This research carried out an analysis of the environment of digital advertising channels, the evaluation of the online presence of the attractions that the Sucre canton has, the quality or degree of optimization of the advertising media used for their promotion and the implementation of actions that allow the dissemination of the tourist offer through search engines through the use of Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and Search Engine Marketing (SEM) strategies that improve the visibility of websites aimed at promoting tourism; improving visibility on popular social media such as Facebook, YouTube, Twitter and Instagram through the use of Social Media Marketing (SMM) and Social Media Optimization (SMO) techniques;the use of mobile marketing through applications aimed at providing tourist information on attractions, the capture of emails for the development of email marketing and the execution of paid advertising campaigns on the internet, also highlighting the great competitive advantages and opportunities for sustained growth that provides the use of digital media in relation to traditional advertising media in cost, reach, usability and measurement of results.also highlighting the great competitive advantages and opportunities for sustained growth offered by the use of digital media in relation to traditional advertising media in costs, reach, usability and measurement of results.also highlighting the great competitive advantages and opportunities for sustained growth offered by the use of digital media in relation to traditional advertising media in costs, reach, usability and measurement of results.
INTRODUCTION
The Sucre canton with its extension of 764 and its privileged geographical location has several tourist attractions distributed throughout its territory, offering tourists various options for rest or entertainment, the tourist attractions in this area have great potential accompanied by unique characteristics that can provide sustained growth to the local tourism sector, to drive this growth and in turn generate and increase tourist visits, it is imperative to implement marketing and advertising strategies. The tourism sector in the Sucre canton has been strongly affected after the earthquake that occurred on April 16, 2016, so it is necessary to implement a development model that reactivates tourism demand,starting from the execution of more effective marketing strategies to encourage the influx of visitors by promoting local attractions and thus achieve sustainable growth that mitigates the economic impact on the communities of the Sucre canton.
Tourism promotion influences the perception of the attractions in the receiving public, according to the statement of (Castillo Palacio & Castano Molina, 2015) it is one of the great pillars of Integrated Marketing Communication, which refers to communicating to potential tourists (consumers) on a tourist offer. In the case of the promotion of tourist destinations, traditional and non-traditional promotion instruments are identified. From this point of view, efforts should be focused on actions aimed at promoting places through traditional and non-traditional advertising resources that allow the recipient to receive information on the qualities of the tourism product.
The objective of this research is to evaluate through various parameters the quality of the use of online media as advertising media that promote the tourist attractions of the Sucre canton in order to suggest a tourism marketing strategy complemented with digital marketing strategies that promote the influx of tourists to the canton.
THEMATIC DEVELOPMENT
Growth of the digital environment
The digital development and use of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) is growing rapidly day by day. Progressively the media evolve together with society and it adapts to the changes of the new era with agility. (We Are Social, 2016) published in its most recent study on digital, social and mobile use worldwide, interesting statistics where the rapid growth of digital media stands out, approaching a global introduction of 50%. Based on a world population of approximately 7,395 million inhabitants, the study reveals that there are 3.42 million active users on the Internet, equivalent to 46% of the global population, 2.31 million users in social networks, equivalent to 31% of global insertion 3.79 million mobile users,corresponding to 51% of the global total and 1.97 million mobile users of social networks with a 27% global inclusion. Taking into account these statistical growth patterns, it must be recognized that the growth of digital media is constant, the increase in users who use the internet, social networks and mobile telephony offers better opportunities to promote the tourist offer that the Sucre canton has. Taking advantage of these information channels as advertising media, natural and cultural tourist attractions can position themselves as a destination for tourists and travelers seeking to discover new places.It must be recognized that the growth of digital communication media is constant, the increase in users who use the internet, social networks and mobile telephony offers better opportunities to promote the tourist offer that the Sucre canton has, taking advantage of these information channels as advertising media. Natural and cultural tourist attractions can position themselves as a destination for tourists and travelers seeking to discover new places.It must be recognized that the growth of digital communication media is constant, the increase in users who use the internet, social networks and mobile telephony offers better opportunities to promote the tourist offer that the Sucre canton has, taking advantage of these information channels as advertising media. Natural and cultural tourist attractions can position themselves as a destination for tourists and travelers seeking to discover new places.Social networks and mobile telephony offer better opportunities to promote the tourist offer that the Sucre canton has, taking advantage of these information channels as advertising media, natural and cultural tourist attractions can position themselves as a destination for tourists and travelers seeking to discover new places.Social networks and mobile telephony offer better opportunities to promote the tourist offer that the Sucre canton has, taking advantage of these information channels as advertising media, natural and cultural tourist attractions can position themselves as a destination for tourists and travelers seeking to discover new places.
Digital Marketing and its advertising benefits for the tourism sector
Digital marketing advertising channels are allowing tourism marketers to channel their promotional strategies through the internet, mobile phones, social networks and other online channels to market and advertise their tourism offer, getting new customers and improving their network of relationships with its current consumers, online advertising channels can provide great benefits for tourist attractions, as stated (Carlos Alcaide, et al., 2013) highlights the possibility of connecting with the target audience of the message, without intermediaries, which allows it to be a complement to traditional advertising actions, there are other advantages that are added below: Access to the global tourism market, competitive advantage compared to other businesses in the same sector,opportunity to compete with large companies at the same level, power of diffusion or virality, ease of adaptation to changes and market evolution, lower cost in relation to traditional advertising media. ability to create interactive promotion that generates engagement, possibility of optimizing sales channels, high degree of audience segmentation, greater reach and better direct customer-oriented support, ease of measurement of results and control of advertising actions.high degree of audience segmentation, greater reach and better direct customer-oriented support, ease of measurement of results and control of advertising actions.high degree of audience segmentation, greater reach and better direct customer-oriented support, ease of measurement of results and control of advertising actions.
The contemporary tourist is a systematic person in terms of the organization and planning of his trip, (Martínez Villa, 2012) describes him as a more experienced traveler since he is more a planner, he searches for information in different ways, but mainly on the Internet. He knows that the information is there in a massive way, real information since it has been left by people like him, many with the same or similar tastes. Coinciding with this definition, the tourist currently frequents media where they can access real information for planning their trip, tourism at this time is motivated by the selection of products that allow people to accumulate experiences that can be shared with other people in blogs, forums, social networks and other media through photos, videos,In addition, digital media provide several benefits to tourists, including: Ease and comfort, low costs, convenience to evaluate alternatives, interaction in pleasant environments, the tourist has the possibility of generating opinions and sharing their experiences with other clients.
Digital marketing advertising tools
Taking into account the statement of (Moro Vallina & Rodés Bach, 2014) the choice of advertising media for the implementation of the digital marketing strategy must be outlined in three stages: Establishment of objectives and design of strategies, definition and execution of actions strategic as well as controlling and measuring results. Based on this description, the digital marketing approach must be outlined based on the objective that is to attract tourism permanently through the use of online advertising channels to promote a tourism product based on the consumer interests and needs of the tourist, strategic actions They will be aimed at designing a website, search engine positioning and marketing, presence and marketing in social networks,email marketing and mobile marketing, then the results must be assessed and evaluated to determine if the advertising methodology is correct and will increase the flow of visitors to tourist attractions.
Search engine marketing
Search engine marketing is comprised of two disciplines: Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and Search Engine Marketing (SEM).
Search engine optimization from the point of view of (Orense Fuentes & Rojas Orduña, 2010) SEO as a discipline is the process by which a web page obtains and maintains notable positions in the results pages (Search Engine Results Pages, SERPs) natural search engines, also called organic results (they come from a large organic database) or algorithmic (they depend on an algorithm for their ordering). Therefore, SEO is the methodology of configuring a website so that it is relevant and understandable for search engines,Through these methods it is possible for the website to be positioned in the first places of the SERPs with the possibility of segmenting the public based on search intention or having a greater reach by optimizing local and international positioning strategies to receive more of clicks that will lead to visits to the web that can become potential tourists to the tourist attractions of the Sucre canton.
Methodology
The investigative technique to carry out this trial is the inductive method, (Rodriguez Moguel, 2005) defines it as a process in which, from the study of particular cases, universal conclusions or laws are obtained that explain or relate the phenomena studied. Therefore, this document has been based on theories and statistical studies to evaluate the application of advertising strategies in the tourist attractions of the Sucre Canton.
To analyze the online advertising media used for the promotion of tourist attractions and the quality of optimization of these, the observation technique was used, looking for online information on the currently existing attractions according to the inventory carried out by (Gobierno Provincial de Manabí, 2005) taking into account the following criteria:
- Online presence of the tourist attractions of the Sucre canton on government websites, pages of tourist establishments or third parties, this search was carried out under the considerations proposed by (Enge, Spencer, & Stricchiola, 2015) on: Indexing in search engines, web structuring and content Analysis of the implementation of SEO strategies on websites considering the factors defined by (Enge, Spencer, & Stricchiola, 2015), among which the following recommendations stand out: Website architecture (Loading speed, mobile adaptation, usability, accessibility), multimedia resources (images, videos, audio), content structuring (use of headings, informative content and without duplication, URL or uniform locator of short resources),existence of internal links (Within the same website), outgoing links to other relevant sites and inbound links (From other websites), using the tools: OnPage.org, CopyScape SEMrush and Ahrefs. Online promotion using SEM strategies in search engines and online advertising, to evaluate this criterion the SEMrush tool was used following the guidelines recommended by (Chaffey & Smith, 2013) which are: Relevance, description of the offer, specific benefits, differentiation from the competition, inclusion of numbers that stand out in advertising, giving relevance to important terms with the use of capital letters, use of spaces if necessary, use of punctuation marks, call to action, use capital letters in the link to the website.Presence in social networks through profiles on Twitter and Instagram or Facebook pages referencing the requirements of profiles in social networks proposed by (Chaffey & Smith, 2013) based on the following insights: Added value in the content of the publications, unique value in the content of each social channel, information in the social profile, easy to find profile, differential value in the publications compared to competitors in this case tourist attractions from other cantons, permanent interaction with followers of the social profile, frequent activity, actions and publications at the appropriate times, feedback and reminder to followers of information about the attractions, ease and optimization for the virality of publications, integration with other digital channels,Take advantage of the advantages offered by each social network.On YouTube the presence of official channels or videos promoting the attractions was examined, videos that are not related to tourism promotion were not considered, also since it is a social network, the principles of the requirements were considered of profiles in social networks suggested by (Chaffey & Smith, 2013).The evaluation of mobile marketing was based on the norms specified by (Chaffey & Smith, 2013) on the use of mobile applications, it proposes to take into account: mobile device application stores, The application must support the various versions of current mobile operating systems and must be compatible with existing mobile terminal models.In relation to email marketing, the existence of email capture strategies was validated according to the following email marketing fundamentals: raised by (Chaffey & Smith, 2013) which are: Capture of emails to send emails aimed at selling, regular informative email campaigns, specific actions for mailing lists and sequences of emails scheduled by events.Following the guidelines listed in the previous points, a table was prepared where the evaluation of the online presence of tourist attractions through the media will be presented. and the quality of optimization within these promotion channels, where the symbol ✓ means that it is within the evaluation criteria and the symbol X indicates that it does not use the valued digital medium.
Results
- Regarding the online presence of the 25 tourist attractions of the Sucre canton, 19 results were found in the search engine, which were promoted on third-party websites and not by governmental tourism organizations, taking into account the SEO recommendations proposed by the The authors (Enge, Spencer, & Stricchiola, 2015) evaluated the websites found, highlighting that only 3 of the 19 pages found met these basic requirements. As suggested (Chaffey & Smith, 2013) and previously in the evaluation criteria is mentioned, the guidelines were followed to analyze the use of SEM strategies, Social Networks, Mobile Marketing and Email Marketing;finding that the attractions are not promoted through online advertising through the various existing formats or SEM in search engines. In social networks such as Facebook, Twitter and Instagram 6 profiles met the evaluation criteria proposed. On YouTube, 5 results were found that they offered information through videos about tourist attractions.
- Based on the rules previously proposed to identify the use of mobile marketing and email marketing, no strategies were found that use these means for the tourist promotion of attractions.
CONCLUSIONS
- The natural and cultural tourist attractions that the Sucre canton possesses have ideal characteristics for attracting visitors, but to complement it, it is necessary to implement effective advertising strategies that promote tourism development and boost the local economy. The current advertising strategies used for promotion of the tourist offer that the canton has are not enough to increase the tourist influx in the area, so it is necessary to implement digital channels to take advantage of the advantages offered by this type of media compared to traditional advertising media. online offers multiple formats to promote the tourist offer, in addition to reaching the ideal audience segment at low cost,presence at any time interval and control the results.On the other hand, websites offer the advantage of offering tourists information about tourism products and services with permanent availability with the help of techniques such as SEO and SEM that can boost online positioning and offer better results.Social networks allow a more personalized approach with the tourist, through the publication of visual content such as videos or images, high commitment can be generated in the client, there is also the advantage of using paid advertising in them with which It is possible to segment users and promote the tourist offer through visual content on the main social networks such as Facebook, YouTube, Instagram and Twitter.Another resource that can be taken advantage of is mobile marketing through the integration of mobile applications; while e-mail marketing constitutes another alternative advertising means for the tourist development of the natural and cultural attractions that the Sucre canton has.
- study on the implementation of online advertising strategies to promote the tourist offer of the attractions of the Sucre canton suggests that government and private organizations should cooperate with each other to offer a better experience to tourists. Online advertising media provide great competitive advantages and growth opportunities sustained thanks to the power of diffusion that can be obtained, the ease of adaptation to changes in the digital environment, the low cost in relation to traditional advertising media, the high degree of segmentation, scope and development of interactive advertising campaigns that generate commitment in the traveler through videos on social networks or animated offers in commercials and simplicity of measuring results.
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