City of Worcester in the United Kingdom - Term Paper Example

Table of Contents Table of Contents 1 Introduction 2 2 Branding and Equity 2 2 Destination Branding 3 2.2 Brand Equity 5 2.3 Overview 6 3.0 Designing A Product 6 3.1 The Tourism Product 7 3.2 Destination Product Dimension 9 4.0 Concluding Recommendations 10 5.0 References 12 1 Introduction The tourism industry is not simply one of the most profitable today but is also the fastest growing. Destinations, be they cities, national regions (as the West Midlands), countries or cross-national regions, are locked in a fierce competition over the attainment of a greater share of the tourism market. If the City of Worcester is to emerge as a tourism pull centre, a focal point in the larger domestic and international tourism trade to and in the United Kingdom, it is contingent upon it to formulate an appropriate marketing plan. This report will identify the core components of tourism marketing, focusing on branding, the creation of equity, and destination management. A critical review of the literature on the aforementioned will serve to outline the nature of tourism marketing and, in so doing, identify the core objectives and components of the City of Worcester's tourism marketing plan. The report will conclude with a set of best practice recommendations, specifically addressed to the City of Worcester. 2 Branding and Equity Branding is a managed process to serve consumers, create identity for goods and services, and differentiate goods and services from competitors (Kotler, 1994; Kapferer, 1997). Branding is a powerful means for creating competitive advantages in marketing corporations, products, and services. Cai (2002) acknowledged that branding is the single most important objective of marketing today. The ability to create value by developing and maintaining the attributes that appeal to consumers emotionally has become a main focus of branding (Knowles, 2001). Therefore, branding refers to the process of transforming functional assets into relationship assets (Knowles, 2001) or the process of adding meaning to consumer products (Aaker, 1991). Branding has developed into a modern concept that can be applied to anything from products and services to companies, not-for-profit causes, and even countries (Clifton, 2003). Modern branding is concerned increasingly with assembling and maintaining a mix of values, both tangible and intangible, which are relevant to consumers and which meaningfully and appropriately distinguish one supplier's brand from that of another (Murphy, 1998). Emotional benefits over and above a product's functional benefits are emphasized increasingly in the branding process. Branding is a powerful means of differentiation, and differentiation is a significant competitive positioning strategy (Pappu, Quester, & Cooksey, 2005). Berry (2000) noted that "a brand reduces customers' perceived monetary, social, or safety risk in buying services, which are difficult to evaluate prior to purchase" (p. 128). Due to greater opportunities to visit a variety of destinations, places are becoming increasingly substitutable and difficult to differentiate (Pike, 2005). 2.1 Destination Branding Travel destinations, just like other consumer products, have had to turn to branding to identify and distinguish themselves and to convey a positive and motivating message (Aaker, 1991). Although branding is a relatively new concept in tourism marketing (Cai, 2002; Pike, 2005), branding's extension into tourism destination management is expanding (William, Gill, & Chura, 2004). Consumers increasingly recognize that a destination can also be a perceptual concept which can be interpreted subjectively through the experience process (Buhalis, 2000). A strong and lasting destination experience for tourists, if appropriately managed, can act as a foundation for building destination brands (Hall, 2002). Buhalis (2000) states that destinations offer an amalgam of tourism products and services which are subsumed under the name of destination brand. Also, Murphy, Pritchard, and Smith (2000) noted that a tourism destination may be regarded as "an amalgam of individual products and experience opportunities that combine to form a total experience of the area visited" (p.44). These characteristics of a destination imply the challenge of branding destinations (Cai, 2002) and the difficulty of creating marketing activities that produce a distinctive and competitive destination brand (Dredge & Jenkins, 2003). Branding destinations is a significant aspect of current destination marketing efforts in order to identify and distinguish tourism destinations and to attract larger numbers of visitors (d'Hauteserre, 2001). Ritchie and Ritchie (1998) asserted that the primary role of a destination brand is the pre-experience roles of selection and reassurance (identification, differentiation, anticipation, expectation, and reassurance) and the post-experience roles (consolidation and reinforcement). Ooi (2004) provided four functions of branding a destination: to shape public perceptions of the place; to package the place selectively and aesthetically; to make the destination stand out in the global tourism market so as to compete with other destinations; and, to shape tourism experiences. These functions of branding play fundamental roles during consumer's purchase decisions at a reasonably broad level (Knowles, 2001). In terms of destination brand management, different ways for a brand to communicate its benefits have been suggested in a conceptual context. However, specific information on destination brand management such as assessment of destination branding impacts has not been investigated. It is crucial to measure the effectiveness of branding for successful long-term destination management (Blain, Levy, & Ritchie, 2005). 2.2 Brand Equity In conceptualizing how destination branding effectiveness is measured, approaches to brand equity measurement can be applied. Brand equity is regarded as a very important concept in business practice as well as in academic research because marketers can gain a competitive advantage through successfbl brands (Lassar, Mittal, Sharma, 1995). Brand equity has been viewed from both marketing and financial perspectives. In the context of marketing decision making, the former focuses on the aim of improving the efficiency of the marketing process. The financial approach estimates the overall value of a brand for investment purposes, such as a merger, acquisition, or divestiture (Motameni & Shahrokhi, 1998). In recent years, the return on investment is translated into other less tangible brand attributes. Researching brand equity deals with the measurement of intangible marketing concepts (Motameni & Shahrokhi, 1998). Keller (2003) defined brand equity as the differential effect of brand knowledge on consumer responses to the marketing of the brand. This perspective is labelled as customer-based brand equity. According to Keller, customer based brand equity has been operationalised into two types: consumer perceptions and behaviours. Studies in general marketing showed that customer-based brand equity occurs when the customer is familiar with the brand (Kamakura & Russell, 1991). The measurement of brand equity has been one of the most challenging and important issues for both academics and managers (Ailawad & Keller, 2004) because a brand is a complex phenomenon (Murphy, 1990) and brand equity is multi-dimensional (de Chernatonty & McDonald, 2003). The measurement issue also applies to the field of hospitality and tourism though it is very important in terms of destination management. 2.3 Overview Proceeding from the above stated, it is evident that the City of Worcester's tourism marketing plan needs to commence with the transformation of the destination itself into a brand. The implication here is that the city, the destination itself, needs to be packaged and marketed as a brand, with the marketing strategy further focusing on the equity derived from the utilisation of the city's tourism services and the pleasure consequentially derived. 3.0 Designing A Product Ultimately, it is not simply a brand which is marketed but a brand referencing a specific product. If the City of Worcester is the brand, the tourism services and attractions it offers are the product. The implication here is, therefore, that it is imperative that the marketing plan designed create a tourism product. 3.1 The Tourism Product There are a variety of definitions of a tourism product. In general, it may be viewed as the total spectrum of the tourism experiences, encompassing accommodation, natural and other resources, entertainment, transportation. food and beverages, recreation, and other attractions. Along the same line, tourism, according to Seaton (1996), constitutes a wide span of products that has to be seen in terms of sectors: the accommodation sector such as hotels, bed and breakfast; the attraction sector such as museums, theme parks, and festivals; the transport sector such as airline, railways, and car rentals; the travel organizers such as tour operators and travel agents; destination organization sectors such as national tourist organizations. Seaton (1996) classified all tourism and tourism-related sectors into eight categories: accommodation, transportation, event and attractions, outdoor recreation and parks, business and conference, travel services, retail, trade and hospitality. Although the definitions vary to some degree, some general consensus as to the nature of tourism product appears to have been achieved: it is a composite and complex entity that is sold to travellers. Middleton and Hawkins (1998) introduced the concepts of "overall tourism product" and "the specific, mainly commercial products" to explain the nature of the product. The overall tourism product comprises a combination of all the service elements that a visitor consumes from the time he or she leaves home to the time of return. This is both an amalgam of elements as well as an idea, an expectation or a mental construct in the customer's mind, at the point of sale. The specific products refer to the components of the overall tourism product, such as particular product offers of attractions. Some researchers define product as a subset of the marketing concept (Kotler 1994; Meidan, 1989; Middleton, 1989). According to Kotler (1994). a product is "anything that can be offered to a market for attention, acquisition, use or consumption that might satisfy a want or need. It includes physical objects, services, persons, places, organization and ideas." Medlik and Middleton (1973) conceptualize tourism products as a bundle or package of tangible and intangible components, based on activities and are perceived by the tourist as an experience, available at a price. This bundle consists of five components: destination attractions, destination facilities, accessibility, images and price. Smith (1994) viewed the destination users as part of the tourism product: it is the traveller's involvement with the destination in the form of participation that completes the production and delivering of the tourism product. Smith (1994) took into account the physical and services, the tangibles and the intangibles that constitute the tourism product. He incorporated the role of traveller's experience and participation into the configuration of the generic tourism product. As evidenced in the above, therefore, the tourism product can be seen as a composite entity, as an amalgam of attractions, transport, accommodation, and entertainment. Each of these components is supplied by the individual tourism business units and is offered directly to the tourist to form the "total" tourism product offering. This unique composite character of destination as a product make the study of product use pattern and factors that affect usage pattern ever more critical for developing the right product for the different target markets, creating satisfaction in the user and encouraging repeat use. 3.2 Destination Product Dimension Tourism planning is concerned with identifying the tourism functional system and needed linkages between components of the systems. Researchers have proposed the concept of the destination product mix (Heath & Wall, 1992), where product is defined exclusively as the attraction and activity dimension of the total destination offering. According to Heath and Wall, a destination's tourism product mix comprises all the product lines and product items that are made available to tourists at the destination. A tourism product line refers to "e group of tourism products that are closely related" that offer benefits along similar lines. Product lines in fact refer to the different categories of products such as cultural products, outdoor-related products, and entertainment-related products. A tourism product item is "a distinct unit within a product line." For instance, under the cultural product line, there can be items such as museums, theatres, historical buildings, monuments, opera house. For marketing and planning purposes, Heath and Wall (1992) proposed that a destination's product mix should be described in terms of width and length. Product width refers to the variety of activities or attraction resources that a destination can offer, or in other words, the number of product lines that a destination possesses. The length of a destination refers to the number of items within each product line or category. The product mix can be widened by adding new product lines or lengthened by adding new product items to each line. Marketers created another concept - product depth to measure the number of the same item (for example, the number of theatres at a destination). In practice, it may happen that some products are core, or primary, tourism products, and others are ancillary, or secondary. Furthermore, in every destination certain tourism products will play a major role in attracting tourists. Kotler and Fox (1985) called such products 'product leaders or flagship products'. It may also happen that a destination will seek to add a star product to its product mix and emphasize it in promotional literature. 4.0 Concluding Recommendations Destination management theories guide one towards the formulation of a tourism marketing plan which has the potential to position a particular destination as an attractive tourism centre. Numerous tourist destinations, both from within and from without the United Kingdom, have designed such plans drawing from the mentioned theories with the outcome being, not just the popularisation of the destination but the realisation of economic profit. From within the United Kingdom, Alton Towers and Snowdonia National Park stand out while, from without, Las Vegas (US), France, Spain, Italy and Thailand, to name a few , have attained tremendous success as global tourism attractions (Horner and Swarbrooke, 2004). Indeed, France, attracting over 70,000,000 tourists a year, is not simply an example in best practices but a case study in how a country/region/centre can effectively market itself so that, irrespective of price and cost, establishes itself as the premier global tourism destination spot (Horner and Swarbrooke, 2004). The inference here is that destination management, concomitant with an effective marketing campaign, can realise incredible tourism success. As directly relates to the City of Worcester, as a tourist centre it offers archaeology, history, culture, museums, art, unique wildlife and, is currently running for the City Award scheme consequent to its architecture. In addition to that, it is home to a football club and is deeply committed to this globally popular sport. In brief, it offers the tourist several types of attractions, combining between environmental/ecological and entertainment types of attraction. Drawing upon these characteristics, the marketing strategy must proceed with the branding of the city, its positioning as a spot for local tourism and a destination for international tourists to the United Kingdom, even as it emphasises brand equity. The city's attractions must be package and marketed as a product, with branding being the city itself. The mentioned attractions must be coherently presented so as to convey the impression of wide-ranging entertainment types as would satisfy variant age group and tourist needs. Through the packaging and branding of the city and its attractions, Worcester can emerge as a premier tourist attraction in the United Kingdom. 5.0 References Aaker, D. A.(1991). Managing brand equity. New York: Free Press Ailawadi, K., & Keller, K. L. (2004). Understanding retail branding: Conceptual insights and research priorities. Journal of Retailing, 80, 33 1-342. Berry, L. L. (2000). Cultivating Service Brand Equity. Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, 28(1), 128-137. Blain, C., Levy, S. E., & Ritchie, R. B. (2005). Destination branding: Insights and practices from destination management organizations. Journal of Travel Research, 43, 328-338. Buhalis, D.(2000). Marketing the competitive destination of the future. Tourism Management, 21 (1), 97- 1 16. Cai, L. A. (2002). 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