Developing and promoting the tourism product
This building block involves everything related to producing your tourism product. It is recommended that a private sector partner possessing the appropriate market focus and experience in ecotourism be selected before embarking on tourism development in order to ensure long-term sustainability. Our model suffered as a result of not having a partner from the start, putting all responsibility for marketing and tour operation on the project. Selecting and training village tourism service group members is the next important step, and should be done with involvement of community leaders, the local government tourism agency and the private sector partner. Contracts with service group members can be used to create incentives for good service and protection of wildlife. Infrastructure should be built as a community project to instill maximum ownership. A cost effective, high impact marketing tool is a ‘familiarization trip(s)’ for tour companies and journalists, in contrast to printing brochures. Word of mouth is the most important factor and is ultimately determined by a unique and well thought out product.
It’s important for stakeholders to understand the importance to partner with the private sector. It is equally important that the private sector understand the product and the goals of the project. If these conditions are not met, an appropriate partnership may not be created, handicapping the project’s ability to create a sound business model. If a partnership cannot be created from the start, it is important to have the financial resources to incubate the product until the conditions are better for forming a partnership.
Private sector partnership is key to developing a sustainable business model, especially in remote areas that require heavy marketing to attract visitors. In the absence of a clear partnership, the project must be ready to operate the tour, possibly with subsidies from donor funds if tour numbers are low in the beginning. This is not recommended, as it takes resources from other project components and risks failure. Infrastructure built and maintained by the community should be designed in the sturdiest fashion to reduce maintenance costs. In selecting and training village tourism service group members, effort should be made to find responsibilities that allow for gender balance