Film tourism is one of the newest forms of recreation and leisure tourism worldwide. As an integral part of business, film tourism marketing is concerned with
- setting goals
- establishing unique policies and programs
- implementing business action for the entire organization
The major tasks of film tourism marketing are to translate consumer wants and needs, actual and potential, into profitable products and services that the company is capable of producing; to cultivate markets to support these new products; and to program the distribution activities necessary to reach the markets.
Film tourism marketing is not merely a specialized activity of the film industry, but rather a perspective for the total management team. Film tourism marketing does not function as a separate entity in the film business, nor is it more important than any other primary activity, yet through actual and potential sales it does establish constraints within which the other activities must be performed.
Film tourism marketing
Marketing aspects of film tourism involve unique features of the product and its impact on the target audience. In reality, the conception of film tourism marketing as a viewpoint or as the fundamental purpose of a business focuses on the business as a satisfier of consumer wants and needs. This conception implies a top-management philosophy of film industry operation -- the marketing philosophy.
Accordingly, customers and consumers become the core around which a business revolves, thus recognizing customer orientation to decision-making and problem-solving and the impact of marketing on other functional areas.
The marketing philosophy is the natural reaction of management in attempting to meet the needs of a keenly competitive, constantly changing environment. It is designed to direct the entire business to serving those customer wants and needs that are in line with the objectives of the corporation. It reflects an integrated and coordinated approach to the management of marketing activity, and the development of total systems of business action that recognize the market as the focal point of business.
Essentially, the marketing philosophy is a way of thinking about corporate activity; a frame of mind; an attitude. It recognizes the primacy of consumers and customers as they influence all business operations. It starts with the company's chief executive, who must recognize that, lacking markets for the company's products and lacking customer wants and needs, no business can exist.
Changes in business and market
Film-induced tourism involves destination promotion techniques, literary tourism and place promotion. Beeton explains that film tourism marketing bears the responsibility for utilizing marketing resources so that corporate objectives are achieved as effectively as possible.
The marketing manager must understand and project the external operating environment of his company, the opportunities they represent, and their impact on the business, and then develop plans to match them with internal business resources. Changing environments create market opportunities for film industry that must be reflected in adaptive corporate action. Resources cannot merely be directed to the cultivation of old markets if competitive positions are to be enhanced. Marketing must play the corporate role of directing organizations to profitable paths. It must perceive of business opportunities in a changing environment and create markets.
In their studies, Hudson and Ritchie argue that film tourism survival require that the management of change be the first order of business. Marketing managers then must accept the task of developing and implementing strategies that will overcome resistance to change. As this occurs, innovation, research, and development become more integral parts of the marketing function. Through marketing management, corporate resources may be balanced both internally and externally. Internal balance is achieved by the coordination of all marketing activity and its integration with the other areas of the business. “Results of a stepwise multiple regression analysis indicate a high correlation between film tourism success and one of the four factors: the proactive efforts of destinations that encourage producers and studios to film at their location” (Hudson and Ritchie 2006).
External balance is concerned with the continuous adjustment of a company to its market environments through changes in product, price, package, channels, advertising, and selling. In this sense, marketing forces are viewed as shaping the total organization and all the business functions. The marketing manager thus becomes concerned with matching market opportunities with the unique capabilities of his firm -- the development of differential advantage.
Important ingredients of success in marketing management are the proper management attitudes and philosophy. Basic belief and conviction rather than the mere utilization of techniques are fundamental requisites for successful implementation of the marketing-management concept .
Deeper into film tourism marketing
According to Horner and Swarbrooke (2005), film industry resources, policies, and decisions will thus be redirected continuously as a result of changing market forces. From a social point of view, marketing's contribution to the direction and development of economies, and its role as a change agent and stimulus for rapid economic progress, will be noted. Although film tourism opportunity assessment may appear to be relatively simple and straightforward, it is actually complex and requires sophisticated corporate thinking.
Concerned with clear and precise definitions of enterprise purpose and market segments, it is indispensable to the profitable functioning and growth of the firm. Its scope is broad, affecting all budgets, research and development, new products, investment in plant and equipment, and profit planning.
Opportunity assessment, the first and most critical of the functions, includes sales forecasting, the determination of target markets, the management of innovation, a concern with stages of market development of products and corporate strategies, and the determination of the impact of future environments on a business. It is an activity crucial to the profitable growth and survival of an enterprise. Opportunity assessment is the basis for sound investment decisions and strategy considerations that shape the total direction of a firm. As a result of the performance of this function, new product opportunities and the need of adjusting current product lines are brought to the attention of management.
Tribe (2005) argues that the degree to which the function of market opportunity assessment is performed effectively, shapes in large measure the profitability of the business. The basic premise of marketing management is that firms are goal-oriented and that systems of action must be developed. Coordinated marketing action is basic to the achievement of manufacturing, as well as marketing, and financial goals.
The marketing philosophy connotes the acceptance of the fact that the fundamental business of business is creating customers, and that marketing provides a perspective for the total management team. The marketing concept refers to a company's management of its marketing resources, its conception of marketing activities. The marketing-management functions, market-opportunity assessment, marketing planning and programming, marketing organization and leadership, and marketing control.
Market opportunities stem from both external and internal forces. Technological developments and changing market environments are externally based, whereas research and development, and modifications of products, packages, marketing channels, and advertising campaigns, are internally based. Opportunity assessment must account for both.
The assessment of market opportunity emphasizes that business ventures begin with study of the market, that the future of the business rather than its present or past is the most significant dimension, and that every company must commit itself to change and innovation. Continuous assessment stresses that management does not focus on products or processes that it now possesses. Rather, management becomes concerned with satisfying changing consumer wants and needs, and continuously adjusting company resources to that end.
Following Alberge (2007): “The effect of films and television can be far-reaching. They help to project an updated image of the UK overseas while historical films and programs reinforce a brand for the UK as a country steeped in history” (Alberge 2007). The assessment of market opportunities involves four stages: recognition of market wants, needs, and developments; projecting them into potential markets; matching them with present and future corporate capabilities; and identifying selected target markets. This indicates that effective opportunity assessment is critical in developing marketing strategy, since that strategy consists of defining targets and developing a marketing mix.
Film tourism marketers perceive marketing opportunity as satisfaction of market segments that have been defined and afford financial attractiveness. Although it is true that most large manufacturers cater to mass markets, since these offer greater potential for mass production, profitable market opportunity may also be recognized in lesser market segments. Moreover, market segments are not stable, and even though defined, customer wants and needs change continuously. Excellent opportunities exist for the development of profitable new markets.
Opportunity assessment should emphasize changing wants, needs, and opportunities. By so doing, a better alignment of a company's marketing mix can be made with profitable market segments. There are many ways of distinguishing innovations. These are based on degree of importance, breadth of application, and impact. The introduction of absolutely new products, variations of products, extension of new services, new packages, new advertising campaigns, and different pricing arrangements are all innovations.
Innovation exists, ranging from very slight modification to radically new, important developments that give rise to new industries. Viewed from the consumer's perspective, three types of product innovations may be delineated: fundamental, functional, and adaptive.
Fundamental innovations create totally new products that have much greater impact than adaptive innovations. Where totally new products are developed, new industries are created. As a result, fundamental innovation may create a monopoly position within an industry for a period of time. For such new film products, the creation of primary demand is more important than for products that are adaptations.
Specifics of film tourism marketing
Film tourism marketing depends upon careful economic, social and marketing analysis. For a film tourism marketing company, the management of change implies the management of new market situations, the solution of new problems on a continuous basis. By recognizing profitable opportunities in continuing change, companies overcome threats and achieve growth.
To manage change, companies must forecast developments, predict logical consequences, translate them into potential opportunities, and plan to capitalize on profitable alternatives.
The assessment of market opportunity is closely linked to the innovative process. Market opportunity encourages innovation and stimulates and extends markets. In fact, the assessment of market opportunity may be considered one of the early phases of the total innovative process.
Still innovation is not equated with market opportunity. Innovation requires the supportive system of marketing resources to cultivate opportunity. Both the stimulation of a continuing flow of ideas and products that can better satisfy wants and needs, and the supply of a marketing system to support them, are requisites of opportunity realization. Critics comment that: "There are countless examples of visitors flocking to locations they've seen in films or on TV and the effect can last for years" (“Film locations boost UK tourism” 2007).
For film tourism, innovation is one of the competitive tools of the business. It is a major means of creating a differential advantage, albeit sometimes short-lived.
In adjusting to change, and in attempting to meet the demands of the marketplace, it must be managed, and programmed innovation is becoming one of the foundations of business strategy. Programmed innovation is an extremely important process that involves great amounts of resources and effort in promoting and accelerating economic change. Innovating firms face a range of possible marketing policies.
At one extreme, they can choose policies to make the maximum short-run profit and then decide to meet competition as it arises as with a pricing policy of skimming markets. Between these extremes, they may choose to be reimbursed for their original outlays while still holding a competitive advantage, and then use the advantage to increase volume and build a stronger market position.
From a social perspective, the benefits of various innovations are often challenged. Fundamental innovations that create something new in the physical sense are hailed as beneficial.
Adaptive innovations, particularly those that generate psychological values and are based on style or design obsolescence, are often criticized. Yet even the latter are beneficial in a highly industrialized economy. The major difference is the time dimension, the degree of specificity of factors, and the tendency to give more immediate problems greater attention. Long-range forecasting is particularly relevant for growth considerations and general concern with adjustment and survival.
Conclusion
In sum, film tourism marketing reflects economic and social changes that occurred in society and has to respond effectively to new market conditions. Marketing organizations are usually described and discussed under steady-state conditions. Their forms and processes are examined, including such concepts as line and staff relationships, the division of responsibilities and authority, and organization charts. Equally significant for film industry marketing is the process of organization adjustment to meet changing film and recreation markets and internal economic conditions. Though film tourism marketers comprise regular sets of behavior and specified interrelationships, success in marketing depends on one element -- dealing with change. New film industry processes and arrangements are necessary to deal with new products and goals.
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