Abstract
The government in partnership with the Knock Airport has embarked on a promotion program that aims at improving tourist activities in the region. The program seeks to popularize the area as well as promoting new routes that provide air access to the region. This paper will be looking at the social economic implications on the region as the tourism activities continue to stabilize. What are the main resulting effects of the success of this initiative? The paper also seeks to identify the major roles of this advertisement. Who is the target market? How does the initiative help the market and the region as a whole? This paper will outline the effects of this initiative on the locals in terms of job opportunities. The paper will outline the estimated market size that the initiative seeks to add on its already existing one in terms of targeted population.
Introduction
Recently, the government embarked on a program dubbed ‘Promote Ireland’ to encourage tourism in the country through the ministry of tourism and sports. The government and the industry players acknowledge the role played by marketing. This has driven them to create awareness through the available platforms including the social media. This paper seeks to discuss the importance of regional airports in social and economic expansion in Ireland.
Purpose of this airports market initiative
The campaign is meant to promote tourism in the region (Grace, 2014). This advert is a joint marketing strategy backed by the airport and the tourism ministry. The campaign is geared towards promoting new routes from Glasgow international to Ireland. The participation of the low fares airline has also helped in achieving this goal (Grace, 2014). The initiative is driven by the need to expose tourists’ attraction sites in the region and to enhance access to the beautiful sceneries.
The effects on the intended target segment
The target markets in this advertisement include business people and visiting friends and family, VFR. There is a growing demand for commercial flights in the region and the knock airport is depending on this gap to make the route a success. The campaign is also seeking to promote new air ways provided by the airport through the direct flights from Benelux (Grace, 2014). The market consists of 20 million people and this is a viable niche to guarantee tourism growth in Ireland (Grace, 2014).
Effects on the local community and aviation interest groups
The locals will greatly benefit from this initiative in several ways. First of all, there is an inevitable growth in the rate of employment in the region as a result of tourism activities. In addition, the region will also experience infrastructural growth. The hospitality industry is likely to set up accommodation facilities around the region (Williams & Bråthen, 2012). As tourists visit the country, the cultural setting is likely to experience some changes as cultures from other parts are introduced to the locals. There is possibility of cultural changes as new cultures are introduced by the visitors (Williams & Bråthen, 2012).
Conclusion
This essay has discussed the initiative launched by the Ireland government and the Ireland West Airport to support the tourism industry. The paper has outlined the major target market and the impact of this initiative to the social economic development in the region. The positive and negative implications of this initiative have clearly been discussed in the last paragraph of this essay.
References
Grace, S. (2014). Minister Michael Ring Lends a Hand to Boost Tourism from the Netherlands. Web.
Williams, G., & Bråthen, S. (2012). Air Transport Provision in Remoter Regions. Farnham, UK: Ashgate Publishing