Analyzing Integrated Marketing Communications in Tourism - MKTG2003

This essay discusses the significance of integrated marketing communications (IMC) within the tourism and hospitality industry. It highlights IMC as a strategic business procedure that integrates various brand promotion methods to effectively reach targeted customers, enhance sales, and maximize cost-effectiveness. IMC's role in creating and nurturing customer relationships, generating financial returns, building brand value and equity, and influencing customer behavior is examined. The essay further elaborates on how IMC informs, persuades, and reminds customers about available services, adds value by influencing perceptions and providing essential information, and helps organizations gain a competitive edge. It also covers the benefits of IMC, such as improved cost-effectiveness, customer retention, market targeting, and result orientation, along with the role of direct and relationship marketing in enhancing customer engagement and streamlining communication efforts. Ultimately, the essay emphasizes the importance of IMC in building brand reputation, attracting customers, and sustaining a competitive presence in the tourism and hospitality sectors.

Running head: IMPORTANCE OF INTEGRATED MARKETING COMMUNICATIONS
IMPORTANCE OF INTEGRATED MARKETING COMMUNICATIONS
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

1IMPORTANCE OF INTEGRATED MARKETING COMMUNICATIONS
Introduction
In this essay the aim of the discussion will be to learn about the importance of
integrated marketing communications in the context of hospitality and tourism industry. It
will help to know about the kind of impact the integrated marketing communications has on
the tourism and hospitality industry, two most promising and fast growing sectors in the
global economy. Integrated marketing communications simply refers to integrating or mixing
all the methods available of brand promotion in order to promote the services provided or the
products sold in the tourism and hospitality industry among the targeted customers who are
availing their services or will avail in near future. All aspects of marketing communication in
integrated marketing communications work together in order to increase the volume of sales
and maximize the cost effectiveness. It can also be termed as the process fir creation as well
as nourishing profitable relationships with the customers and the shareholders of the
enterprises engaged in not only the tourism and hospitality, but all other sectors, through
strategically influencing or controlling all the messages sent to the targeted people (Camilleri
2018).
Importance of Integrated Marketing Communications
Integrated marketing communications can be termed as a strategic business procedure
which is used to plan, develop, execute and evaluate the coordinated, measurable, persuasive
brand communication programs relating to consumers, customers, prospected employees as
well as other relevant internal and external audiences. The main aim of the integrated
marketing communications is to generate or create short-term financial returns for the tourism
and hospitality sector and also to build long-term brand value of the services provided and
also for the organizations or enterprises who are providing those services. It will help to
attract the customers to avail the services of a particular restaurant or hotel or any kind of

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other services related to the hospitality and tourism industry, so that brand value can be
maintained as well as increased and will help to earn revenues so that the services can be
provided in a much better, unique and modern way. Integrated marketing communications
can be recognized as a business process which is focused to the multiple number of relevant
audiences which helps in demand for the accountability of the services provided and also
helps in to measure the outcomes in an effective and efficient way. Integrated marketing
communications also plays a vital role in the process of improving and sustaining the brand
identity as well as the brand equity of the organizations who are dealing with providing the
services related to hospitality and tourism sector. The main purpose or objective of the
integrated marketing communications are to inform, persuade and remind the kind of services
provided by the hospitality and tourism sector to the targeted customers. It can also be said
that the major role also includes of influencing the behavior of the targeted market by the
service provides in tourism and hospitality sector. The marketing communications should be
capable to change the behavior of the people of the targeted market towards availing of the
services provided or the sale of the products or the customer loyalty towards a particular
brand (Opreana and Simona 2015). The marketing people of the organizations can use the
strategies involved in marketing communications to convince the selected target marketplace
about the services or the products provided, which actually helps to have a competitive edge
over the competitors. Integrated marketing communications Also adds value to the customers
who avail the products and the services provided by the hospitality and tourism sector,
because customers have the right to get informed about the kind of services which will be
provided to them, about the brand value or the information related to the surroundings of the
place where the services will be provided. In other words, it can be said that integrated
marketing communications helps a lot in influencing the perceptions of the audience of
specified features and symbolic associations that are better than the services provided by the

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competitors. Proper marketing communications also helps tom add value for the company
who are providing the services to the targeted customers. Integrated marketing
communications also helps to add value to for the organization or the advertiser who are
providing the services by building the brands as well as creating brand equity. As marketing
communication mainly happens at the brand level, it can be used by the organizations to
create well-known, popular or brands which are valued. Integrated marketing
communications helps to restrategize the promotional communication activities of the
organizations of hospitality and tourism sector. It helps to combine all the inter-departmental
marketing operations into a single homogeneous function, which helps to create a seamless
environment where sales, marketing, public relations, advertising and other areas will
complement the functions of each other’s rather than contradicting it. There are also unique
and salient benefits of integrated marketing communications, like improving the cost-
effectiveness of the efforts of the overall promotional activities in value terms. It helps
immensely the sectors of tourism and hospitality to attract as well as retain the targeted
customers by satisfying their needs and wants of them. Proper marketing communications
also helps to target new markets and people by providing high quality services in these two
sectors effectively and efficiently. Integrated marketing communications also helps to get
better rating on the result-orientation front, both at the fields level and boardroom level
(Finne and Christian 2017).
Though integrated marketing communications needs a lot of effort, but at the end it
helps to deliver many benefits to the tourism and hospitality industries. It helps to create
competitive advantage, boost the sales and profits as well as saving time, money and stress.
Integrated marketing communications helps to wrap the communications around the
customers who are availing the services provided by the tourism and hospitality sector and
providing an efficient and effective way to move through the different stages of the buying

4IMPORTANCE OF INTEGRATED MARKETING COMMUNICATIONS
process. It also helps the organizations related to these sectors by nurturing the relation with
the customers, which will help them to retail them to avail the services again in future
purposes. The capability to maintain a particular client for lifetime is a strong competitive
gain which can be possessed by the enterprises by maintaining proper marketing
communications with the customers. Relationship Marketing also plays a major role in the
integrated marketing communications, which also helps to increase the profit through the
increase of the effectiveness of the services provided by the hospitality and tourism sector. A
unified message is always better and has better impacts than a disconnected infinite of
messages. The crystal clear as well as consolidated message has a more possibility of
reducing the noise of more than five hundred economic messages in this modern competitive
and busy world. It has also seen in the studies and researches that proper and clear pictures
shared in broadcasting and direct mail helps to increase the advertising alartness and mail
shot replies. So it can be said that integrated marketing communications can boost up the
sales by stretching messages across different tools of communication to create more avenues
for the customers of tourism and hospitality sector to become aware and excited to avail the
services and the products provided by these two sectors. Messages which are linked carefully
also helps the customers to provide timely reminders, updated information as well as special
offers and discounts which, if presented in a planned and proper sequence, help the customers
to move comfortably through the different stages of the buying process, which actually helps
to reduce the agony of choices in this busy and complex world. Integrated marketing
communications also helps to make the messages more consistent and credible. This helps to
reduce the risk factors in the mind of the customers which, in turn, shortens the search
process and helps to command the outcome of comparisons between the brans who provide
the services to the targeted people. Integrated marketing communications also helps to save
money as it helps to eliminate the duplication in fields like photography and graphics as they

5IMPORTANCE OF INTEGRATED MARKETING COMMUNICATIONS
can be shared and used in advertising and sales promotion of the services provided by the
tourism and hospitality sectors. Proper integrated marketing communications also helps in
making tactical and strategic planning, which also helps to reduce the workload and stress
levels (Valos et al. 2016).
Direct Marketing is a part of integrated marketing communications. It includes the following
things (Kitchen, Philip and Tony 2015):
Direct Mail
Internet Sales
Shopping Channels
Catalogs
Telemarketing
Direct response Advertising
Integrated marketing communications also educates or informs the customers about
the types of services available in the hospitality and tourism sector and about the prices and
places where they are available, so that the customers can select the places and prices
according to their requirements. The customer database information can also be obtained
through the internet which will help these two sectors to infirm about the offers and discounts
and other relevant information regarding the places where the customer wants to visit
according to their tastes and preferences. The relationship can also be properly maintained by
the enterprises and the customers or the tourists. Proper customers service and support can
also be provided to the customers who will avail the services in the tourism and hospitality
sector. It also helps to make the planning which will be audience-centric, so that the
customers can avail the best from the services provided by the hospitality and tourism sector

6IMPORTANCE OF INTEGRATED MARKETING COMMUNICATIONS
and also help to attract new people to avail the services and purchase the products supplied in
these two sectors (Rakić and Mira 2014). Proper integrated marketing communications will
help the people to get the information in an efficient manner so that it can reduce the
miscommunications between the service providers and the end customers. Integrated
marketing communications helps to build a brand reputation and brand value to the customers
for whom the services as well as the products are designed or made. It also helps to develop
the awareness among the targeted people about the happenings and occurrences of the events
and news in the hospitality and tourism sector, and also to attract additional targeted traffic on
priority basis. Integrated marketing communications also helps to review the marketing plan
in the tourism and hospitality sectors which will help to attract new customers as well as
retain the old customer base in this highly competitive world (Kitchen, Philip and Inga 2015).
And it is very difficult to retain a customer in this competitive world to sustain in the
marketplace where so many players are preparing the marketing plans in order to provide
high end services and top class products to the customers. It also helps to analyze the
promotional program situation and the communication process so that it can be overcome or
can be restructured according to the demands of the targeted people to fulfill their needs and
wants. Better results can be received through integrated marketing communications, as it
helps to improve the effectiveness in the marketing campaigns used by the enterprises of the
tourism and hospitality sector. In an integrated marketing, the advertising can be used to raise
the awareness of the services provided by the organizations as well to generate leads for the
sales force (Barker 2013).
Direct mails or messages can be used to follow up the inquires and helps to provide
information to the prospects. Integrated marketing communications helps to convert these
prospects to customers by the help of telemarketing tool. Active presence on online also helps
to convey messages effectively and efficiently to the targeted people so that they can avail the

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services provided by them. Modernized form of advertising tools actually helps o promote
the different campaigns by the service providers to the targeted market to distribute the news
about the details in the services. Integrated marketing communications also helps to create as
well as maintain consistency throughout the channels or mediums used in the marketing
communication processes by the service providers in the tourism and hospitality industry.
Proper brand hitting can be done by the help of integrated marketing communications
process, which helps to convert the prospects to the customers (Brunello 2013). Awareness
programs can also be followed properly by the service providers of these two sectors in
integrated marketing communications. It also saves the overall costs by using the same
procedure in different kinds of media. It will also useful for the prospects as well as the
customers as they can remember the same thing rather summarizing the different images and
data of the same service providers. As there are so many organizations engaged in the market
of hospitality and tourism sector. Integrated marketing communications also helps to provide
customers with the information in the proper format required by them. It can be via text
message, email, telephone or direct mail. Prospects as well as the customers can view about
the details of the services provided by the enterprises of the tourism and hospitality sectors
through print ads, watching television or hearing to the radio. Integration assures about
receiving the same information in all forms of communication for the prospects as well as for
the potential customers. In modern world, the competition is very tough, especially on
hospitality and tourism industry, as more service providers are entering the marketplace to
provide different array of services to the people around the world. Proper integrated
marketing communications helps to maintain a healthy relationship with the prospects as well
as with the customers. Public relations are a major tool in the integrated marketing
communications which helps to attract new people to avail the services as well as to retain
them in this highly competitive sectors of tourism and hospitality. It also helps to focus on

8IMPORTANCE OF INTEGRATED MARKETING COMMUNICATIONS
the results as proper integrated marketing communications helps to communicate the
messages from the service providers to the customers effectively and efficiently. The greater
return of investment will be achieved by the service providers if the communication of the
messages is done both internally and externally (Barger, Victor and Lauren 2013).
Conclusion
From the above essay, it can be concluded that integrated marketing communications
performs an important function on context of tourism and hospitality sector in order to attract
and retain customers in this competitive world. Necessity is the mother of all inventions and
integrated marketing communications is no exception. So, it can be said that integrated
marketing communications is very much necessary in conveying the messages to the end
people or customers by the service providers in an effective and efficient way. Integrated
marketing communications will help the organizations to provide a link between the service
providers and the end customers so that a healthy relation can be maintained between them,
which will help to retain the customers as well as to attract new people in this competitive
sector of tourism and hospitality. Integrated marketing communications starts from preparing
a proper message to finally conveying it to the targeted people in a structured way, so that it
helps both the service providers as well as the end customers. It is beneficial to both the
sectors of hospitality and tourism, the two most competitive and ever-increasing sector in
modern world. So, it can be said that integrated marketing communications should be
followed and maintained by one and all, across all the sectors.

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