Action
Create a task force of no more than 12 people with specific skills and experience who can speak on behalf of your tourism and hospitality industry, with a particular emphasis on local, small businesses.
Why
The pandemic has highlighted the importance of cooperation between governments, destinations, and business.
To rebuild traveler confidence, destinations must be able to demonstrate visitor safety across the end-to-end journey, which requires all players to adopt a coordinated approach.
Moreover, as the tourism sector comprises mainly micro and small businesses, there is a clear role for governments and DMOs to use their convening power to help local businesses work together and be heard by policy makers.
Case Study
One Industry One Voice
The UK One Industry One Voice coalition is a weekly taskforce of events industry associations and businesses, led by umbrella trade organisation “The Business Visits and Events Partnership” — which represents the conference, exhibition, and outdoor events sector.
The coalition is supported by eight other industry associations including “UK Live Music Group”, which represents the UK’s live music industry, and events and entertainment technology trade association, “The Professional Lighting and Sound Association.” It is also supported by London’s DMO, London & Partners, which operates the city’s tourism and convention bureaus.
The taskforce was created following an informal meeting organised by an event management company in July 2020 to coordinate the communications being developed to support the industry.
It has 4 objectives:
- Coordination of campaign timings
- Consistency of data and statistics about the industry
- Alignment on asks and communication to government
- Amplification of key messaging and mutual support to promote campaigns activities.
The taskforce took time to build trust and find ways of working, as well as understand and agree on the key issues facing everyone who works in the events industry.
It established working groups on COVID testing and insurance issues, where the focus was on sharing of information and ideas, as well as understanding where conversations were taking place within different government departments.
It also created a website, which contains base line numbers for the industry that were used across all campaigning activity — from the economic value that the industry delivers, to the number of people employed across the event industry ecosystem. The website also contains a diary function to allow people to share key dates and activations to support the scheduling of communications and messaging. Further, the taskforce launched a quarterly survey into the state of the industry. This was used for campaigns and shared with associations, so that they could use it in their own lobbying and campaigning activity.
The taskforce’s lobbying campaigns have included # We Create Experiences, # What About Weddings, and # Save Nightlife.
How to adopt this approach
Keep the task force agile, focused, and responsive. It should consist only of people with the skills, experience, and connections needed to get the job done.
There should be a regular cadence of meetings with clear tasks beforehand and afterwards.
Focus the task force on specific, practical projects which will produce a particular result.
A government or DMO official should connect the task force to municipal, county, state, and federal decision makers.
The task force should operate transparently, providing regular updates to businesses, sharing trusted information and advice, and creating opportunities for businesses to support its goals.
Do
- Do gather compelling data on the industry’s importance to the destination, as well as the impact that the pandemic has had on local businesses and workers. For example, prior to the pandemic, New York’s Hudson Valley collected data which found that tourist activity supported multiple sectors of the economy, sustained $38bn total income, reduced the unemployment rate from 12.5 to 4.1%, and saved every household an average of $1,221 in taxes.
- Do make things easier for stretched public officials — becoming a single point of contact to understand industry wants and needs, a way to communicate to the industry, and a partner to get support to the businesses and workers who need it most.
- Do accept that different segments of the industry may have different priorities and focus the task force on common goals — but not on the lowest common denominator.
Don’t
- Don’t try to maintain the task force beyond its useful life, and don’t ask it to solve every challenge facing every segment. Remember that it is a temporary grouping for the purpose of accomplishing a definite objective.
To find out more
COVID-19 Economic Response and Recovery
Rebuild Traveler Confidence in your Destination
Action
Implement a widely recognized COVID-19 safety compliance certification program for tourism and hospitality businesses, and communicate it widely.
Provide a flow of easily accessible, digestible, accurate, and timely information and facts about the state of your destination. Be open to answering questions to inform travelers’ decision-making.
Why
With visitor number levels down, many destinations cannot afford to alienate travelers, which can now demand more stringent cleaning and safety protocols. Destinations which have implemented recognized health and hygiene protocols will be better able to position themselves as safe, and increase travelers’ (particularly baby boomers) confidence.
However, the implementation of a “gold standard” certification program is not, in itself, sufficient. Destinations also need to be transparent in their communications if they are to spur demand. In particular, they need to communicate detailed, trustworthy information about cleanliness and health measures through regular updates from trusted sources.
Background
Many leading destinations have launched recognizable certification programs to strive for a consistent approach to safety. For example the Singapore Tourism Board, Visit California and Cape Town Travel.
These programs often draw on the World Travel and Tourism Council’s SafeTravels program, which sets out detailed protocols for hospitality, retail, attractions, meeting venues, and car rental companies, amongst others.
Case Study
Austin’s Dine with Confidence
A volunteer-led coalition of business owners, known as Good Work Austin, created a program called Dine With Confidence in response to the state’s more lax COVID guidelines, which became a “bill of rights” for diners and restaurant workers.
The goal was to build consumer confidence, keep workers safe, and prevent restaurants from closing. The coalition set strict protocols around social distancing, sanitary measures, mask mandates, and other measures. It was their hope that the city would endorse the measures.
It then asked local businesses — fine dining restaurants, counter-service spots, coffee shops, and businesses that were only open for take-out — to sign the pledge.
The pledge requires businesses to:
- Add notes to websites and reservation sites stating that guests cannot enter if they are exhibiting any symptoms of COVID-19
- Engage a medical professional to counsel employees on safe behaviors, both at work and away from work.
- Require employees to complete a health declaration to make sure they are not putting community members at risk
- Take staff temperatures daily and send home anyone with a 99.6º, or higher temperature
- Require staff who have experienced COVID-19 symptoms to remain at home until they can 1) receive a doctor’s note allowing them to return to work; 2) receive a negative result from a COVID-19 PCR test; 3) complete a 10-day self-quarantine
- Require staff, who were in close contact (within 6 ft for more than 15 mins) with an employee who tests positive for COVID-19, to quarantine for 7 days, and then obtain a negative PCR test
- Provide all staff with access to health care and paid sick leave
- Require all dine-in or other unmasked customers to provide their names and complete a Health Declaration
- Require all staff to wear masks while in the establishment. Require guests to wear masks, unless specifically excepted for active dining, or receiving other services that require them to be unmasked
- Enforce hand washing every 30 minutes for all staff
- Prevent staff from having any intentional physical contact, and make them constantly aware of the necessity of social distancing
- Dedicate certain employees to service guests and/or divide spaces and redefine roles to further separate employees and guests
- Make menus and similar information items online, display, single-use, or sanitize them after each use
- Place hand sanitation stations at the entrance and exit of the establishment and outside the restrooms
- Ensure proper ventilation of indoor spaces by cleaning and changing MERV13 filters monthly. Perform preventive maintenance quarterly for HVAC systems. Identify other measures to increase air flow
- Adopt all elements of the “Open Texas Minimum Standard Health Protocols” for facility, employees, and guests.
When creating the list, the coalition surveyed businesses to find out what they needed and what challenges they faced. It then purchased PPE in bulk and at lower cost. It also sourced architects, who offered pro-bono advice on safe dining formats. Where possible, the coalition drew on CDC guidelines. Where this was not available, it drew on local authorities and experts. The pledge was promoted to businesses and patrons through press and social media. 50 local businesses signed the charter, and numerous towns and cities from Raleigh, NC, to San Diego, and the Hudson Valley, asked for guidance to replicate it.
How to adapt this approach
Identify industry representative bodies or leaders, with local influence and reach into businesses which/who can front the program.
Work with CDC and local health officials to develop measures which both meet high standards and will satisfy anxious residents and visitors.
Develop guidance which is specific and unambiguous. Monitor and call out breaches.
Engage a wide range of businesses about the measures to understand their adoption challenges. Work with the businesses to identify solutions. Communicate the measures widely and encourage residents and visitors to share their experiences.
Do
- Do make safety measures specific, and try to secure broad adoption across a customer’s end-to-end journey.
- Do engage city officials early in the process to seek their buy-in, help coordinate and extend measures across industry segments, and communicate them to residents and visitors.
- Do encourage local businesses to raise awareness of local safety measures with residents and visitors, because first travelers can validate destinations’ communications and spread the word to family and friends that they would have the confidence to return. (92% of travelers say that they trust word-of-mouth recommendations from family and friends.12)
- Do focus communications on relevant social media channels and online forums. Since the pandemic, travelers have placed greater importance on pre-trip planning, and Pinterest has emerged as a popular platform.13 Almost half of all travelers have also increased their time spent browsing social media, and many rely on online travel forums to find information about how destinations are executing on safety.14
Don’t
- Don’t activate tactical marketing too early. Multiple surveys show that travelers will not visit your destination unless they are confident that they can do so safely. Action 3 contains advice on ways to build their confidence.
Learn more about the Tactical Guide
COVID-19 Economic Response and Recovery
Support Mainstreet/Downtown Businesses by Increasing Local Tourism
Problem:
The COVID-19 pandemic has dramatically altered tourism and travel across the world. Because of these new circumstances, cities can now capture some of that spend locally.
Action:
Cities/ tourism bureaus should launch a PR and targeted advertising campaign to encourage patronage of local businesses. Disinvested neighborhoods and hard-hit industries should be prioritized.
Case Study
New York, NY: NYC & Company Local Tourism Campaign
After the 2008 financial crisis, New York City’s hospitality industry was facing a crisis. Tourism had declined to record low levels and models accurately predicted that business travel and international visitors would be slow to return. This presented a unique challenge for a city that serves as an international tourist and business hub.
To address this, NYC & Company – the City’s destination marketing organization (DMO) – launched a campaign to encourage local tourism. One element was a media campaign to encourage local tourism. The DMO targeted people living in the five boroughs and surrounding neighborhoods to encourage them to visit local attractions and do “staycations” in local hotels. Their communications team also launched promotions of local restaurants and attractions, and showcased examples of New Yorkers enjoying their staycations. Because of a limited budget, the team focused on earned media. It developed contacts at local TV stations and established recurring Friday programming highlighting new places to explore. The marketing team also enlisted prominent residents to promote local establishments and developed content that it could provide to media organizations and through social media channels. The program was successful; there was an increase in room demand and occupancy rate in spring 2009, which was driven by local residents. The business travel market stayed depressed for at least 12-16 months and it took even longer for international travel to return.
Hotel stays were just one element of the organization’s strategy. It also encouraged residents to try local neighborhood restaurants and to explore the many attractions that NYC has to offer.
NYC & Company is currently applying its learnings from the 2008 crisis to develop a roadmap for reopening the city, called All In NYC. The initiative builds on the exploration and staycations promoted in 2008 and prioritizes “Hyperlocal Exploration”, including a Five-Borough Public Art Program. It is also creating “Welcome Back” content which shows how businesses are reopening safely, in an effort to restore consumer confidence.
How To Adapt this Approach:
- Identify local communities that have disposable income (e.g., suburbs, surrounding regions, and states)
- Try to bring on board a local digital marketing agency, which might be willing to work for free/at a discounted rate in exchange for local brand recognition
- Brainstorm marketing campaigns to encourage local “stay-cations” and short getaways. Focus on your audience’s needs and wants and structure the campaign around 5 questions: “what, who, why, where, and when”
- Develop a content plan, which will appeal to your target audience’s needs and wants
- Include a focus on less obvious attractions and neighborhoods. These can include walking tours of famous places (e.g., history, civil rights), visits to ethnic restaurants, and shops that offer local artisan goods
- Develop creative ways to tell local stories
- Launch the campaign with dedicated funding
- Focus all marketing spend on mobile, social media
- “Earn” (do not buy) time on regional publications and media. Try to bring on board a local PR agency, or former journalist with experience pitching stories to the media (and not just writing press releases). Again, negotiate a discount in exchange for local brand recognition and/or access to local business development opportunities
- Attend virtual (or in-person) community gatherings to offer suggestions for safe ways to “explore your city”
- Include a “featured neighborhood” of the week/month, with suggested restaurants, attractions, etc.
- Create a list of top restaurants by cuisine for each neighborhood in the city
- Work with local business leaders to offer incentives to residents who live within a certain distance
- Track reach, engagement and influence, and revise tactics as necessary.
Benefits:
- Facilitates additional spending at local businesses during a time when people are not traveling as much
Risks:
- Spending will just be redistributed within the city, rather than be additional
- Many city-backed marketing campaigns are poorly targeted, executed or measured
Impact: Medium
Implementation time: Slow
Cost: Low. This primarily is leveraging existing media and advertising resources to promote local neighborhoods.
Learn more about the Tactical Guide
COVID-19 Economic Response and Recovery
Provide Access to Funds and Resources for Tourism Businesses to Adapt
Action:
Provide access to finance and technical assistance to help small, tourism and hospitality businesses pivot, adapt, and capitalize on new demands and opportunities in a postpandemic world.
Why:
Keeping local, small businesses is critical for the recovery of your tourism economy. By helping them develop new online communications and sales channels, create new lines of business, or repurpose and adapt their space, you are helping to create longterm revenue solutions.
Background:
In 2020, U.S. travel spend declined by nearly $500 million and, while the industry improved between April and September, progress stalled in the final quarter of the year due to the continued absence of business travel and another surge in COVID-19 cases.
The travel economies of every city and state were affected. Seventy percent of U.S. metropolitan regions have at least 10% of their workforce in leisure and hospitality, and during 2020, cities in more than 18 states experienced 40+% downturn in travel spending. The impact was felt most by small businesses (with fewer than 500 employees), which make up 99.5% of the tourism sector and 60.6% of employment within the sector. Many of them face a time of extreme liquidity strain and most of them entered the pandemic with very limited cash flow.
Women and minorities have also been hard hit, with women- and minority-owned businesses comprising 63.5% of U.S. accommodation and food services businesses and 46.5% of arts and entertainment businesses.
Given that COVID-19 will probably be around for a long time, many tourism businesses will need to adapt and/or reinvent themselves for “the new normal.”
Case Study
Bellville Downtown District Marketplace
Belleville is a town located between Toronto and Ottawa in Canada. During Canada’s strict lockdown in 2020, the Downtown Belleville Improvement Area (a business improvement district) decided to embark on a project to create an online marketplace called the Downtown District Marketplace.
In just four weeks, the BID launched a website which allowed nearly two-dozen businesses to receive orders for curbside pickup. Today, the website hosts over a thousand products from local businesses, including restaurants, artisan markets, art associations, and galleries. It has attracted more than 50,000 visitors and over 1,000 orders. In fact, the marketplace has been such a success that the BID is no longer supporting it with grant funding.
The BID is currently developing the site to add shipping. Currently, customers can pick up curbside, or merchants manage deliveries themselves.
How the marketplace works
The BID created the marketplace on the Shopify platform. The platform charges the BID $299/month, plus $10/month for a multi vendor marketplace app, which means the BID does not become the merchant.
The BID was fortunate to have two young staff members with the technical skills needed to design a website. They created pages for each local business, which only they could access and edit.
Shopify collects the money from the sales, and the BID pays its merchants every 2 weeks. Each local business is responsible for paying credit card and transaction fees. The BID doesn’t take any commission. The local businesses greatest concern about the marketplace was payment terms. Early on in the project, the BID spent many hours sorting out payments to the local businesses, but it has since managed to automate this process.
Launching the marketplace
The BID launched the marketplace with a teaser campaign, which included VIP access to the first 250 people that signed up for its newsletter. In this way, it was able to gather feedback on issues that early users faced and make adjustments before opening to the general public.
Its subsequent marketing tactics have included social media (paid and organic), digital advertisements, local radio, and press releases sent to local and national media outlets. Local partners have also provided content and written features for the Marketplace.
The BID did not receive support from the city to launch the Marketplace. It did, however, receive funding from a regional marketing board to run a contest on the website — users who spent $50 could win Marketplace gift cards to use on their
next purchase.
How To Adopt This Approach:
The project’s success was based on strong relationships with local businesses
1. Assemble and train a group of 5–10 local business owners, who will become
your ambassadors to get other merchants on board
2. Regularly engage business owners and provide sufficient training about the sales platform, recognizing that different business owners have different levels of digital literacy. This will mean creating step-by-step guides, complete with screenshots on how to add products and make payments
3. Help merchants to become confident selling online. Just as a shop needs an attractive window display, a website needs beautiful photos. Merchants will also have to do their own marketing to drive traffic from their website to the Marketplace, for example, by posting and buying advertisements on social media.
Do:
- Do spend time building the trust and confidence of your member businesses.
- Do regularly engage with your business owners and provide support based on their differing levels of digital literacy.
- Do set aside considerable time at the beginning to sort out payments from Shopify to vendors.
Don’t:
- Don’t assume any knowledge. Create stepby- step guides, and share information on how businesses can take good photographs, buy ads, and market their businesses on social media.
Learn more about the Tactical Guide
COVID-19 Economic Response and Recovery
Provide Technical Assistance to Small Businesses
Action:
Create strategies and partnerships that will make your destination more sustainable and inclusive. And tell that story to visitors
Why:
Since COVID-19, travelers, particularly younger travelers, have a heightened awareness of environmental sustainability and social and racial equity. As a result, they are more likely to look for evidence that destinations are taking steps to address these issues.
Background:
Numerous reports and studies have found that the pandemic has reinforced, even accelerated, people’s views on sustainability, with more consumers focused on helping to create a better, healthier world.
For example, 60% of travelers say that their future booking decisions would be influenced by sustainable initiatives at the property, even if it meant spending a modest premium.
Travelers’ behavior, loyalty, and values are also being redefined by the economic downturn, restrictions in day-to-day living caused by COVID-19, and flashpoint events highlighting systemic racism within our communities.
It is widely expected that the pandemic will accelerate the trend of travelers seeking “travel with a purpose,” with 67% of recently polled travelers saying they want their bookings to make a positive difference for communities affected by the pandemic.
Travelers are also now placing greater importance on pre-trip planning.
Destinations can respond to these trends by developing a shared understanding of what it means to be a sustainable destination.
For example, Sedona, AZ engaged the Global Sustainable Tourism Council to conduct a sustainability assessment of its tourism economy.
The goal was to enable the destination to design and target policies, programs, and campaigns which demonstrate sustainable destination management, maximize economic benefits to the host community, and minimize negative impacts on the environment.
Programs could include:
- Sector-wide sustainable guidelines.
- Technical assistance to small businesses to help them adopt more sustainable practices (e.g., relating to energy and water use, single use plastics and recycling, food procurement, laundry operations, and reporting).
- Destination management tools to “nudge” visitors around the city, to manage crowds, and/or to help tourists engage local communities.
- Investments in green infrastructure.
- Communicating the destination’s commitments to travelers.
Case Study
City of Boston
In 2020, the City of Boston drew down $2.5M of CARES Act Federal relief funding to launch a marketing campaign to market the city to Black and Brown residents and visitors.
The campaign’s goals were to “build Boston’s brand as a travel destination, increase awareness and active promotion, and drive visits to Boston from diverse local and regional visitors.“ It was part of the city’s strategy to build back a stronger and more equitable economy.
In particular, the campaign sought to “examine the ways in which Boston communicates about the offerings of the city, and highlight attractions and events that speak to the experiences of people of color.”
The Greater Boston Convention & Visitors Bureau selected two award-winning agencies with deep roots in the city. One was Boston’s oldest, minorityowned and operated marketing communications agency. The other was a Boston-based, minority owned, award-winning creative branding, design,
and advertising agency.
They soon discovered that the city had allowed others to create a narrative of Boston as an all white, masculine, sports- and alcohol- dominated city. Visitors and some residents had low awareness of the city’s vibrant Black neighborhoods, and the contributions of Black and Brown residents to the city.
The campaign featured different Boston neighborhoods with neighborhood maps and guides and short-form videos, as well as social media influencers from some of the city’s oldest Black neighborhoods. It also celebrated Black and Brownowned businesses in local and national media, in order to drive local spend.
Like many campaigns during the pandemic, its primary audience was local residents. However, as travel becomes safer, the city plans to continue its efforts to encourage a wider audience to change their perceptions and, ultimately, actions.
Learn more about the Toolkit
COVID-19 Economic Response and Recovery
Help Your Industry to be at the Front of “The New Normal”
Action:
Convene thought leaders, analysts, entrepreneurs, and tech startups to focus on technology development and adoption that could reshape travel and tourism.
Why:
The pandemic is turning the travel industry upside down and has changed the way people think about travel. “The next incarnation of tourism is on its way.”
Background:
Thanks to the internet, the ways that people travel have changed drastically in a short span of time. Technology has made traveling safer and less time consuming, changed the way we book a flight or room, the way we are informed of events, or seek advice to sightsee a city. It has allowed us to have more personalized experiences, helped us to surpass language barriers, and even changed our packing routines. It is also impacting how destinations and those in the tourism industry market their products and services.
For example, data analytics, cloud computing and devices which are connected to the Internet-of-Things allow personalization for a better customer experience. Smart conversational interfaces have become more useful in providing feedback and answering customer questions. Free mobile connectivity not only allows travelers to share their experiences with others through social media easily, it also allows a destination to collect data about their travelers during different steps of the visit— which can help them sell the right product to the right visitor at the right time.
Case Study
Singapore Tourism Accelerator
Some cities are not only focusing on the immediate effects of the pandemic on the travel industry, they are also taking a longer-term perspective. For example, the Singapore Tourism Board has partnered with Ravel Innovation to create the Singapore Tourism Accelerator. It targets startups that are developing solutions to future-proof the travel and tourism industry and help tourism companies thrive amidst the challenges brought about by COVID-19. During the 4 month program, the selected startups develop pilot solutions to challenges which have been defined by local travel and hospitality businesses.
For example, convention and events businesses in Singapore are seeking a solution for the following challenge:
Current visitor, exhibitor, speaker and competition data collection/analysis is insufficient for customer insights and limits the ability to design personalized, hybrid experiences for the MICE sector. The company will design an online-to-offline (O2O) visitor management solution that can capture exhibitors and visitors’ data (e.g., interactions, transactions), analyze and profile visitors to help design better experiences and business matchmaking.
The chosen startup will gain unparalleled access to the leading industry players, and can also get assistance with temporary relocation to Singapore.
How To Adopt This Approach:
Identify an experienced tech accelerator partner and decide the size and cadence
of your cohorts (the Singapore Tourism Accelerator runs two rounds a year, each
with up to 12 companies).
Create an application process with clear selection criteria for admission to the accelerator. Promote the program extensively, through government colleagues, tech membership groups, incubators, universities, social media, conferences, and in person.
Design an accelerator program. The Singapore Tourism Accelerator consists of two phases:,a 2-week “acceleration” bootcamp, and a 3-month “pilot” phase. The bootcamp comprises modules, workshops, mentoring sessions, and events to help program participants define value propositions and use-cases, in collaborations with matched industry partners. During the pilot phase, participants work with industry partners to build prototypes and assess the feasibility of scaling up their solutions. The prototypes are funded by industry partner grants.
Finally, plan a demo day for participants to showcase their solutions to a wide set of industry partners and investors.
Do:
- Do recognize that many governments and DMOs are siloed, risk-averse, and bureaucratic organizations, and will find it very hard to digitally transform. Therefore, partner with brands and technology vendors which are better placed to develop solutions.
- Do seek innovative business and revenue models, where each party contributes something and each party benefits. Governments and DMOs should not underestimate the value of their authority, bully pulpit, data, audience reach and engagement, relationships, and ability
to “get things done” in the city.
Don’t:
- Don’t try to turn a DMO into a tech development company, as this is not your core strength.
- Don’t undervalue your assets and don’t simply hand over your data. Try to price what it would cost the vendor/partner to purchase these assets or achieve the same benefits on the open market.
Learn more about the Tactical Guide
COVID-19 Economic Response and Recovery
Give Those Returning to Travel a Reason to Visit
Action:
Develop digital marketing and communications campaigns which target early returning travelers with messages and offers that address their wants and needs.
Why:
Once a destination has been able to contain COVID-19, its DMO should direct its attention back to promotion which will support economic recovery
Background:
Destinations should prioritize demographics which are likely to jumpstart the recovery, making sure their destination’s product offerings match their passions, wants and needs, and are being marketed on “the right channels”. (See Appendix 2 for guidance on creating traveler personas.)
Surveys and reports suggest “first wave” travelers are likely to be those who are most optimistic about travel — aged 25 to 34 and 65-plus.
The International Air Transport Association has identified the following six post COVID traveler personas:
- The impatient innovator
- The young early majority
- The untroubled 55+
- The wait-and-see X and Y generations
- The late business trip, and
- The late leisure trip
Ketchum Travel’s “Transforming Travelers study” takes a different approach, identifying 4 personas which are based on how soon individuals will feel comfortable returning to their pre-COVID lives and activities; and how much the importance of various personal values has changed in response to COVID-19.
It is evident that COVID has made many travelers rethink the types of destinations they will select.
There is clearly strong interest in smaller and less crowded destinations, but there also appears to be a renewed interest in authentic and connected experiences.
Local communities can be crucial partners in designing these experiences, e.g., cooking classes, tours by locals, and insider talks.
For example, Melbourne-based Free to Feed offers immersive cooking experiences for visitors, which are delivered by refugees, people seeking asylum and new migrants.
At the other end of the spectrum, there is also increased interest in “once-in-a lifetime trips,” with travelers thinking “Why didn’t I take that trip before, when I had the chance?” and “now that ‘can’t’ has been put in front of me, it feels more urgent to do the things I’ve dreamed of doing.”
Campaign Checklist:
It is our experience that DMOs are more likely to deliver a successful marketing campaign if they start by focusing on the following five questions:
1. Why are we doing this?
- Why is this the right objective? What are the
benefits for the city? What will success look like?
2. Who are the right audiences to focus on?
- What are the right markets and personas?
(Or, personal data sets?)
3. What messages and offers should we promote?
4. Where and how should we deliver these messages and offers?
- Which mediums and channels to raise awareness? To engage? To convert
- Should we partner with a travel specialist digital agency?
- What are our calls to action?
- What is the role of PR in a brand-driven campaign?
- Who are the right partners (e.g. car rental companies, hotels/property sharing platforms, restaurants tour operators, attractions, cultural institutions, retailers, credit card companies, social media platforms, other destinations) What is their value? What is their need? What can we offer them?
5. When should we market to these audiences?
- When is the audience dreaming? Planning? Booking? Experiencing? Reminiscing?
Learn more about the Tactical Guide
Action
Take time to develop a city-wide plan to re-open, rebuild, and re-emerge stronger.
Why
Many tourism economies have been devastated and will be in turmoil for some time. A city-wide plan can help to build a common understanding and realistic assessment of the challenges and opportunities that your destination faces.
Case Study
City Tourism Recovery Plans
Cities, such as New York City, Auckland, New Zealand and Barcelona, Spain, have successfully galvanized their stakeholders behind plans to revitalize their tourism economies. These plans typically prioritize:
- Relief interventions to help businesses — and particularly artisans and cultural institutions — to survive and adapt, such as technical assistance, finance solutions, leasing opportunities and RFPs
- Communications and social media toolkits — to provide clear information to travelers, encourage local businesses to join the campaign, and tell good news stories about the destination
- Brand marketing — to place the city front-of-mind for travelers.
In many cases, the plans identify ways to capture more value from visitors and recognize that local tourism will need to be part of the solution. In some cases, the plans make conscious decisions to move away from mass tourism and reorient towards a more cultural and/or resident friendly tourism model.
How to adopt this approach
Given the scale of the crisis, it can be difficult to know where to start. As part of Bloomberg Associates’ support for municipal governments, we have found it helpful to think about answers to the questions in Appendix 1.
Do’s
- Do try to access data, research, and modeling to understand the size and shape of the pandemic’s impact on your tourism economy — with a particular focus on strategic tourism assets and vulnerable small businesses, and low income workers.
- Do bring industry stakeholders together to support the strategy development process, speak with one voice, and play their part in implementing it. Action 2 describes ways to do this.
- Do be realistic about what you can achieve. It would be better to deliver 3–4 actions with concrete benefits, than try to solve every challenge and deliver against none of them.
- Do focus limited resources on gaps in support from other governments, support for strategic assets, and programs which are important for the long term sustainability of your tourism economy.
Don’t
- Don’t activate tactical marketing too early. Multiple surveys show that travelers will not visit your destination unless they are confident that they can do so safely. Action 3 contains advice on ways to build their confidence.
Learn more about the Tactical Guide
COVID-19 Economic Response and Recovery
Consider Additional Sources of Funding and Cost Savings
Action
Support industry coalitions which are building a case for additional aid for tourism businesses, as well as American Rescue Plan Federal replacement revenues for lost hotel tax revenues. (For example, provide access to data/evidence and connections.)
Support local, small businesses — particularly micro, minority-owned and unbanked businesses — to apply for direct aid and technical assistance.
Encourage industry players to pool funding and resources (for example, to purchase PPE or for marketing activities).
Explore opportunities to make cost cutting savings by partnering, delivering through others, and/or merging operations.
Why
In the future, many DMOs will have to manage with smaller budgets, and many local businesses have bled cash during lockdowns. As a result, everyone will need to identify savings, find new ways to collaborate, and pool resources for programming which benefits all.
Background
The pandemic has placed enormous budget pressure on municipal governments, threatening deep and potentially lasting cuts to programming. The U.S. Travel Association and Tourism Economics estimates that the depressed level of travel spending has caused a loss of $64 billion in federal, state, and local tax revenue since March 1 2020.
Many DMOs and convention centers rely on hotel tax revenues for a large share of their operations. From 2020 to 2025, hotel tax revenues in 25 largest US cities are estimated to fall short of 2019 levels by approximately $6.1 billion.
As a result, DMOs and municipal governments may need to refinance debt that is repaid by hotel tax revenues if reserves are insufficient to cover existing debt service obligations. They may also need to temporarily close convention centers, delay convention center expansion projects, and/or reduce DMO operations unless American Rescue Plan funds can be used, alternative revenue sources can be found, or hotel tax revenues recover.
Some cities are implementing temporary measures. For example, McCormick Place Convention Center in Chicago has traditionally accessed taxes from restaurant and hotel sales, car rentals and airport departures, as well as the State of Illinois’ sales tax. When sales taxes dropped in 2020, the Center tapped into a reserve fund to help pay back its debt. In 2021, it plans to refinance its debt to replenish the fund.
Guidance
Bloomberg Associates has created a tactical guide on new sources of operating funding for economic development programming, some of which may be relevant for programming to support your tourism economy.
Cities may also want to look at alternative DMO funding models, which do not rely on hotel or sales tax.
For example, Julie Heart from CFO by Design has suggested a shared-services model between local convention bureaus, Chambers of Commerce and economic development councils.
Under this model, the convention bureau would develop branding and creative services for the city, the Chamber would educate local businesses on the value that tourism and meetings bring to the destination, and the economic development council would work with the convention bureau to attract industry, businesses and talent to the city.
Other cities, such as London (UK) have gone further, merging their agencies to better promote the city with one voice while achieving significant cost savings. In 2011, London merged its tourism and convention bureau with its business attraction, international student attention, and small business support programs, generating more than £2m initial savings.
A similar model was followed in Topeka, Kansas. The Greater Topeka Partnership combined the economic development agency, Chamber of Commerce, BID and tourism agency, which combined office space and eliminated redundancies (such as multiple contracts with the same vendor). The organizations also coordinated their plans and activities to create jobs and attract visitors.
We are also seeing more partnership working between local and state/national DMOs. For example, Destination Canada and Destination BC announced a partnership last year to help local DMOs market domestically.
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COVID-19 Economic Response and Recovery
Build Your Data Capacity and Digital Presence
Action:
Build tools and partnerships to help you better understand and boost your online presence with target travelers.
Why:
The pandemic has increased digital screen time. More and more travelers are searching for travel inspiration online, and they increasingly expect technology to provide them with more personal control over their travel experiences.
In a recent poll, 95% of travelers from 28 countries said they spent free time during the pandemic looking for travel inspiration, with 38% looking at potential destinations at least once a week.
This has created opportunities for destinations to use aggregated, anonymized data, and/or to ask travelers for permission to access personal data to personalize marketing campaigns and offerings — which should achieve significantly higher open and click through rates.
Background:
As we adapt to the new reality, destinations need to stimulate and capture the little demand that currently exists, and be ready to capitalize on pent up demand as things return to “new normal.”
Messages and promotions will, therefore, need to be relevant, given the behavior that specific consumers have developed during the pandemic. Has a traveler flown yet? Stayed in a hotel yet? Left their home state yet? Are they nervous to do so? What are their biggest concerns?
Despite consumers saying that they are concerned about the privacy of their personal data, there is plenty of evidence that they are very willing to trade personal information for benefits or rewards — particularly monetary compensation, promotion incentives, and discounts based on their interests, and convenience and speed in using services.
Personalized marketing technology has advanced rapidly in recent year and many brands — from Amazon29 to Target30 — have used behavioral targeting and predictive modelling to take marketing to a whole new level.
Travel and tourism industry examples of data tools to help personalize marketing, target sales, and/or enhance customer service, include:
- London Heathrow Airport’s Connected Spaces project, which enables the airport to better identify, understand, and engage with customers across all touchpoints of the airport.
- Virgin Hotel’s Customer Wi-Fi and Business Intelligence platform, which allows the hotel to acquire new customers, target sales offers, build loyalty with personalized communications, create campaigns based on contextual data, understand customers better through new insights, and refine audience segmentation.
- Singapore National Research Foundation’s Virtual Singapore software, which can analyze visitor movements, with multiple applications for destination management.
- Lufthansa’s Big Data Engine, which allows the airline to offer personal services, as well as upsell to customers.
From our experience, very few cities or DMOs have the resources or know how to imitate leading retail or tourism players.
Fortunately, there are specialist tourism, ad-tech agencies, such as California’s Sojern and Adara, which offer digital travel marketing solutions and can deliver tourism marketing campaigns which microsegment audiences at scale.
Some DMOs, however, do have ambitions to become truly data-driven organizations, by building data solutions specifically for their destinations.
Bloomberg Associates has provided past advice to governments and DMOs which are seeking to understand each visitor — their behaviors and expectations — in order to provide a personalized experience.
It has been our experience that they have often struggled to progress these goals beyond individual marketing campaigns which offer personalize content. This is largely due to aversion to risk, limited technical skills, and/or legacy technology stacks.
Cities and DMOs should, therefore, approach this topic with their eyes open.
Below, we share some principles for DMOs that are thinking to build destination data platforms, which are drawn from our own consulting experience. We have also included, at Appendix 3, an infographic, which shows what an end-to-end data management platform solution could look like.
Case Study
Singapore’s Tourism Analytics Network (Stan)
Singapore’s Tourism Analytics Network (Stan) is an analytics platform for its DMO and tourism organizations, which contains monthly tourism data sets and visualizations.
It was created in 2016 for the Singapore Tourism Board (STB), initially as an internal management tool. The STB subsequently opened it to the general public. The platform contains top line statistics, which are available to the general public, and more in-depth features, which are available to selected industry organizations with a login account. The platform is currently free for all users.
Its data sets and visualizations include:
- Visitor arrivals and seasonality
- Visitor segmentation and demographics
- Visitor spend (what visitors are buying, how much they are spending, what their interests are, etc.)
- Hotel statistics; and
- Visitor satisfaction rates.
The STB uses the platform to understand its visitors and to encourage industry collaboration. It has also developed a self-assessment tool for industry players to diagnose their current state of transformation and provide targeted insights to take action to stay relevant and thrive.
The STB is currently adding new features to the platform, which include:
- A data marketplace for industry players to share and consume tourism-related data; and
- A co-creation space equipped with predictive tools, for industry collaboration on data analytics projects.
How To Adopt This Approach:
Engage a local partner to create, initially, an internal dashboard/insights platform. E.g., Start by talking to your local National Neighborhood Indicators Partnership partner (if you have one), a local university, or community college.
Explore how you can complement existing data sets with third-party (including private sector) data and closer-to-real-time data.
Engage local industry players to understand what insights would help them to thrive.
Recognize that different tourism organizations will have different levels of tech and data literacy, so prioritize a very simple and intuitive user interface.
Distribute the platform for beta testing and get feedback as quickly as possible.
Once your platform has been released, take the time to publicize it and train industry organizations for different use cases. Continue to host training sessions as the product evolves.
Do:
- Do recognize that a data platform, particularly one which enables content personalization, will require money, time, and technical skills. It may also require upgrades to, or the replacement of, your tech stack (e.g., visitor data collection system, CRM, content database, suggestion engine, and visitor communication channels — website, mobile app, chatbot).
- Do talk to your local public transit operator, which may be more advanced, and already using real-time traveler data.
- Do recognize that a solution for a destination will be more complex than a solution for an airport, shopping mall, or hotel. However, the increased return on investment, in terms of reach, engagement and conversion, will
also be significant. - Do engage a specialist database marketing company to build your solution, and do not try to build it on a public sector technology stack.
- Do hire a dedicated project manager who has the technical capability to manage your vendor and oversee its work.
- Do seek a costed menu of options before selecting your preferred solution.
- Do run a pilot for proof of concept and to demonstrate that the expected return on investment is real.
- Do seek legal and policy advice before handling personal data — not just to comply with data protection laws, but also not to adversely affect your government’s/destination’s reputation.
Don’t:
- Don‘t try to turn your DMO into a tech development company, which will never be your core strength.
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