Designing promotion

Strategy
By the completion of this module, you
should be able to

i. Define tourism promotion

ii. Understand the objectives of tourism promotion
iii. Explain types of promotion
iv. Identify and explain elements of tourism promotion
v. Describe factors that influence selection of
promotion mix
 MARKETING MIX
Marketing mix is a combination of elements/ tools used by the
firm to achieve marketing objectives in the target market.
Marketing mix is the set of marketing tools that the firm uses to
pursue its marketing objectives in the target market.
For marketing of products, there are the four elements of
marketing mix those are product, price, distribution and
promotion.
In the cases of services, there are three additional elements.
These elements are people, physical evidence and process.
Meaning and definitions
Promotion some time is known as marketing communication
Tourism Promotion refers to the process of informing, persuading,
encouraging the potential customers and trade intermediaries like
travel agents, tour operators, reservation services, and hotel and
charter brokers, about the benefits of the product.
 Three Types of Promotion
Informative promotion
 It is conducted during the early stages of the product life cycle.
 Marketing manger seeks promotional outlets to inform the public of
the facilities and amenities of the tourism products
Persuasive promotion
 It is used when an product is in its early stages of growth.
 Marketers put very much promotional effort in developing
persuasive messages and sending them through several channels.
Reminder promotion

 Reminder promotion is used mainly when product reaching a

mature stage.
 Marketer launches marketing campaigns to remind people of
their products.
 These reminder messages serve to jog(shake) the memory
and keep the product in the public.
 Objectives of promotion

• To create awareness
• To generate interest
• To stimulate sales
• To meet competition
• To create good image and relationship
 Promotional Mix

Promotion-mix is also known as the marketing communication-mix

refers to the combination of the promotional elements (advertising,
sales promotions etc, used by the firm to achieve promotional
objectives.
Promotion mix is the combination of different methods of promotion.
Each method is suitable under different conditions and a right
combination can be very powerful.
Forms of promotional strategy

There are two different forms of promotional strategy

Push strategy refers to a method by which the organization
promotes directly to the intermediaries thereby these
organizations promote the items to the final customer.
For a package holiday company, this would involve the
organization promoting their holidays to travel agents who will
then sell them directly to the final customer.
Pull strategy relies on the idea that if an organization
communicates to their final customer, then the customer will
demand the item from the intermediaries.
Tour companies, for example, advertise directly to the
customer via television, magazines and press advertising.
It is hoped that the customer will then demand the holidays
from the travel agent.
In reality, organizations use both push strategies and pull
strategies in their total marketing communications strategies.
 Promotional Mix
Tourist enterprises use different methods of communication to
achieve their objectives.
1. Advertising
2. Public relations and publicity
3. Sales promotions
4. Personal selling
5. Merchandising
6. Direct marketing
Advertising: Is a Paid Non-personal communication for mass
market by an identified sponsor. Such as newspapers, magazines,
billboards, sides of public transports posters, TV commercials, radio
and others.
Public relations (PR) includes all the activities that a tourism or
hospitality organization uses to maintain or improve its relationship
with other organizations or individuals.
Familiarization tours/ trip
Press Releases
Travel Exhibitions
The winning of awards
Sales promotions are short-term activities designed to generate
a temporary increase in sales of the products/services.
Examples of sales promotional tools are discounts, coupons,
contests and sweepstakes.
Personal selling: Oral conservations, either by telephone or fact
to face, between salespeople and prospective customers.
Merchandising: This includes materials used in-house to stimulate
sales, e.g. menus, wine lists, tent cards, signs, posters, brochures,
meeting planner guides, displays, and other point-of-sale
promotional items.
For example, some restaurants will have the tent cards on the
dining table to promote wines of the week or desserts of the week.

Direct marketing is defined as all the media activities,

communications and responses which are directed at individual
customers or potential customers. Examples using direct mail and
e-mail.
 Factors Influence Selection of Promotion Mix

A marketing manager from one company might decide to focus

on social media, whereas a marketing manager from another
company might decide to focus his company’s efforts on
television commercials.
Promotional Objectives
Fund Available for Market Promotion
Stage in the product life cycle.
Level of Competition
Nature of the market
Nature of Market
In case the group of potential customers is small and are
concentrated in a particular locality, then personal selling is more
likely to be effective.
Whereas, if the customer base is large and widespread, then the
blend of advertising, personal selling, and the sales promotion is
required to sell the product.
 Stage of Product’s Life
During the introduction stage, the principal objective of the promotion
is to create the primary demand by emphasizing the product’s
features, utility, etc. therefore, the blend of advertising and publicity is
required.
As the product reaches its maturity stage the advertising and personal
selling is required to maintain the demand of the customers.
Availability of Funds
If the funds available for the promotion are large, then the blend of
promotional tools can be used, whereas in the case the funds are
limited then the management must choose the promotional tool
wisely.
Level of Competition
Promotional efforts are designed according to type and
intensity of competition.
All promotional tools are aimed at protecting company’s
interest against competition.
Level of promotional efforts and selection of promotional
tools depend on level of competition.
Promotional Objectives
If company’s objective is to inform a large number of buyers,
advertising is advisable.
If company wants to convince limited consumers, it may go for
personal selling.
when company wants to influence buyers during specific season or
occasion, the sales promotion can be used.
Some companies use publicity to create or improve brand image
and goodwill in the market
THE END