
Along with this, roles and services of DMOs and assessment of challenges faced by DMOs.
TASK 1
P1. Evaluation of marketing planning principles for supporting marketing of a particular
destination
Marketing refers to the process or function of promoting the product or service in the
target market so that large number of people can be attracted. It involves advertising, selling and
delivering products or services to people. There are some principles which govern this activity
within the organisation. These have been explained and used in the context of Acorn which is
provided below:
Product/service- This principle states that product or service should be made or
produced for catering specific needs of customers. It should be such which have the capabilities
of providing higher profit. It should be value for money that leads to higher performance. It is
helpful for the growth of organisation (Avraham, 2016). For example, Acorn can identify the
hotels and related services of Turkey which can help it provide information to the people.
Furthermore, many other services can be known to it in order to display all the possible services
that a person can get on a trip to Turkey. The advertisement should contain all the details about
the services so that queries can be reduced to a great extent.
Price- According to this principle, there are number of factors which impact prices of the
products or services. These include customer demographics, demand of product, brand image,
cost of production etc. It is an important principle which can affect the marketing planning to a
great extent. For instance, Acorn can estimate the costs incurred in promoting Turkey and its
1

places. This is likely to help in controlling prices which can increase its profit and performance.
Acorn should have its own pricing strategy made on the basis of different costs and other
elements so that unnecessary costs can be reduced.
Place- In the context of a service which is provided by destination marketing
organisation, place refers to a location or medium where the advertisement should be placed. It
can be online as well as offline and the choice is made on the basis of requirements of the
organisation (Bokunewicz and Shulman, 2017). For example, Acorn can use Facebook,
Instagram etc. for displaying the advertisement about the places, services present in Turkey.
Also, the prices are to mentioned so as that customers can make the best decision. Since, large
number of individuals are active on social media, it can use this mode of advertisement as well as
it can sell the services there.
Promotion- This principle states that different kinds of strategies and techniques are
formulated for example advertising, sales, promotions, special offers and public relations. It is
also a function of marketing team to reach large number of customers and raise the awareness
about the services. For examples, Acorn can promote Turkey as a tourist destination by
providing different packages at discounted prices. Also, it can make combination of services in
bundles so that people can have different options to choose from (Gretzel and Fesenmaier, 2016).
TASK 2
P2. Analyse the key elements of a range of destination marketing campaign examples to analyse
the success of objectives
Destination marketing campaigns refer to advertise a particular destination from different
modes. These may be TV, radio, online platforms, newspaper etc. The motive of such an activity
is to get the attention of huge number of individuals who are interested in that particular
destination or might develop an interest in future. Mainly, the major points are reflected such as
offers, services, prices and many more. Some examples of promotional campaign have been
presented below by using variety of destinations:
Family destination- This is a concept of tourism which allows a person to spend time
with family on holidays. Such kind of trips are most preferred and liked by majority of
population in different parts of the world (Gibbs and Gretzel, 2015). Some of the example of
locations is national parts, resorts, amusement parks, zoo etc. When a company is approached for
2

providing these services, it make sure that requirements of every individual are met. For
example, Light and sound show has been started at many historic places in Turkey wherein the
history about the specific location is disclosed through audio and parts of such places are shown
by using lights of different colours.
Pilgrimage destination- The destinations falling under this category are for the people
who have become old. These include temple, churches, mosque and many other related
locations. The main motive of such destinations is to give an experience of harmony and peace.
These two are essential basis on which the whole idea of pilgrimage destination is based. For
example, India is place of heritage which is also known for having one of the world's seven
wonders which is Tajmahal. Majority of the locations are connected with history and spiritual
places which can be included in this category. Therefore, in order to promote India among the
world, it has “Incredible India” campaign which reflects diverse culture present in India. There
are many people which has found that India is not just limited to spiritual places but there are
many other locations which have natural beauty of mountains, oceans, etc. Also, the love for
different culture has increased in many people living outside India which made them pursue their
career in Hindi language (Jiang, Ramkissoon and Mavondo, 2016).
Adventure destination- There destinations are full of new and sporty activities which
give an experience that is beyond the imagination. These are often termed as extraordinary
services which are full of energy. People falling in the category of millenials have high demand
to go to these destinations which are unexplored but provide new experiences. For instance,
Iceland has started a campaign which says “Fill your heart”. It is a part of Iceland Tourism which
provides valuable and attractive information about that country in order to boost the energy level.
This is an unique and innovative idea that shows what Iceland can provide to the visitors visiting
this country. With this campaign, Iceland has seen a good hike on the number of tourists
travelling to this destination. This is one of the advantages of such advertisement which has
proved to be useful in attracting large number of individuals.
3

TASK 3
P3. Review of different digital marketing tools used for promoting and advertising a specific
destination
Digital marketing tools are the techniques which help in promoting different services and
products online. It is done with the used of internet and is totally opposite to traditional
approaches of advertising the something new production. The digital technique used by most of
the organisations is digital marina tool which is used for advertising goods and services. The
benefit of using this is that it is cost-effective and capable of influence large number of people
who can be its customers in future. Some of the digital marketing tools that can be used are as
follows:
Content marketing- This tool involves writing some good content about the product or
service as a way of advertising it online (Kladou and Mavragani, 2015). It is beneficial in
attracting customer which the organisation wish to target. In includes variety of promotional
tools such as vacation planner, hotel publications, world wide travel publications, and many
more for particular destinations. With the use of this tool, Acorn can write details about the
beautiful places, restaurants situated at the bay of the ocean, historic monuments etc. There are
many people who read these content before making plans to visit a particular country.
Social media marketing- This digital marketing tool uses social media as a platform to
to promote products and services by destination marketing consulting firms. There are large
number of population who are active users of internet and have their presence on different social
media sites. It is the best way to connect with people from different corners of the world. For
example, Acorn can use Buffer digital marketing tool for engaging many diverse categories of
people. Apart from this, there are many social media sites such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram
etc. which help in promoting the products or services to reach a large number of individuals.
Google Analytics- It is a a program which is created bye Google. It is useful in tracing
traffic of website with a view to report them. Generally it is used for promoting the brand of the
company. People like SEO analyst and webmasters are appointed for carrying the activities
related to digital campaigns. It helps in having an interaction with the users all new websites of
the company. It is the most used tool of digital marketing by which Turkey can be promoted as
the most desirable place in the advertisement (the most desirable place in the advertisement (Lee,
2015).
4

E-mail Marketing- when the people are persuaded or reached by sending commercial
message through mail, then it is called email marketing. Mostly, the potential and existing
customers are the ones to whom search mails are sent. It is a way of advertising item through
emailing. It is a popular promotional tools of digital marketing which helps in establishing direct
and healthy relationships with customer and marketer. It should be designed in such a way that
helps attracting customers.
The way in which these tools helps in promoting tourism in Turkey
The companies in the tourism sector which are engaged in providing services related to
trips to different locations carry extensive research on the customers in order to assess their
demands and requirements (Makkonen, 2016). In addition to this, the data extracted are used for
engaging the customers on digital platform for advertisement of their choice of destination.
Turkey is known for its architecture as well as the modern life. Acorn is using tools of digital
advertisement in the following manner:
 There is an official website of the company where people can visit different locations
through digital mode. It is the best way to gather information on the basis of which
decisions can be made weather to visit the country or not.
 Mobile application software has also been launched which can be downloaded in phone
so that it becomes handy for people to use.
 The company uses various social media sites such as Facebook, Instagram etc. Which are
used in excess. Here, different promotional offers are given through cutting the prices of
the overall packages in order to attract the people to visit Turkey.
TASK 4
P4) Role and Services of DMO in marketing a destination
DMO stands for Destination Marketing Organisation which represent destinations and help to
develop their long-term travel and tourism strategy. Some of the labels used are tourism board,
convention and visitors bureau and tourism authority. They have a gold of advertising the
destination in a way to increase the demand so that people can visit, work or live there. The
mixed strategies are developed in order to enhance the brand image of a country for attracting
large number of customers (Pike, 2015).
5

They help in directing, making and executing various activities in order to achieve the
particular country to achieve their goals of tourism. The main purpose is to improve experience
of people visiting specific nation. Some of the roles and services provided by DMOs are
elaborated below:
Making a Tourism Marketing plan- DMOs Have the role to formulate a strong and
appropriate plan for displaying the country in such a way that draw the attention of people to
visit that particular country. Every nation has their own purpose, similarly Turkey has the
purpose to encourage people to take more trips to this country. In order to meet this objective,
DMOs making maps and it using methodologies in order to achieve such goals.
Building a platform on Social Media Sites: This is about creating a a place on the social media
sites in order to create network with the locals staying in a particular. This is to attract the
customers to those specific areas. There is a special team which has job of of creating
networking online through various application and social media sites. Also, they are responsible
for its administration so that large number of customers can be reached. This helps in
establishing good amount of visitors who are capable of visiting Turkey (Richards, 2015).
Promotion and Advertising: This is associated with promoting and advertising a
specific objective for locations which can be liked by individuals. For this purpose, different
approaches such as website, application software etc. are Developed for giving the information
related to tourism in the particular country. Various initiatives in the form of online
advertisement are taken by using different kinds of social media sites and platforms to provide
information which can help people take decision about travelling. For example, Acorn has its
presence on Facebook through which it can promote the tourism of Turkey by highlighting
positive points and great experience that a person can after visiting the country.
Conducting Market Research- In this service, DMOs Cadbury market research for gathering
statistics that are related to the main objective of a country. It can be based on demands,
demographics, etc. the data collected are used for formulating plants and procedures in order to
who was playing the particular country in an attractive manner. It helps in understanding what
could be done to improve experience of the customers (Stalidis, Karapistolis and Vafeiadis,
2015). Turkey can be expensive for some of the people because of good restaurants and other
services. This can be a factor in reducing the interest of people to visit the country. Therefore,
6

Acorn being a destination marketing organisation can use this statistics in reducing the overall
cost so that large number of people can be influence to take trips to Turkey.
P5. Challenges Faced by DMO
DMOs are the organisations that are capable to publicize the different kinds of
destinations.The contribution is to make particular area of famous. It is a challenging job which
can attract many difficulties that have been discussed below:
Adopting to Technical changes- The main issue is to cope up with the transformation that
are taking place in technical environment. It becomes hard for the definition marketing
organisation to make adjustments in a speedy manner so that no delay in the attainment of goals
occur. For instance, Acord is confronting it hard to receive arbitrary specialized change however
endeavours are made to keep a harmony between specialized change and income required for
dispensing those change.
Competitors: there are more than one entities which are included in the category of
destination marketing organisation. With the presence of so many competitors it becomes
difficult for Acorn to make a strategies in order to fight the challenges that maybe due to to
various issues going on in Turkey. It undertakes number of methods and procedures for
administrating all the activities in a better manner by keeping stability. It makes sure that a
healthy competition is is there in the market which may become fierce. This can make Acorn to
put extra efforts in surviving the competitive market.
Another test that is looked by this association in goal advancements is enormous number of
contender. Number of association are ceaselessly expanding in goal showcase in this way, this
division is getting incredibly focused in around the world. Reve Tourism Marketing is
confronting extreme challenge from visit and goes of UK. For confronting this significant level
of rivalry this undertaking is utilizing a few method and procedures to separate their
administrations from other. Notice and limited time techniques of Reve Tourism are centred
around keeping a harmony between vital target of all partners just as likewise centred around
manageable utilization of asset for making better social picture in brains of clients, which
improves it and unrivalled than different contenders (Yang and Wang, 2015).
Threat of Terrorism-Destination marketings is confronting greatest dangers from
psychological oppression as security and assurance of clients is the obligation of a goal
publicizing direction. Expanding in psychological militant assaults makes a dread in clients
7

which will eventually decrease number clients for an association. Reve Tourism attempt their
best to choose a protected goal for its clients and furthermore giving preparing to its staff to meet
circumstance of emergencies and risk (Pike, 2015).
Natural calamities: These are likewise making a risk for DMO as it additionally makes a
hazard on life of clients. Customers like to make the most of their days off in common habitat
however at such spot danger of floods, seismic tremor, avalanche, and so forth., is a lot higher
and nobody have control on such occasions. Reve Tourism is leading opportune research to think
about odds of characteristic disaster and convenient preventive moves are additionally made to
protect clients from such dangers.
CONCLUSION
From the above assignment, it has been concluded that destination marketing is very
important in order to make the promotion of a destination place like any other historical places
around the globe. There are many principles of marketing planning which are used in order to
meet the objectives of destination with the help of providing their customers with better support
and guidance in order to meet the expectation of customers as well. There are many different
types of destinations such as adventure, family and many more which helps in differentiating the
customer's experience. In addition to this, there are also some digital promotional tools which
helps in the promotional the destinations such as social media, emails, google activity, providing
support to the organisation in order to make an increment in their sales and revenues.
8

REFERENCES
Books and Journals
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.
Avraham, E., 2016. Destination marketing and image repair during tourism crises: The case of
Egypt. Journal of Hospitality and Tourism Management, 28, pp.41-48.
Bokunewicz, J.F. and Shulman, J., 2017. Influencer identification in Twitter networks of
destination marketing organizations. Journal of Hospitality and Tourism
Technology, 8(2), pp.205-219.
Gibbs, C. and Gretzel, U., 2015. Drivers of responsive website design innovation by destination
marketing organizations. In Information and Communication Technologies in Tourism
2015(pp. 581-592). Springer, Cham.
Gretzel, U. and Fesenmaier, D.R., 2016. Customer relations 2.0–implications for destination
marketing.
Jiang, Y., Ramkissoon, H. and Mavondo, F., 2016. Destination marketing and visitor
experiences: The development of a conceptual framework. Journal of Hospitality
Marketing & Management, 25(6), pp.653-675.
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.
Lee, B.C., 2015. The impact of social capital on tourism technology adoption for destination
marketing. Current Issues in Tourism, 18(6), pp.561-578.
Makkonen, T., 2016. Cross-border shopping and tourism destination marketing: the case of
Southern Jutland, Denmark. Scandinavian journal of hospitality and tourism, 16(sup1),
pp.36-50.
Pike, S., 2015. Destination marketing: essentials. Routledge.
Richards, G., 2015. Food experience as integrated destination marketing strategy. World Food
Tourism Summit in Estoril, Portugal, 10, p.2015.
Stalidis, G., Karapistolis, D. and Vafeiadis, A., 2015. Marketing decision support using Artificial
Intelligence and Knowledge Modeling: application to tourist destination
management. Procedia-Social and Behavioral Sciences, 175, pp.106-113.
Yang, X. and Wang, D., 2015. The exploration of social media marketing strategies of
destination marketing organizations in China. Journal of China Tourism
Research, 11(2), pp.166-185.
9

10