A Critical Analysis of Sales Promotion Used by a Resort - Case study of Nature Notes Resort (Manali)

Summary

About tourism in India

There has been a global tourism boom in the recent times. Tourism has already achieved the distinction of being the world’s largest export industry. Resort industry is at a boom now days. They are focusing more on the customers & making their sales more improved.

Sales promotion is one of the major tools they are using today.

If we see overall tourism market on level of our country we can get a clear view of all tourism scenarios.

India had received just over 16,800 international tourists in 1951. The arrivals increased to 1.7 million in 1990 and further to 2.64 million in 2005. The growth rate between 1990 and 2005 has been 4.46 per cent per annum.

The tourism receipts of India went up from US$ 2583 million in 1995 to US$ 3168 million in 2005 showing an annual average growth rate of 4.17 per cent as compared to the world’s average growth rate of 3.2 per cent during this period. There has been a phenomenal growth in domestic tourism in the country during the last one decade. The domestic tourist visits increased from 63.8 million in 1990 to 210 million in 2005.

Tourism provides enormous opportunity for employment generation. According to an estimate the travel and tourism industry would have directly generated 9.3 million jobs in India. The travel and tourism industry includes activities such as accommodation, transport, catering, entertainment, recreation and other travel-related services. The travel and tourism economy which expresses the impact of travel and tourism and its flow-through effect across the wider economy would have generated 17.4 million jobs in India.

Tourism is a service based industry therefore the principal product provided by a Recreational or Tourism business are Recreation and hospitality. Tourism as a service involves intangibility, perish ability, heterogeneous, inseparability and lack of ownership. Market mix of tourism industry includes Product, Price, Place, Promotion, People, Physical evidence and Process.

The report is based on the understanding of Marketing Strategies and operations of Tourism business which include sales promotion with the help of studying the strategies & sales promotion used by ‘Nature Notes Resort’ which is situated in Manila. The Resort is headed by Mr. Amit Chawla and is a venture of ‘Ocean Hugs’. Therefore the following report basically deals with the various sales promotion strategies of the resort, viz., for understanding their sales promotion activities deeply it is necessary to go through their business objective; Market environment analysis; Number of available resources; Market segmentation; The different marketing objectives for the different segments; the Implementation plan being adopted by the Company; Planned budget and the final evaluation.

The study is based on the observation and active interaction with the employees in the functioning of the organization (both in the Marketing as well as Operations department).

CONCLUSION

Customer satisfaction in tourism is greatly influenced by the way in which the services are delivered but most important is that how he is attracted to the resort. The physical appearance and personality of the business is took as the major attracting tool & by support of sales promotion  customers are made more attracted to the resort. It is critical that these elements be communicated in the best possible manner to convince people to come and experience what your business or community has to offer. Equally important is the ability to generate repeat business because of your efforts. Thus, sales promotion becomes the method to reach potential visitors. It is a vital part of tourism management and can be done effectively and well, with sophistication and tact, or it can be done poorly in a loud, crass and intrusive manner. Hopefully, this bulletin has given you the basics for the former rather than the latter. Remember that to do an effective job at marketing:

Adopt a strong customer orientation which includes regular research and assessment of their needs, wants and attitudes;

• Allocate sufficient resources and time to marketing.
• Assign formal responsibility for marketing to one person or department
• Develop and regularly update a marketing plan.
• Put as much as more effort toward better sales promotion activities.

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The above article is a summary extract from the dissertation projects of the MBA and BBA students of Skyline College. Skyline, situated in Delhi and Gurgaon (NCR) is a premier institute providing management education specialising in MBA and BBA degrees and specialist courses for travel and tourism as well as mass communication.