Arizona: Tourism, Travel, and Recreation - Essay Example

s Introduction Arizona is located in the Southwestern part of the United s and in terms of size; it is the sixth largest state of America. It has a somewhat rocky topography and is bordered by Utah and New Mexico. Arizona has a very diverse topography with a combination of beautiful plateaus (such as the Colorado Plateau), gorges, and deep canyons. The Colorado River is the most beautiful and exquisite river of Arizona. The leading industry of Arizona is the tourism and travel industry and generates a lot of revenues for the state (around $13.76 billion in the year 2000). In the year 2000, there were 26.7 million visitors from different parts of US and 899000 foreign visitors. So the tourism industry has great potential in Arizona. There are a lot of places of tourist attraction in Arizona such as the 22 monuments and national parks (Grand Canyon National Park is the most popular park). There are specifically 14 state parks that are able to attract a million visitors each year. There are many camping sites on both private and public, ranches and farms (majorly in Tucson and Wickenburg). Navaho and Hopi are ideal places for shopping and sight seeing. The Salt River Lake is very ideal for boating while the red rock country of Sedona is unique in its own ways (ArizonaTourism). Because of the high potential of the tourism business, the business that I started a hotel called Tourist’s Paradise in Phoenix in the state of Arizona. Marketing Objectives Tourist’s Paradise has a total of 350 rooms with ten rooms being suites (used majorly by newly wed couples). This hotel started off 5 years ago but still not many people are aware about it as this is reflected in the number of visitations in the past five years. It has all the attractions for a tourist or a vacationer such as a bar, swimming pool, tennis court and gym. The expected profits have not been achieved and hence the marketing plan will be developed to increase visitations by 15%, increase day and night stay by 10 % (because that is where most of our revenues lie) and to have at least 5% repeat customers each year. SWOT ANALYSIS Strengths Spacious rooms Swimming pool Gymnasium Tennis Court Bar 10 suites Weaknesses Initially when the hotel came into being, proper marketing was not done A lot of people are not aware of this grandiose hotel It is very difficult to reduce prices when the operating costs are so high Threats Phoenix already has a lot of luxurious hotels such as Comfort Inn Phoenix West. Econo Lodge Phoenix Airport and Days Inn Phoenix Metrocenter (Booking). These are very successful and well established hotels so Tourist’s Paradise faces a lot of competition from these hotels that that can also afford to charge lower prices Phoenix Hotel is our toughest competitor as it has 500 rooms (fully air-conditioned) with baths and patio pools. Its exotic resort-like atmosphere is the biggest attraction for visitors. Similarly The Camelback Inn in Phoenix Arizona is the perfect inn to spend winter vacations at. It has been built in a manner such that the visitors can enjoy the Arizonian clear blue skies and still experience the desert effect in winters (Abey). With such outclass hotels and inns, there is a lot for us to worry about. We have to come up with a feature of hotel to convince customers that our hotel is also special in some way and delivering this claim is the greatest challenge in order to have repeat customers. Opportunities The number of tourists visiting Phoenix is a lot each year. 13 to 15 million people visit Phoenix each year (VisitPhoenix). This is a great opportunity that can be capitalized upon With good service provided to customers, there are chances that they might come to our hotel again. Target Markets Demographics: People between the ages of 20-50 are the main target market. However children are more than welcome with their parents. Since we cannot cut down our costs, we cannot charge lower prices. So we are looking for people for an annual income of $20,000 or more. Our luxurious suites are specially designed for the honeymooners and people who come with their mates on a romantic vacation. We are also targeting people who are either employed or have businesses because these two things reflect the affordability of visitors. Psychographics: People who are adventurous, energetic, lively and health conscious will feel that our hotel is the right place for them. With our state of the art gymnasium, swimming pool and tennis court, visitors would not want to leave the hotel at all. Our target market belongs to SEC A and B mostly and lives in posh areas and the rest belong to the upper middle class. Social groups: People who vacation and travel a lot with either their partners or whole families. Activities: these people like adventure like camping and boating. Motives and Benefits: Our target market will probably be looking for luxury, comfort and adventure from this trip. Past Experience: People who visit our hotel from within the USA are mostly coming for the second or third time but overseas visitors mostly come for the first time. Planning frame: People who come from overseas plan their vacations a month in advance while Americans plan it a week in advance. Strategies Following are the 4 P’s of marketing for our hotel: Product: The product that we are offering is actually a service of hotels. People can stay for the day or night both for as long as they want. Price: Since our hotel is positioned as a luxury brand, it will not charge very cheap rates. In fact prices will be a little higher than the average prices charged by the rest of the hotels. Place: we will pay commission to travel agencies and tourists guides for recommending our hotel to tourists. Promotion: This hotel will be promoted in all the leading tourist magazines insides the USA. Besides that there will be constant updates on the hotel’s site and there will be T.V commercials showing the luxurious experience at our hotel. Besides this Public relations will be stress particularly in order to maintain a positive image in front of customers and the society at large. Since it is a service, we have to incorporate the remaining 3 P’s as well in our marketing plan, which are: People: All our employees and staff will be treated as a resource rather than a cost. We will invest in the training and development of our employees and make sure they never let the customer go unsatisfied. Process: There will be constant checks on the way our staff serves our visitors and customers’ comments will be given the most importance. Physical evidence: Waiters and the rest of the staff will be clad in starched uniforms and differentiation will be made use of in things as trivial as the room key or the menu. Tracking In order to make sure that the marketing plan is meeting its target tracking is done. We will be using all kinds of advertising such as display advertising, direct marketing, and TV or radio ads, Internet marketing, promotions, events, trade shows, database, analysis and data storage. In display advertising follow up on consumers can be done by special offers such as summer deals and via the telephone. When customer queries arise, our staff will maintain records of the callers. When customers’ specifications are taken into account and incorporated into the published advertisements, there are very high chances of their being retained by the reader or marked for future reference in case they plan on a vacation. Customers whose correspondence is through postal services or telephone, can be dealt with by direct marketing. For instance if a customer sends a mail, then he can be assigned a code and against that code customer’s entire information can be stored in a system like a Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system. If these are repeat customers then efforts should diverted towards retaining them and we will make sure that they are the first ones to know about our exclusive holiday packages. Similarly TV and radio ads can be used and gallop polls can be used to find out how many times our TV commercials our viewed by particular customers. Internet marketing has a very broad reach is very cheap compared to the other forms of marketing. We can pay various sites for displaying our advertisements on their home page. The traffic to their website will become aware of our hotel and we will know through the traffic to the site that how many people actually saw our ad even if it was just a glimpse. Promotions that make the customer return the bill so that he or she can win exciting prizes are also very effective as they help in tracking. There can be promotions targeted towards children only because children are more gullible and have a lot of pester power (they easily convince their parents into buying them expensive toys or taking them out to expensive places). Cartoon characters are a great way to attract children and in our TV commercials, we will use cartoon characters in order to entice children and ultimately convince their parents to visit our hotel. If remarkable events are held at our hotel, then people will tend to recall our hotel more and might come more often. Charity fairs and fundraisers are excellent ways to get media attention as well as customer attention. This is because a lot of elite people grace such charitable events and due to this fact not only the event but also its venue becomes popular. Our hotel will also take part in trade shows so that people become aware about it and due to the word-of-mouth phenomenon, we gain more popularity. People who visit trade shows but do not vacation much might give holidays and vacations a thought once they see our booth at the next trade fair. Database management is important for every business even if it a hotel. We will maintain a backup of our database so that in case of a disaster, we do not loser valuable customer information. Data analysis can be used to determine the trends in visitor’s visitation (how often do they come, what time of the year do they prefer etc.). Evaluation Evaluation will depend a lot on the impact of the marketing plan or campaign on visitations. The more visitations there are, the more powerful and effective the marketing plan was. Whether the objectives of increasing visitations by 15%, day and night stay by 10% and repeat customers by 5% are met or not implies how successful or unsuccessful the marketing plan was. However there should be a time lag allowed for the marketing plan to have the maximum impact and only after that can we gauge the positive or negative impact of the marketing plan. Service industries treat customer like God and it is taken for granted that the customer is always right. If the customer is unsatisfied that means not only a loss revenue but also bad publicity because word-of-mouth counts a lot. People recommend a restaurant, hotel or spa to their friends, families and relatives if they like it but they leave these place unsatisfied not only will they never come back again but also deter other potentials customers from paying a visit. An important point to bear in mind before going with a marketing plan is that a business should highlight its differentiating features in all the advertising media that it uses and this will give it an edge over its competitors and the consumers perception of a differentiated hotel is better than his perception for a hotel that just provides ordinary services and does not differentiate. The problem with the service industry is that it does not have a Unique Selling Proposition (USP) and it can be easily copied. So with constantly updating our services and new packages we will make an effort to stay ahead of competition. The customer experience should be extraordinary every time he comes to our hotel and for that our staff will be trained very professionally. People, who are paying more than the average market price for a luxury, expect extraordinary service and hence we cannot afford to disappoint these customers. Our staff is on its own toes at all times so that there are no delays in serving the customer and making him want to come again. Another problem with services is that they are intangible; they cannot be stored but can only be experienced. The more memorable we make our visitors’ experience, the more revenues and repeat customers we can expect in the future. Prior to the construction of our hotel, some thorough feasibility studies were done in order to ascertain whether the idea of a new hotel would prove to be successful amidst so many luxurious hotels and inns. First of we evaluated each of our lenders who were majorly the financial institutions and banks. Evaluation was done from the first step as these lenders were evaluated on the basis of interest rates they charged and how flexible or stringent their terms and conditions were. This was part of the economic feasibility studies (Halpin). Then after the construction when we started operating, we did operational studies to check whether our newly hired staff or employees had the necessary soft skills to entertain different kinds of visitors from different countries and places and whether our hotel was fully equipped in every respect. A lot of thinking went into this. People who were short tempered and intolerant within the first few months of their jobs were asked to leave and only those employee who had tolerance towards difficult customers were retained and trained further. This is because of our values of treating the customers well and placing them before profits and revenues. Since if the customer leaves our hotel unsatisfied, there are very slim chances of convincing him to come back. With constant follow-ups and a good system of check and balance we can meet the standards set by our toughest competitors which are one of the best hotels in Arizona. If waiters and other employees follow the proper code of conduct and there are no compromises on quality we can surely win customers away from our competitors. But there needs to be a lot of cooperation from our employees for that matter. In return we will treat our employees well. It is a self-motivated thing, employees will work well if they have good incentives and salary and owners of the hotel and management will treat the employees well if they get customers and good business. Five years are still not enough for a hotel business for judging success or failure but with persistent efforts and good marketing planes, we can overcome barriers like low revenues and low visitations. Employee satisfaction is one of our core values and we stick to it proudly. Bibliography VisitPhoenix. Visit Phoenix. 10 November 2011. 13 June 2012 . Abey, Joseph A. "Where to Stay." The Rotarian-An International Magazine July 1961: 63. ArizonaTourism. Arizona - Tourism, travel, and recreation . 2000. 13 June 2012 . Booking. Hotels in Phoenix. 12 March 2011. 13 june 2012 . Halpin, Daniel W. Construction Management. 4th. Phoenix: Don Fowley, 2010. Read More