Advertising uses many forms of communication to persuade people to buy particular goods and services. In Swanage itself, there is the Swanage Advertiser, Purbeck Gazette, Dorset Echo, local Radio and TV, the carnival programme, websites, flyers, inserts, posters... the list goes on.
But they are all designed to persuade people who are already in the area.
Who is advertising Swanage itself? and what forms of advertising are being used to attract people into the town?
Posted by The Wonderer to swanageview at 8:56 AM
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That begs the question of who should be doing the advertising and paying for it. The two thirds of council tax payers who are not involved in tourism might have something to say if it was their money. Actually the research shows that far more people get information about the area from the web than from print sources and the need is for a really good website.
What would a really good website have on it that Virtual Swanage, for example, doesn't have?
So who is marketing Swanage to potential tourists? How are they marketing it? and what's their budget?
Clean ie raked beaches with bars, beach cafes, barbecue areas and showers; free clean toilets, availability of water sports, good restaurants, you can buy local seafood, bustling local food markets, cheap wine, ready erected luxury camping sites, marinas and working harbours, purpose built hotels, a motorway all the way, or you can take a high speed train. Shops and caterers are welcoming, they don't just "tolerate" families who bring children. You get called sir or madam wherever you go. It’s cheaper, hotter and sunnier, and it has less rain. No amusement arcades or fish and chips.
There is quite a difference between advertising and marketing. Rick Stein says in his book that his seafood restaurant in Padstow remained undiscovered for ten years until he won the Times Sunday Lunch of the Year Award. Unfortunately Swanage has little to market in this way, so it may be necessary to conduct expensive advertising. It isn’t quaint, special or cool. It has quite a disadvantage to other UK seaside resorts. I would ask what could be Swanage’s unique marketing point?
What could be Swanage's unique marketing point? Why do people come here? isn't it a throwback in time to a more gentle era? small, not particularly cosmopolitan, steam railway, stuck in the early 1950s?
err no thats eastern europe
Whether Swanage gets marketed as a Theme Park based on Austerity Britain or Victorian Life and Architecture doesn’t matter too much so long as someone decides and the whole Town pulls in the same direction.
A few years ago pdc produced a draft cultural policy which said that as far as they are concerned culture meant village halls and sports centres. It specifically ruled out spending on anything that would attract tourists. Fortunately the document seems to have been buried but it did highlight an interesting paradox in thinking. It seems to be ok to employ tourism staff and give them a bit of a marketing budget but not to put money into activities the tourists might be drawn here to see and hear. To my way of thinking this is a much more effective way of boosting tourism than general marketing. What do others think?
yes PDC should not be involved in marketing of tourism, they should employ a firm with the qualification and experience to do so.
no PDC should not invest directly in tourism projects, they should concentrate on creating an environment in which the private sector can supply what is required.
What would "create an environment"? It is possible that many of the activities that would bring tourists here do not in themselves generate enough revenue to cover their costs. With an atomised private sector here is is not easy to get funding organised for anything that does not have an immediate return.
One thing I neglected to say is that in the discussion of the merits of France nobody has mentioned that they have a tourist tax the proceeds of which are spent on developing tourism. I suspect this would not commend itself to Swanage businesses though.
Its a cart and horse problem here.
50 years ago when the Grosvenor hotel was full, the Corrie and the Durlston court were full. The chip shops had queues outside for 10 weeks. THEN the tourist taxes should have gone in to provide fantastic leisure facilities. A 50 m pool, flumes, a cable car ride to Durlston, a race course, casino perhaps and etc
People would be clamouring to invest still.
Yes, that is central to the problem. When things are going well nobody sees any need to invest for changed circumstances and when they have changed nobody has any spare money, hence the advantage of a tax which only need be, for example 50p or a pound a night per person.
The Swiss have done it"Tourist Tax
There is also an approximately $2 per person per day tax that you pay on hotels or vacation rentals for every day you are in Switzerland. This may be paid when you arrive at your vacation rental or they may ask you to pay at the tourist office and leave the receipt in the apartment for them. We have always had to pay this. When you pay the tax, you usually get a card for the period you are in the town that gives you discounts on bus rides, etc."
But its too lat now. Young Mr Burt had the isea and then Mr Durrant but Swange folk knew better/
The Isle of White has its own TV & Radio Channel and as a result gets many of its stories broadcast on Southern and BBC.
BBC Radio Dorset gets calls on Fridays and Saturdays that the traffic is bumper to bumper from Bakers Arm roundabout into Corfe and Swanage. I had just turned at Bakers Arms for home and heard the broadcast, the road was clear all the way home!
Wherever you are in the world people remeber Swanage from when they were kids, that should be exploited.
RobO
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