Marketing Opportunities
These
trade workshops are opened to National Tourism
Organisations, social and environmental
agencies/enterprises, eco-tour operators and
entrepreneurs, eco-lodge owners and any
organisation with an interest to promote, engage
and network with the global ecotourism
fraternity at the WEC2010.
It is
designed for NTOs, destinations and ecotourism
operators. Small enterprises and community-based
products find it hard to reach markets. Cost
effective promotion is a challenge for many
ecotourism enterprises because of their
isolation, small size and lack of resources and
skills. Targetted at the specialist travel trade
and media, these workshops can be the most
effective marketing platforms for you:-
Promoting the concept and practice of
responsible tourism
The
challenge and opportunity for product
development and marketing is to stimulate more
visitor spending per head, minimise leakage away
from the local area, reduce environmental impact
and increase support for conservation. Your
workshop may strive to promote ecotourism
concepts and eco-touristic experiences through
your tour itineraries, educating the travel
trade and travelling public, the value of
responsible tourism to endemic flora and fauna
and the benefit to local communities.
Shifting to web-based marketing applications
Although specialist tour operators are important
in this market, the majority of ecotourists are
individual travellers making their own
arrangements. You may want to provide the travel
trade and consumers with e-marketing and
web-based applications, branding and positioning
of website channels and introducing interactive
applications eg social media channels, booking
engines etc. All of these technological
applications offers fast, responsive and
detailed engagements, linking demand to
suppliers more efficiently.
Reaching out to specialist tour operators and
media
The
WEC2010 is a dedicated conference for the
ecotourism fraternity and trade, making this the
perfect platform for international, national and
local tourist organisations to engage and
promote their ecotourism themes and products to
specialist tour operators and media. The
workshops combined with the Green Tourism
International Mart as well as offers of
technical familiarisation tours to your
destinations are opportunities to engage
directly with targetted travel intermediaries
and eco-travellers. Effectively done, it will
generate the all important 'word of mouth'
recommendations which by far is the most potent
form of marketing in ecotourism.
Educationals as part of ecotourism marketing
These
workshops are educational platforms for
eco-destinations and ecotourism programmes to
reach out to the market with emphasis on
quality, authenticity and security. In marketing
ecotourism, providing information on the ecology
and culture of the area and how to respect it as
well as quality interpretation by hosts,
protected area authorities or local tour
operators, can greatly affect the visitors’
experience and their impact on the local
community. International and incoming tour
operators have an important role to play, not
only in promoting ecotourism but also in
advising on the overall quality of a
eco-destination, relating this to customer
requirements. More informed market segmentation
will enable products and promotional strategies
to be adapted to different expectations and
requirements.