Marketing for sustainability

RTD11

Tim WilliamsonDirector of Marketing & Content – Responsible Travel

Qualified to comment?

• Marketing & Customer director

– TUI UK

– Monarch Airlines

• Responsible Travel

Marketing

• 2 purposes– Influence the market

– Influence the customer

• To market sustainable or responsible tourism you don’t need to be perfect!

Influencing the market on responsible & sustainable tourism

• Just the role of the NGO, charities & governments?

• Should commercial companies not get involved?

Influencing the market on responsible & sustainable tourism

• If you are going to try and influence the market:

– Need to be clear and transparent about your objectives/agenda

– Accept that it’s a slow process

Campaigning

• Not about selling holidays –changing the market– Orcas

– Volunteering with orphans

– Elephant safaris

– Travel journalism

– Tourist Board’s stance on responsible tourism

– Etc etc

• And also changing your mind

• Can be seen as event marketing but really:– A showcase for the best in class examples from around the world in

responsibility & sustainability– Sponsorship there to grow and market the awards– Worldwide expansion will further help

– But clearly benefit by association for the founding brand

Influencing the individual on responsible & sustainable tourism

• Need to face the fact that the market for this is relatively small

• For the majority it will be a secondary consideration, at best

• Certainly not a reason to not bother or we won’t have an industry in the future!

Authentic experiences

• What customers do increasingly want is an “authentic” Holiday but what is this?– Something off the “tourist trail”– A brief glimpse into life in another country, culture or community– A break from normal life by experiencing something quite different

for a short space of time– Something that can be talked about, remembered and shared

Responsible Travel belief – the win:win

• We have proved (or stumbled upon) a link between these experiences and responsible & sustainable tourism

• We only screen for responsible & sustainable commitment from our 400 tour operators yet they deliver life changing experiences & amazing holidays

Why are these scores so high?

• Holidays created by interesting people who love where they live – the culture, the wildlife, the landscape – open up and show a side to life that might not be immediately obvious

• These are amazing authentic experiences which can be marketed as such BUT also tick the responsible tourism box

Marketing sustainability & responsibility

• One last thought –responsible tourism is not immune for the drive for more honest and believable content

• Content marketing is not a fad

• Search engines are making us all make our sites more interesting and easy to use

Responsible Travel Guides

• Lack of journalistic independence and the rise of user generated content is an opportunity

• Our guides are designed to:– Be Honest & digestible– To drive traffic and

booking conversion

Responsible Travel Guides

• Our Travel Guides give us the opportunity to highlight the responsible tourism issues

• And what customers can do to minimise and avoid them

Summary

• It is possible to market responsible and sustainable tourism to:– Influence the market:

• not just down to the public sector, charities & trade bodies• Need to be clear and open about what you are trying to do and

why

– Influence the customer:• Need to focus on the customer benefit as well as the local

community• This could be a better holiday experience or just a cheaper price

• For both it is about marketing the fact that you are on a journey rather than already at your destination