There has been a lot of word-of-mouth and mentions in social networking site

about “It’s more FUN in the Philippines”, the new Slogan of the Department of Tourism
(DOT) in 2012 which replaced the long-running slogan, “WOW Philippines”. Observers
notes, however whether Filipinos, who posted their own efforts or ideas for the slogan in
their Faceboook and twitter, communicated the right audience as the DOT attempted
to make a viral people’s campaign that aimed to bring travellers from other countries
to the Philippines.

With market potential off 1 billion tourists spending US$1 trillion worldwide, a small
increase in tourist numbers would greatly benefit the Philippines as it has not attracted
as many foreign tourists, with market shares of less than half of the one percent. This is
when even with the consideration of the many natural wonders that the Philippines has
versus the manmade structures in the other countries. The additional source of revenues
could complement other major sources of foreign receipts like exports with reported
values of over US$51 billion and of OFW remittances nearly US$20 billion in 2010.

The top ten tourism destinations of the world as of 2011 included two Asian
countries: France, USA, China, Spain, Italy, UK, Turkey, Germany, Malaysia and Mexico.
Some 204 million tourists visited the Asia-Pacific region in 2010, and the top ten places
were: China (56 million) , Malaysia(25 million), Hongkong (20 million), Thailand (16
million), Macau (12 million), Singapore (9 million), South Korea (8.8 million), Japan(8.6
million), Indonesia (7 million) and Australia (6 million). The Philippines has not been in the
top ten it has improved to attracting around 3.7 million foreign tourists in 2011, each
staying an average of nine days and spending an average of US$100 a day (or US$900
per tourist). The DOT aims to attract 10 million tourists by end-2016, to narrow the gap in
comparisons between Pg Philippines and Vietnam (which is already getting 5 million
visitors a year). In March of 20122, it was reported that the Philippines has reached its
highest ever tourist visits in a month, reaching 400, 000, suggesting the success of the
“It’s more FUN in the Philippines” campaign and other local tourism initiatives.

Observing the behaviour of tourists, it was noted that some of them have either
come from another country or are going to another country after visiting the Philippines.
An idea then is to consider the potential of dual-country visits among tourists. This means
the DOT will consider the possibility of re-positioning the Philippines as a second of two
destinations tourists must visit, like after visiting china, Singapore, Malaysia or Hongkong,
they also visit the Philippines. A bundling strategy done consistently and, when
creatively executed and supported by Philippine embassies in each country, may
even, in less than 2 years leapfrog the Philippines several ranks higher than its
neighbouring countries that have chosen to promote tourism alone.
I. Time Context
 Year 2012

II. View point

 Department of Tourism (DOT) – The executive department of the
Philippine Government responsible for the regulation of the Philippine
tourism industry and the promotion of the Philippines as a tourist
destination.

III. Problem Statement

 Even with the great effort of the Department of Tourism to promote
tourism, they still failed to attract half of the target percentage of
foreign tourists.

IV. Objectives
 To attract 10 million tourist by the end of 2016.(short- term)
 To narrow the gap in comparison between Philippines and
Vietnam.(short-term)
 To increase the number of tourist visiting in the Philippines.(long-term)
 To be included in the top 10 tourist destination in Asia.(long term)

V. Areas of Consideration

STRENGTHS
 Filipino People
 Tourist destination
 Foods
WEAKNESSES
 Accommodation
 Safety and Security Issue
 Weak transportation and infrastructure
OPPORTUNITIES
 Capitalize on the Philippine’s globally attractive tourism assets and
proximity to large Asian growth markets.
 Capitalize on the government’s convergence strategies for socio
economic development and poverty reduction.
 Leverage participation in international tourism cooperation initiatives.
THREATS
 Competition
 Natural Disaster
 Internal and external conflicts
 Financial economic crisis
  Climate change

VI. Alternative Courses of Action

a. Promotional advertisement / Social Media Advertising
b. Promo packages
c. Maintain natural wonders of the Philippines
d. Build new facilities/building for tourist accommodation.
e. Improve transportation infrastructure.
f. Offer new activities.
g. Make it cheaper to visit the Philippines.

Advantages

 Social media sites are great for building customer relationship and offers an
incredible reach and the opportunity to connect with customers in an entirely new
way
 Offers a wide reach, with its potential for viral marketing
 Traffic generated can be extremely targeted
 Social media tools are relatively inexpensive
 By making the cost of visiting the Philippines a lot cheaper, we can attract more
potential tourists in the country.

Disadvantages

 Targeting is so low because of the diversity and breadth of audiences, resulting in

low ROI as visitors do not convert
 Visitors mainly go to social media sites to socialize, and are not interested in
advertising
 Traffic is typically in the learning stage of the buying process; hence it is more
important to inform and teach than sell outright
 Social media can be a hard branding tool for small businesses, and it is not easy to
build awareness, create appeal and generate traffic
VII. Recommendation

 Department of Tourism must develop more promotional ads for

television, radio and to spread it to social networking site. They should
encourage fellow Filipino’s to get more involve to “It’s more fun in the
Philippines” campaign.

VIII. Conclusion/Active Plan

 To become one of the top tourist destinations in the world, we have to

maintain and develop our natural wonders and man-made structures.
The government should give their full support to ensure that they will
achieve the target goals.