Thomas Cook's Marketing Strategy: Elements, Service Mix, and Tourism

This report provides a detailed analysis of the marketing elements and service sector mix employed by Thomas Cook, focusing on their new summer holiday package 2017 to Egypt and Morocco. It examines the issues related to product, price, and place within the marketing mix, highlighting challenges such as product life cycle, pricing policies, and potential impacts of terrorist activities. The report also emphasizes the importance of the service sector mix, including people, packaging, partnership, and programming, for enhancing the brand image and customer experience. Furthermore, it explores the concept of the total tourism product, encompassing various services like accommodation, travel facilities, and customized services to attract a larger customer base. The analysis is supported by references to relevant academic sources, providing a comprehensive overview of Thomas Cook's marketing strategies in the travel and tourism industry.

MARKETING IN TRAVEL AND TOURISM
TASK 3

3.1 Issues in marketing elements with
respect to Thomas Cook
Marketing mix can be defined as the combination of different elements
such as price, product, place and promotion which are created for influencing the
strategies of marketing and target customers in an effective manner. Thomas Cook is
planning to launch their new summer holiday package 2017 to Egypt and Morocco so
that it is essential to consider all of the elements of marketing. Furthermore, there are
certain issues which can be faced by the manger in context of marketing elements for
targeting in Egypt and Morocco so that description is given below:

Cont..
Product
It is considered as the different types of products which are offered by Thomas
Cook for meeting the needs of customers. Further, the stated firm is offering a new
summer holiday package 2017 to Egypt and Morocco so that it is important for
manager to recognise an appropriate life cycle of the products which are provided by
the organisation. This will helps to identify the period in which the business can earn
high level of revenue along with the decline period where the profits are falling.

Cont..
Price- It can be states as the prices which are needed to pay by customer for the services offered by Thomas
cook. In context of this, the stated firm can make modification in their prices according to the life cycle of
the products and services. Further, company ca also use the pricing policy of skimming that helps them to
charge maximum prices at the time of launching of services. However, the firm can reduce the prices over a
specific period of time. One of the major issue which can be faced by the company which is related to some
of the customers who are not purchasing high quality of products and services such as tour package which is
offered by the Thomas Cook. Thus, there are certain impact on the activities of company due to some of the
service providers who sells products at low cost in Morocco.

Cont..
Place- It is considered as the areas where enterprise offers different types of services
and it is also considered as location of the company. In this context, Thomas Cook can
make development in the offices in the central locations such as airports, railway
station for ensuring the convenience to the consumers. Apart from this, at the time of
launching of product which is a trip in Egypt and Morocco so that it is important for
planning in an appropriate manner as it is considered as a evidence there are certain
terrorist attacks that can having an impact on the demand of packages.

3.2 Importance of Service Sector Mix in
Travel and Tourism
Service sector mix can be termed as the different types of elements of service marketing
which helps Thomas cook for communicating the brand image and content for targeting
customers. Service marketing of Thomas Cook can be considered as interactive marketing so
that the firm can make changes in the services after identification of preferences of customers.
Therefore, there is appropriate improvement in the quality of services can be done for
maintaining the brand image of the company in various markets. With the helps of service
sector mix elements it gives appropriate services. Further, there are certain elements for the
improvement in level of performance of summer holiday package in the cited countries.

Cont..
People- In context of people, the employees of companies are required to
provide appropriate services by the enhancement through the sessions of
training and development so that they can provide appropriate services to the
customers. Other than this, employees can be able to solve the issues of
customers in an efficient manner. Thus, highly qualified and skilled employees
will assists for the enhancement in the level of revenue.

Cont..
Packaging- The way in which the products and services are presented to the customers is
related to the concept of packaging. Here the organisation try to attract large number of
customers through creating e-brochure which provides information related to the new summer
holiday packages to customers. This will also involves the different features of Morocco and
Egypt that helps to grab attention of customers.

Cont..
Partnership- The concept of partnership helps to increase in the level of popularity of the
different types of products and services. Through partnership with the local service providers,
the stated firm can expect proper response of the customers.
Programming- It is considered as the timing of different types of activities which can be
performed under the functions of marketing which plays an important role in appropriate
strategic application. Thus, the marketing manager might adopt different types of methods
which helps them in the management of different activities for the smooth functioning of
business.

3.3 Concept of Total tourism product
Total tourism product can be defined as the collection of different services
which are offered by Thomas Cook to their customers for the enhancement of
experience. All of the different services which are provided by Thomas coo can be
classified in the various packages which they are offering to clients. The major focus
of specific level services is on the ticket bookings along with the various particular
services.

Cont..
In context of total tourism services which involves the facilities such as
accommodation, facilities of travelling along with the gym and spa. Here, the
organisation offers all of the services which provides effective experience to the
different types of customers. With respect to the summer holiday package, Thomas
Cook provides all of the services along with the hotel and restaurants with customised
services such as facilities of gym and pool. Thus, the firm can add large number of
customers by offering different types of services.

References
 Ashworth, G. and Goodall, B., 2012. Marketing tourism places (Vol. 2). Routledge.
 Buhalis, D. and Foerste, M., 2015. SoCoMo marketing for travel and tourism: Empowering co-creation
of value. Journal of Destination Marketing & Management. 4(3). pp.151-161.
 Dasgupta, D., 2011. Tourism marketing. India: Dorling Kindersley.
 Evans, N., Stonehouse, G. and Campbell, D., 2012. Strategic management for travel and tourism.
Taylor & Francis.
 Garín-Muñoz, T. and Pérez-Amaral, T., 2011. Internet usage for travel and tourism: the case of Spain.
Tourism Economics. 17(5). pp.1071-1085.
 Goeldner, C.R. and Ritchie, J.B., 2012. Tourism: principles, practices, philosophies (No. Ed. 12). John
Wiley and Sons, Inc.