THEME 1.

TOURISM MARKETING - CONCEPT, DIMENSIONS, PERSPECTIVES

 What is marketing?
• Marketing consists in activities related to:
product development,
research,
distribution,
price,
promotion,
service.
• Marketing optimises the profit for each market transaction and facilitates
the development of beneficial relationships with product consumers and
suppliers.
 Markets

Needs,
Exchanges,
desires,
transactions
demand
Marketing

Value,
Products,
satisfaction,
services
quality
 Questions
• Which is in your opinion the main difference between needs,
desires and demand?
• Which are the main factors influencing the demand for
tourism services?
• At what level in Maslow’s pyramid is the need to travel? What
implications does this position pose?
 NEEDS
Self
“Requirements of a person or a group of
actualisation
persons which must be satisfied since
Self esteem they ensure their very existence and
development”
Love/belonging
(A. Maslow)
Safety

Physiological needs

Adapted from Maslow, A - “Towards a Psychology of Being”, Van Nostrand, New York, 1967
DESIRES satisfy human needs:

• a dinner at a restaurant satisfies the NEED

for food, but it can also satisfy the DESIRE
for social interaction and self esteem
(particularly in the case of a premium/deluxe
restaurant);

• an adventure tourism program may satisfy

not only the NEEDto travel, but also the
DESIRE of self-actualization.
DEMAND – a need that can be satisfied while taking into consideration
individuals’ and organisations’ (limited) material resources

UNLIMITED
DEMAND LIMITED RESOURCES
NEEDS
PRODUCT / SERVICE- „anything that can be offered on a market for
acquisition, use or consumption while satisfying a need or desire”
(Ph. Kotler)
 VALUE, SATISFACTION, QUALITY
VALUE • The difference between the advantages obtained by a
consumer through the acquisition of a product and
services and the acquisition costs
SATISFACTION • The degree to which a product or services meets the
consumer’s expectations
• Depends on the product’s performance
QUALITY • Is assessed by the consumer
• Represents the degree to which his or her desires and
needs have been met
• The consumer will prefer the products and services
with a higher quality-price ratio
 What is marketing?

“A social process by which individuals and groups obtain what they

need and want through creating and exchanging products and
value with others.”
(Philip Kotler)
 EXCHANGE and TRANSACTIONS
Obtaining the necessary products can be done through EXCHANGE or TRANSACTIONS
EXCHANGE • The act of obtaining the desired product from another
person or organisation through exchanging goods or
services of similar value;
• Takes place between two parties, each obtaining
advantages.

TRANSACTIONS • Represents the exchange of values between two parties;

• Is carried out with the help of money or by exchanging
products.
 THE MARKET
• The place of interaction between the demand and the offer;
• Includes ACTUAL and POTENTIAL BUYERS which might interact
with a SELLER or PROVIDER;
• The market size depends both on the number of actual and
potential buyers, as well as on the number and size of actual and
potential transactions.
 MARKETING MANAGEMENT

Includes the:
• analysis
• planning of programs that create and maintain the exchange
of advantages with target-customers
• implementation
• control
Takes into consideration production, sales, marketing
and organizational marketing.
 ORGANISATIONAL MARKETING
• targets organisations in their entirety;
• represents the process of determining and satisfying the needs,
desires and interests of target markets more efficiently and effectively
than competitors;
• The primary objective is to maintain or improve the welfare of
consumers as well as of other members of society.
 SERVICES MARKETING
• Different from marketing of goods;
• Aims at identifying the consumers’ needs and
desires and satisfying them at the right place and
time, at the most attractive price;
• Differences related to the nature and characteristics
of services => GENERIC DIFFERENCES
• Differences related to how service-providing
companies are managed and organised =>
CONTEXTUAL DIFFERENCES
 Questions
• Which are the main differences between tangible goods on
one hand and services on the other?
• Which are the main differences between the market for
goods and the market for services?
• What do these differences mean to marketers?
 Services and their characteristics

Intangibility
• SERVICES represent “any
action or activity which
can be offered by a party
to another party, which
Characteristics
is basically intangible
Perisability
of services Inseparability and can not affect any
ownership. Service may
be related to tangible
products or intangible
Variability products” – Philip Kotler
 Services and their characteristics

INTANGIBILITY
•represents the property of services to be perceived through the
human senses (sight, hearing, touching, smelling etc.) before
being bought;
•in order to be evaluated and appreciated before being bought,
a service must be promoted;
•promoting a services means creating an image of that service in
the customer’s mind;
•the IMAGE represents the key-element of service marketing.
 Services and their characteristics

INSEPARABILITY
•Services are simultaneously produces and consumed;
•The provider and consumer are present and interact throughout the
provision and consumption process;
•There is no possibility to return or change the service with another
one, as in the case of material goods;
•The provider’s main task is to select, prepare and motivate the
service-providing staff so as to ensure the customer’s satisfaction.
 Services and their characteristics
HETEROGENEITY/VARIABILITY
•Generated by the complex environment in
which the provision of services takes place (e.g.
the provision of one service depends on the
physical and psychological state of the provider,
as well as on external environmental factors)
•The continuous improvement of quality in the
provision of services remains very important to
the consumer.
 Services and their characteristics
PERISHABILITY
•Services cannot be stored or kept for future consumption;
•Not using the whole capacity of a hotel or a restaurants
leads to diminishing returns, without the possibility of
recovering them at a later time.
 CONTEXTUAL DIFFERENCES
• the insufficient development of marketing in service provider
companies;
• little attention paid to developing the marketing competences of
service-providing staff;
• different organisational structures – there is a great variety of
companies with organisational structures that vary according to the
size of capital, the nature of provided services, the geographic
localisation etc.
• an insufficient base of performance-related data;
• high impact of law and regulations on the tertiary sector.
 SPECIFIC FEATURES of tourism services
The services provided by the tourism industry have a series
of specific features that distinguishes them from other
services:
• Predominance of the emotional factor in the decision to
buy a tourism product – tourism products are provided
directly to the consumer. The need to buy a tourism service
is established by every consumer based on the image
he/she forms and the experience he/she has gained.
• The complexity of tourism products – tourism services are
generally provided as packages which comprise
information, transportation, accommodation, dining,
entertainment, medical treatment etc. or any combination
of these services.
 SPECIFIC FEATURES of tourism services
• The dependency of tourism services of services
offered by complementary enterprises – tourism
services are provided to tourists by tourism
enterprises, but through complementary enterprises;
• The influence of distributon channels – tourism
services are provided to consumers through
intermediaries which have an important role not only
in distribution, but also in the purchasing decision.
 SPECIFIC FEATURES of tourism services
• Seasonality
- tourism services are characterized by a pronounced seasonality
- for this reason, the elements of the marketing mix are used
differently;
- thus, while promotion is mainly done in extra-season, price and
distribution are most important in the tourism season;
- Maintenance and reparations are implemented in extra-season.
 Internal vs. external marketing
• EXTERNAL MARKETING – includes product preparation, establishing of
price rates, distribution and promotion of services towards consumers

• INTERNAL MARKETING – preparing and motivating a company’s own

employees with the aim of providing high-quality services to consumers
 Tourism marketing

• Developing tourism products which satisfy as much as possible

tourists’ needs and desires;
• Developing only those products which are expected by
consumers and ensure a high economic efficiency.
 Tourism marketing
Involves the SELECTION of:
•tourism products,
•global markets or target markets,
•price, distribution, promotion and partnership policies;
•service-providing staff;
As well as COMBINING and PROGRAMMING services so to as to
diversify the tourism product.
 Questions
• Why do you think the marketing is important for
tourism? If so, why do think it is not applied to all the
branches / sectors of activity ?
• Which do you think are the most important trends in tourism
marketing ?
• How do technological innovation and computerized data
influence tourism marketing?
• Which are the disadvantages or limits of online marketing?
How can we overcome them?
 Perspectives of tourism marketing

• Identifying MARKET SEGMENTS for which new products can be

developed

PAN-EUROPEAN SEGMENTS:
• Youth and adults with similar tastes in terms of clothing, music and
food;
• Persons that place in high regard their health and diet;
• Persons that are concerned with environmental problems and pay high
attention to protecting and conserving the natural environment;
• Persons with a high interest in using modern means of communication.
 Perspectives of tourism marketing
• Marketing will be based on computerized data, eliminating
intermediaries
• The majority of companies in tourism will be managed by persons
with a wide knowledge of marketing
• Marketing associations will hold an ever increasing role in the
industry;
• Tourism marketing will contribute to stimulating consumer culture,
which is on the rise throughout the world
• Tourism marketing will help develop social responsibility towards the
environment
 Perspectives of tourism marketing
CHANGES that bring important implications to marketers:
• Demographic changes (e.g. the increase of elderly persons and of
one-child families)
•An increasing heterogeneity of the population will create more market
niches, while leading to the decrease of mass markets;
•Mass-media will continue to exercise an increasing influence on
consumers;
•Women – a market segment on the rise.
 Perspectives of tourism marketing
• TECHNOLOGICAL INNOVATIONS (e.g. virtual reality, artificial
intelligence);
• Technological innovations lead to a higher travelling speed, which makes
tourism products more accessible to everyone on the planet, which in
turn leads to a favourable development of unindustrialized countries.