Ministry to Undertake Aggressive Marketing Campaign

The Ministry of Tourism intends to, over the next few months, grow its existing markets and make significant inroads into new destinations, through an aggressive promotion campaign.
Tourism Minister, Hon. Edmund Bartlett, speaking in the House of Representatives yesterday (June 30), said that the campaign will involve integrated public relations programmes, advertising and sales strategies.
“We’ll be targeting those markets, which hold good potential for business for Jamaica. Now more than ever, we need to be very visible in the marketplace…we need to use strategies that will get the most out of every dollar that we spend,” he said.
The Ministry’s package of innovative approaches includes social marketing as a key new tool. This will see increased use of the Internet and other web-based technologies as these new communication tools have changed the way tourism is marketed, Mr. Bartlett said, noting that the Ministry has been utilising viral campaigns, interactive tools and travel research sites.
“We have had to adopt new approaches to marketing because of the fact that the profile of the traveller is changing. A very important segment of our market is what we call ‘Generation Y’, that is people born after the mid-80s. This younger generation is technologically savvy, attention craving, and passionate about their interests. They travel more and are more inclined to be adventurous. They care about the environment and tend to be more sensitive to cultures, than other groups. They are blogging, they use Facebook and Twitter. Our communication then must take all these into consideration,” Mr. Bartlett outlined.
In addition, direct and cable television is being used to advertise in a more pointed way, and partnerships forged with hoteliers, travel agents and tour operators, in order to ensure the delivery of a wider range of product offerings, which will bring Jamaica to all markets.
“We are going to be dealing with summer promotions in the United States, (and) passion travel, focussing on family, music, weddings, faith-based tourism, cuisine, sports, edu-tourism, volun (volunteer)-tourism, eco-tourism, and health and wellness tourism,” the Minister stated.