The City of Cape Town has launched it's domestic tourism campaign, which aims to support and assist the tourism industry this festive season. Mayor Geordin Hill-Lewis says: "Our launch event today is testament to the quick-thinking creativity of our tourism teams, and is testament to our City's commitment to doing what we can to help the tens of thousands of Capetonians who work in tourism to thrive in this difficult time."
‘We turned this campaign on in a week to send out a clear message to every South African and Capetonian: Don’t let travel bans ruin your travel plans - come to Cape Town! We are waiting to welcome you with open arms, and can’t wait for you to safely experience the best our city has to offer,’ said Hill-Lewis.
The City's team worked to put together a collection of offers and packages to attract more South African to visit Cape Town this season and to encourage Capetonians to be tourists in their city. "Our launch includes many discounts to flights, accommodation and attractions around Cape Town, and we are relaunching the Pocket-Friendly Campaign to give visitors lots of options. The tourism industry needs every ounce of support this summer peak season and we’re looking forward to welcoming back tourists to visit beautiful Cape Town."
"When the bad news hit, we used that verb that became the global word of 2020: pivot. Our team has worked quickly to pivot our summer message to a domestic audience, and I am pleased to be here today to launch their work. I have spoken about the need for Cape Town to be creative, innovative and nimble-footed and today is one important example of how we are starting to show that in practice," say Hill-Lewis.
The Pocket-Friendly Campaign
The Pocket-Friendly Challenge is part of the overall campaign and helps promote and explain the initiative in is a series of six video episodes where multi-cultural teams are given R150 per person to explore the neighbourhoods of Langa, Athlone, Kalk Bay, Sea Point, Kirstenbosch and Blouberg. Each neighbourhood is highlighted by a video, a route map, that can be downloaded, and a website feature.
"Cape Town Tourism has decided to relaunch the Pocket-Friendly Campaign with Travelstart that runs until 28 February 2022, and will help counteract the abrupt international cancellations over the last two weeks. This will be done by offering our domestic travellers great discounts and lower fares to Cape Town through subsidies and vouchers across hotels, flights and experiences. This campaign will benefit the sector from SMME businesses such as independent local attractions, guest houses, and B&B accommodation all the way to larger hotel chains that all need assistance over these challenging times," Mayor Hill-Lewis.
Alderman James Vos, Mayoral Committee Member for Economic Growth highlighted a recent domestic survey by CTT, which indicated that the majority of South Africans have a strong appetite for vacationing over the festive period. "Local travellers have always been a pillar of strength for our industry and to ease the financial pressure, we are really amplifying CTT’s Pocket-Friendly Campaign this year with these new offers and partnerships.
"At the same time, we are keenly focused on conversion, which is about turning potential travellers into actual bookings. CTT and the City is working closely with small businesses and communities to get them ready for visitors. For example, CTT has hosted several eKasi Tourism Development workshops and recently rolled out a Neighbourhood Experience Development practical training manual.
"We have created the TravelWise initiative, which provides visitors with information on health and safety and ready access to an emergency operator through the Namola app. Travelwise was instrumental in helping myself and provincial officials in assisting international travellers stranded by the latest travel bans. Let’s continue to give travellers the best, most affordable and safest experience possible," says Vos.
"Based on domestic research, the primary barrier to Cape Town as a domestic leisure destination is the perception of cost versus value. To this end, the initiative is focused on our domestic marketing by promoting the diversity of our neighbourhood experiences. When domestic travel opened mid-August in 2020, we partnered with Travelstart to add a conversion element to the campaign, where we offered highly discounted flights to drive demand in flight bookings.
"This campaign was extremely successful. Cape Town International Airport domestic arrivals to Cape Town between August and December 2020 increased by 34% in four months to reach 50% of 2019 levels. We achieved a return on investment 74:1 when comparing visitor spend to campaign spend," said Enver Duminy, Cape Town Tourism CEO.
The Pocket-Friendly Campaign offers discounts in flights, hotels and highlights activities. With a Love Cape Town discount code found on www.travelstart.co.za, domestic and local travellers can get up to R300 off bookings through Travelstart, Safarinow and Club Travel across flights, accommodation and experiences. Or can find deals discounted up to online.
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