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Cape Town Tourism: Employing Digital Marketing in Tourism
EXCERPTS
EFFORTS TO REPOSITION THE BRAND
By 2008, the world was seeing a major shift in tourist behaviors and trends. Keeping this in mind, the City of Cape Town instructed Cape Town Tourism to go in for a selective brand positioning process for the city. It wanted the city to be positioned for more than its natural resources. Hence, in a collaborative exercise, tourism members, the private sector, the City of Cape Town, non-member role players, and key stakeholders such as Accelerate Cape Town , the Cape Film Commission, and the newly formed EDP (Economic Development Program) , framed the brand positioning... |
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POST-EVENT DIP & LOOKING FOR NEW AVENUES
After the 2010 FIFA World Cup, there was an overall slowdown in travel throughout Africa. According to the national information in the Economic Value in Tourism Report 2012, the economic value of tourism in Cape Town was R 12.4 billion in 2009, R16 billion in 2010, and R14.7 billion in 2011. Due to the 2010 FIFA World Cup, there was a strong increase in the economic value of tourism in 2010...
TARGETING THE ‘DIGITAL NOMADS’
In September 2011, after assessing the need for digital marketing, Cape Town Tourism appointed Ogilvy & Mather as its advertising agency . On October 17, 2011, at its Annual General Meeting, it announced its ‘Global Marketing Campaign’, which was launched on November 7, 2011, in the World Trade Market ...
CAPE TOWN TOOLKIT
In March 2012, Cape Town Tourism came up with the ‘Cape Town Toolkit’ to upgrade its official website. Realizing that in these fast paced times with innovations in the digital marketing strategies, it had to be more than just a traditional official website of the tourism department...
‘iAMBASSADOR’ CAMPAIGN
In August 2012, Cape Town Tourism introduced the unique ‘iAmbassador Campaign’ .The campaign was one of a kind and was praised by industry observers for its creative use of digital marketing. Under this campaign, four world renowned bloggers were invited to visit Cape Town and stay for a week...
THE FACEBOOK CAMPAIGN
As soon as Cape Town Tourism launched the ‘I ♥ Cape Town’ Facebook fan page on 11 June, 2010 , it became a hit amongst the Facebook users. Through the Facebook page, the department remained in touch with the visitors during the 2010 FIFA World Cup. Here, Cape Town Tourism could update its latest marketing campaigns...
RESULTS AND REACTIONS
The campaign instantly created a buzz in the digital marketing sectors and social media, and the campaign, advertising agency, and Cape Town Tourism received many awards for it. Greg Smith (Greg), owner of 360 Online Marketing Agency (South Africa), appreciated the campaign and said, “Online and social media give us the opportunity to play out of the box, and marketers need to do that, and create even virtual environments to achieve one’s goals...
CHALLENGES
By the end of September 2013, the continuous efforts of Cape Town Tourism began to show results. The destination gradually started receiving more tourists. Cape Town witnessed the arrival of 1,048,450 tourists in the first nine months of 2013, 14% more than during the same period in 2012...
EXHIBITS
Exhibit I : Total Foreign Visitors to the Western Cape (‘000)
Exhibit II : Responsible Tourism
Exhibit III : Eco Poster Designed by Cape Town Tourism for their “2010 Fuel Efficiency Campaign”
Exhibit IV : Cape Town – Foreign Tourist Arrivals by Quarter, 2009-2013 (000’s)
Exhibit V : iAmbassador Model
Exhibit VI : An Image from the Cape Town Facebook Campaign
