What Should Tourism Marketing Look Like in Times of Crisis?

The tourism sector was the first one in the world to be affected by the Covid-19 pandemic. In Serbia, all travel arrangements until May 15 have been postponed, and tourism employees expect the state and the competent ministry to adopt concrete measures. The time of a pandemic, disease and closed borders is not the right time for promotion of tourism products. However, this doesn't mean that promotion should stop, but that what's not adequate and doable at the moment should not be promoted, Milan Stojkovic, the director of the Etourism Consulting agency, says for eKapija.

– Marketing activities should be directed at promoting picturesque areas, destinations, exceptional experiences, good stories – everything that makes tourism beautiful. It is not necessary to create expensive TV ads. It's enough to remain active on social networks. Not only will people gladly follow such promotional content, as it will take their minds off the current events for a while, reminding them of a time when we could travel freely, but these activities will also make people more eager and substantially increase the tourist demand, which will mean more work and a quicker recovery after the crisis – Stojkovic says.

According to him, there's a possibility for the market to recover if the crisis ends by June.

– I am communicating with a large number of tourism companies these days. All their hopes are for the crisis to end by June. In that case, not everything will be lost. Some predict a decrease in the demand and a drop in prices, some others point to a potential increase in prices and a sudden growth of the demand. It's hard to deal in such predictions and, while it's certain that the market will be disrupted, my perspective is that I would be more than happy if we could start talking about such activities in tourism in June – Stojkovic says.

Employees in tourism, according to him, should use this period to take care of everything in their operations which they otherwise wouldn't have time for.

– This is an ideal time for thorough cleaning, replacement of interior elements and similar works – he says.

Still, as he says, it is now the right time for tourist workers to exchange experiences and advice and educate each other.

– To that end, I have already opened a Facebook group called “Turizam, ugostiteljstvo, hotelijerstvo”, which has grown to over 600 members in a short time and where tourism workers can start truly communicating with each other maybe for the first time, sharing valuable advice and information. It's what this sector needed even before the pandemic – emphasizes the director of Etourism Consulting.

A mutual education initiative has been launched within the group, where members with rich experience in this field will share their valuable and practical knowledge with colleagues from the group through video lessons.

– I will contribute by providing advice for how websites and web marketing should work, considering that this is what I specialize in, and I will also ask other experienced people to do the same, so that we can cover several areas most important to people.

According to him, small and medium tourism companies may have an advantage, as they can adapt to the changes more quickly, if they know how to use the situation to their benefit.

– Larger systems are slower to change and adapt, they are not flexible, and if they don't start reorganizing internally, educating and improving their business and services right away, they will probably experience problems – Stojkovic says.

I. Milovanovic

ETOURISM CONSULTING NIŠ

Etourism Consulting

Milan Stojković

tourism

marketing in tourism

pandemic

covid 19

coronavirus

tourism employees

tourism companies

layoffs in tourism