Recognising that media consumption habits have changed and that people have also changed the way they plan and book their travel, the Singapore Tourism Board has launched a new brand, YourSingapore.
At the heart of the new service is a website that will allow people to personalise their experiences, post and share reviews and transact through a metasearch interface, among other things.
The STB says YourSingapore will allow travellers to conceptualise and plan their individual Singapore travel itinerary.
It also facilitates sharing of experiences among travellers and local residents alike, and will be powered by up-to-date multimedia content.
The new website, developed by XM Asia, roped in three partners: content partner ACP, publishers of Where and IS magazines; maps by WhereTo.sg; and metasearch interface from Wego.
The STB says it would make significant investments into search engine marketing to drive traffic to the new website which will also feature mobile, social media and blogging platforms.
It will also develop a new CRM system to ensure it can engage with customers effectively.
While it says it will not ignore traditional media channels – it has developed two television commercials and will also work on outdoor advertising creatives – clearly the marketing spend will mark a shift from traditional media such as print.
With this new digital thrust, the STB hopes to differentiate itself from other tourism boards in the way it communicates with customers and empowers them to customise their travel experiences. In other words “personalize your visit around what you love to do at pace you love to do it”.
It recognizes that media consumption has changed from passive to active, influencers of travel decisions have changed and that the Internet has become a major planning and research tool for travellers.
Indeed, STB’s own research shows that 53% of visitor arrivals to Singapore say that the Internet is their most important source of pre-arrival information.
The website will be available in English, Chinese, Bahasa Indonesian, Vietnamese, Korean and Japanese.
In many ways, Singapore is the perfect place to take on such a digital approach. It is small and compact and its density of experiences within a small area, as well as its ease of use, make it ideal for the Free and Independent Travellers which make up more than 60% of visitor arrivals.
Ms Aw Kah Peng, chief executive of the STB, says:
“In the past few years, the way that people plan and book travel has fundamentally shifted from passive content consumption to the active engagement of empowered individuals, primarily due to the dominance of digital and social media.
“Video on demand, online news, blogs, websites that enable social interaction have dramatically changed the way that travellers seek and obtain information. YourSingapore is a response to the pervasive influence of digital media and the rise of virtual communities, as well as consumer demands for personalised travel plans.”
Ken Low, assistant chief executive of the STB’s Marketing Group, says that to differentiate Singapore in the crowded market for destination marketing, STB had to embrace global trends and the shift in media consumption, “to the extent that we have put digital at the heart of our marketing communications, in order to transform the way we reach out to our potential visitors”.
“We will continue to use traditional media in our communications but it will play a more specific role to emotionally engage our audience and drive potential visitors to our digital platforms where they can experience and have a glimpse into what Singapore has to offer.”
The new brand, unveiled at the Tourism Industry Conference on March 5, is fresh and bold, and features eight overlapping squares, representing the concentration of experiences, which can take on different forms of expressions depending on what is being communicated.
As with any idea though, the challenge is in the execution. As well as driving traffic to the website, the STB has to ensure a depth of content that’s relevant and compelling to users. It says it is open to other partnerships and would like to see more video content for example.
On the push side, it has to ensure its industry partners are ready to take the digital leap. While the major players like airlines and hotel chains are more than ready, smaller players like tour operators, tour guides and tourist attractions may not be as prepared.
To encourage them to go digital, the STB also announced the S$5 million iDigital scheme which will fund up to 50% of qualifying costs. It promises it will be easier to access than the $10 million Tourism Technology Fund.
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About Siew Hoon Yeoh
I was in Singapore for the launch of their previous ‘Uniquely Singapore’ brand around 5 years back and remember most of us were a tad underwhelmed. It felt very ‘me too’.
This conversely looks genuinely groundbreaking and smart too. Would love to know what it cost. It can’t have been cheap. First glance and I’m genuinely impressed… wonder if it will be problematic on slower connections though? It’s quite a heavy site – lots of elements.
@jeremy – i agree entirely.
There’s a lot in this but one also wonders whether there’s also whizziness for the sake of it.
A few months in will determine whether the interaction and engagement will have worked.
Interesting to see that a Destination Tourism Office would use a travel meta search engine like Wego.com for hotel and flight bookings. I guess a meta search engine is a logical solution for Gov Tourism sites as they are in theory non bias to travel suppliers.
Great to see a Gov Tourism Organization being so innovative
Congratulations to the STB for taking a bold step in the right direction by moving the web to the core of their marketing activities and not consider it just another underfunded tool competing for funding in the traditional marketing mix. That is no longer the strategy for success in the second decade of the 21st Century.
The web, and increasingly the social web, is where – as their research shows – a large number of their customers already are and where they have to be engaging with them in a smart way. This, at first glance, is what they attempt to do. What is also necessary by now is to offer potential visitors an easy way to book their trip right when they are motivated to do so on a DMO site.
Now, if only they had named the site “MySingapore”, it would have been perfect for ME as an aspiring visitor to the city state.
Seem to be alot of investment into social media or even the social web altogether. I wonder how will they actually measure the success of this campaign. Any idea?