Sri Lankan tourist operators, frustrated by the Government’s inability to promote the country’s leisure product overseas particularly in the post-war period, are planning to spend their own cash on much-needed promotion.
At least one local company says it has plans to hire its own PR outfit overseas and do what “the government is expected to do.”“We just can’t wait and see our competitors take market share,” a director from the company, who declined to be named, said.
Sri Lanka Tourism is currently following a policy of spending more money on product development and less on promotion with an eye on 2.5 million arrivals by 2016 from a mere 700,000 plus now.
Over the years most of Sri Lanka Tourism’s budget has been spent on promotion including presence at trade fairs, advertising and sponsorship on top of sponsored visits for tour operators and foreign media, among other initiatives. However government planners say of more concern today is to improve the product after years of neglect due to the war; otherwise the country will not be ready for the increased tourist flows.
Industry observers agree that product development is important but also point out that promotion and awareness creation should not be neglected either since many foreigners and would-be travellers are still unaware that Sri Lanka is a peaceful country, in fact more safer than other tourist-generating countries in the region. Furthermore, they say, tourism is becoming very competitive with other destinations offering an equal or better money’s worth of travel and leisure. “What we want is more advertising (of the country),” noted Sri Lanka Association of Inbound Tour Operators President Nilmin Nanayakkara.
Some observers earlier believed arrivals may drop in May. However May figures released by Sri Lanka Tourism on Friday showed a rise of 39% to 48,943 from May 2010.
Mr Nanayakkara said he raised these issues at the National Council for Economic Development meeting recently, and they are being favourably considered by the Government. “Today there seems to be hardly any marketing taking place. There is a need for advertising and promotions with interactive promotions,” he said.
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