Monday 27 July 2015

Niche Market Research to Boost Tourism Development

Five fully fledged tourism niche market reports are now available for Pacific tourism stakeholders to effectively plan their approach in maximizing growth in these developing markets.

The reports have been produced under the European Union Project, 'Pacific Regional Tourism Capacity Building Programme (PRTCBP)', implemented in partnership with the South Pacific Tourism Organisation (SPTO). The reports cover diving, culture and heritage, fishing, backpacker and the wedding and honeymoon markets.

Designed to provide practical and actionable market intelligence, they aim to provide guidance to Pacific tourism operators wishing to penetrate these niche markets.

SPTO Chief Executive Ilisoni Vuidreketi stated the Pacific region lacks specific market research data and intelligence at both regional and country levels.

“As a consequence, the tourism industry in the region cannot benefit from relevant research information and data to help optimize its product development planning and particularly its destination marketing activities”, he added.

“This constraint is particularly severe in the case of niche tourism markets where specialized and often small-scale operators do not benefit from any relevant and practical market intelligence to guide their marketing activities”, Mr. Vuidreketi continued.

“As a first step in this area, the SPTO has compiled a database of nineteen (19) niche market profiles which were completed from 2012 to 2013”, he added.

These niche market profiles cover bird watching, cultural heritage and historic tourism, cycling, diving, festival and sports events tourism, fishing, health, wellness and spa, sailing, soft adventure, surfing, wedding and honeymoon tourism, battlefield tourism, ecotourism (Green Tourism), homestays, island cruising, marine wildlife tourism, photography tourism, volunteer tourism and water adventure tourism.

“With increasing competitive pressures in the international tourism market, the availability of relevant and focused research intelligence is an essential precondition of growth.” Mr. Vuidreketi reiterated.

The reports come on the offset of the recent completion of the Pacific Cruise Research Market & Intelligence report (PCMRI) – another in-depth intelligence research on cruise tourism for the Pacific. The report is comprehensive analysis and assessment on cruising in the Pacific.

Disseminated in both hard and electronic copies to SPTO members (government, National Tourism Offices and private sector), the reports have also been uploaded into the Regional Tourism Resource Centre (RTRC) that house an additional 1,000 reports available to members on the SPTO website www.spto.org/members.

No comments:

Post a Comment