I think most of us were expecting the new tourism campaign to be based around sunshine on the beach, and so it is, although they’re making more mention of our gorgeous landscapes as well as the fantastic climte. For La Palma, they also show the night sky and observatory. The new thing is the way we’re going to market it. The new campaign plans to use social media much more skilfully. Did you know that 1.6 million visitors to the Canaries last year have been here at least 10 times before? We need to encourage them to tell all their friends and family how much they love it here. And with social media, it’s much easier to have targeted campaigns for smaller segments of the market, like honeymooners / families / active leisure / conferences / LGBT, and to produce each video in lots of languages.
So there’s a special website, vuelveabrillar.com in six languages. Shineagain.com has the same content, although the default language is English. It has a video for each island – all beautifully done, with locals narrating each one (I seem to be the only one who doesn’t like La Palma’s the narrator’s accent). There are even websites in Polish and Russian. Please, please like and share the photos and videos on Facebook and Twitter etc. every chance you get. It’ll only take you a few seconds, and it might get you your next customer.
There’s also a campaign to get people to share photos and videos on social media.
Paulino Rivero said that we’re basing our appeal around the climate as before, but also diversity, friendliness and ecological sustainability. It’s not in our interest to wreck our landscapes because then the tourists will have nothing to come for.
I’m glad he said that. It got spontaneous applause.
And you know, for those of us who live here, it’s easy to forget how very appealing sunny beaches are to people waiting at the bus stop in the driving sleet. Let’s make sure they know what they’re missing.
