Social media an effective strategy for tight marketing budgets

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As tourism agencies deal with tight budgets, one increasingly popular way to reach an audience on the cheap is through interaction on social media platforms and tourism websites.

Ed Dombroskas, executive director of Connecticut’s Eastern Region Tourism District, said his agency used social media, essentially for free, to exploit a growth area.

“We know that the weddings market is a very potentially lucrative market for us, but we don’t have enough funds to actually create a marketing plan around weddings,” he said. “So we decided to do that through social media.”
Dombroskas said he’s already seen significant results from the effort.
Meryl Levitz, president and CEO of the Greater Philadelphia Tourism and Marketing Corp., said there’s a natural connection between social media and travel, “because social media is social, and so is travel.”

Part of the New Jersey Division of Travel and Tourism’s social media strategy is pairing its sweepstakes contest with the agency’s Facebook page. In order to qualify for the contest, users must “like” the agency on Facebook.

Israel Posner, executive director of the Lloyd D. Levenson Institute of Gaming, Hospitality and Tourism at the Richard Stockton College of New Jersey, said tourism agencies must take advantage of not just Facebook and Twitter, but also tools like blogging and through search engine optimization methods.
A successful digital strategy can be an important way to extend an area’s brand message at little to no cost, said Jack Ferguson, president and CEO of the Philadelphia Convention and Visitors Bureau.
“All of a sudden, you’re expanding your marketing dollars and making it look more effective,” he said. “It’s millions of dollars’ worth of space, and you don’t have to pay for it.”

Still, don’t look for low-cost social media to replace traditional media anytime soon, Dombroskas said.
“I don’t think too many tourism marketing associations think that by using social media, you really can back away from more traditional media elements, nor has it made marketing less expensive,” he said. “It’s just added another element.”

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