AHVN Marketing Strategy and Action Plan
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The project is co-funded by the European Union Instrument for Pre-Accession Assistance The AHVN Marketing Strategy & Action Plan Local Network in Montenegro PROJECT: Adriatic Health and Vitality Network Acronym: AHVN AHVN Partner: GREEN HOME, Montenegro Consultant: VB Center d.o.o., Slovenia Podgorica, December 2012 Contents: 1. Introduction ............................................................................................................................ 3 2. Pre-Strategy Workshop – Lessons learned, Conclusions ....................................................... 4 2.1. Modern Trends in Tourism and development of the new type consumer among target group customers ...................................................................................................................... 4 2.2. Regional Best practice overview ..................................................................................... 6 2.3. Development and changes in Montenegro tourism ......................................................... 6 2.4. Compliance with the Montenegro Tourism Development Strategy to 2020 ................... 9 3. Montenegro Healthy Lifestyles – Marketing Strategy ......................................................... 10 3.1. Development of the early initiatives .............................................................................. 10 3.2. Vision ............................................................................................................................. 10 3.3. Creating Strategy – Introduction, Strategic goals .......................................................... 11 3.4. Marketing Strategy – MONTENEGRO HEALTHY LIFESTYLES ............................ 13 3.4.1. INITIATIVE 1: True Tastes & Tales of Montenegro ................................................ 13 3.4.2. INITIATIVE 2: Northern Montenegro – Mountain Trails, Rivers and Inspiration ... 22 3.4.3. INITIATIVE 3: Boka Kotorska Forts from Sea & Land ............................................ 24 3.4.4. INITIATIVE 4: Kitesurfing & more .......................................................................... 28 3.4.5. INITIATIVE 5: Women Handcrafting Traditional Montenegrin Designs ................. 30 3.5. Marketing Strategy – PRICING .................................................................................... 32 3.6. Marketing Strategy – PROMOTION ............................................................................ 32 4. Action Plan of Montenegrin Healthy Lifestyles Network.................................................... 34 5. References ............................................................................................................................ 39 VB Center d.o.o. 2 1. Introduction Multinational project AHVN (Adriatic Health and Vitality Network) aims at building a transnational network of compatible products and services providers, all with the shared philosophy of wellbeing and healthy lifestyle development. The transnational network is going to be a compilation of national networks from all partner states, but the development of each national network is the responsibility of each local partner. Individual networks will differ, depending on the network members, which are going to join the project. On the basis of common criteria, developed and shared between project’s partners, only best suitable providers of products and services, will be included. The present Marketing Strategy is going to be developed for and with an active participation of Montenegro network members. For Strategy to being adopted by its users, it is of vital importance that it is not yet another Strategy “per se”, but it is designed as a direct answer to network members’ needs, plans and desires. Aim of the strategy is to review the initiatives that have begun to build among network members and to develop Marketing Strategy and Action Plan for the initiatives. The integral part of the marketing strategy are going to be the results of the Pre-Strategy Workshop, which has been implemented as a continuation of the closing phase of the Study on the potential of Health Tourism in Montenegro. Pre-Strategy Workshop intended to discuss the open issues, regarding the existing conditions in Montenegro Tourism, as compared to the past and to crystallize the vision of the future development. As well the Pre-Strategy Workshop presented the modern trends in Tourism, the phenomenon of the new type of consumer as well as several best practices, which were used as an inspiration for further development of the Montenegro Network initiatives. Further development will merge the Strategy development with initiative building. We believe, that this approach can produce more effective Marketing Strategy, tailor made to the Montenegro Network’s initiatives. The Strategy itself will present the initiatives developed and define suitable marketing mix for the initiatives. Strategy will be further upgraded with the Action Plan, which will set further actions and schedule their implementation. Action Plan will also set some guidelines for further development of initiatives, which might join/develop within Montenegro Network later on, with respect of the criteria, which will be set from AHVN project partners. At the end we believe, that present Marketing Strategy and Action Plan will be used also as the best practice example for development of similar initiatives in Montenegro and will as such serve as the foundation for the development of the entirely new approach towards the Montenegro tourism. VB Center d.o.o. 3 2. Pre-Strategy Workshop – Lessons learned, Conclusions As a final phase of the Study of the potential of Health Tourism in Montenegro, Pre-Strategy Workshop (or Focus group meeting) was carried out. The invitation has been sent to all interviewees, as well as some additional providers of different products and services. The workshop began with short presentation of all the participants, thus forming foundation for further work and cooperation. The aim of the Focus group meeting was: to present to the participants the modern trends in the tourism industry, to introduce the behaviour of the new type of consumer, which we believe will represent the most important target group for Montenegro Network, to prepare overview of best practices in the wider region, to discuss development and changes in the Montenegro tourism, to define several early initiatives for further work. 2.1. Modern Trends in Tourism and development of the new type consumer among target group customers Modern Trends in tourism have been presented in details in the Study of the Potential of Health Tourism in Montenegro. The most important recognition for AHVN project is the awareness of its network members about the definition or the concept the Health & Vitality Tourism. This definition has to come from the customers/tourists and the role of the network members is to develop an offer which will satisfy the needs and the expectations of the target customer. The proper term for our type of tourism is Wellbeing or Healthy lifestyle tourism. Customers tend to connect this type of tourism with: outdoor recreational activities and “back to nature” attitude, consuming local, healthy food, learning about and enjoying the local culture, accomodation which can be traditional with less comfort or modern, but with the sensibility towards eco and sustainability standards, sensibility towards environment; “wildness” of the nature, purity of the water and air, without pollution. Network members, who have expressed the preparedness to join and further develop Montenegro AHVN Network, already include one or several fields of Wellbeing tourism in their offer. VB Center d.o.o. 4 Simultaneously with the changes in trends we can observe the development of the new demographic segment of consumers, which put the main emphasis on the sustainability. These are so called LOHAS consumers. LOHAS is abbreviation for the Lifestyles of Health and Sustainability. We believe that the majority of our target customers will come from the group of LOHAS consumers. LOHAS consumers are interested for the following products and services (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LOHAS): Organic and locally grown food, Organic and natural personal care products, Hybrid and electric cars as well as city bicycles, Green and sustainable building, Sustainable or Ecotourism, Energy efficient electronics/applicances, Socially responsible investing, Natural household products (paper goods and cleaning products), Complementary, alternative and preventive medicine (Naturopathy, Chinese medicine), Fair trade products, Literature in the Mind/Body/Soul, Holistic Health, and New Age genres. If we compare these definitions with the above mentioned areas of Wellbeing tourism, we can observe that LOHAS’ choice comparing to Wellbeing tourism, widen the set of offers also to other areas of spending. Statistics show, that today LOHAS customers account for approximately 20 % of German market. We can assume, that similar % is valid also for other EU countries, at least the Western part. The market for AHVN products and services is large. But the network members will have to take into consideration also one important aspect of LOHAS customers. They want value for money. Sustainable tourism thus does not mean high-end, exclusivity tourism, but high quality tourism at a reasonable price. Realization of this fact is very important for pricing strategy of our network members. Regarding placing and promotion elements of the marketing mix, we can observe