Tourism in France in a freefall -Interview by Howard Sharman

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TOURISM IN FREE FALL

France is seeing a decline in tourism for the third year running, sparking fears that some companies will fall by the wayside as competition hots up for the crumbs from the shrinking cake. France Review looks at the problems and potential solutions and talks to Paul Herbert, CEO of the Where On Earth Group who, despite all the gloom and doom have seen a 4% increase in enquiries over last year.

Interview by Howard Sharman.

Even before the dramatic events of 9/11 when people stopped travelling any further than the corner shop, France was suffering from a decline in tourism. Since then, the year on year decline in people visiting France on holiday has been on a slippery slope.

High ferry fares, 9/11, over dependence on UK visitors, more people buying holiday homes, cheap package holidays and apathy from the French government to promote France have all contributed to the problem. However, Paul Herbert believes that there are other problems that lay closer to home and more deep rooted reasons that are likely to get worse and compound the situation before we see a positive upturn in travel

Herbert says that the biggest problems we face are that people working in the travel industry don't understand what the real problems are and therefore don't know how to provide the solutions. This applies to the largest companies through to the owners of the holiday homes. The markets have changed, yet everyone seems to just continue doing the same old thing, advertising in the same old places, same old marketing messages and attacking the same old markets in the hope that something is going to happen. He likens it to a child continuing to put their hand in a fire and getting burnt and thinking that the next time it won't hurt.

Herbert is not slow to point the finger at companies and accommodation owners he believes are compounding the problems. He agrees that supply is outstripping demand, that high ferry fares don't help and that the markets have changed but says that happens in any industry, which is why companies invest in product development and marketing. Something he thinks the tourist industry has failed to do and is rolling out the same old product despite the fact that the people who were buying self-catering holidays a decade ago have moved on, can no longer afford holidays in France or died.

Whole markets have disappeared because of economic constraints, low interest rates, stock market levels, pension and mortgage problems and all the advertising in the world is not going to get these people to part with their money. Passive advertising in the press or on the Internet only works when people are looking. If they're not, you're performing to an empty theatre.

Holiday homeowners have to re-invent themselves in order to appeal to new markets, be prepared to work and provide something more than accommodation and aim there marketing at more niche markets. This he says can be financially prohibitive for most holiday homeowners which is why Where On Earth are helping their members to develop consortiums to reduce the fiscal burden.

Above all he believes that people have to be prepared to invest in their marketing. No business can expect to generate high-income levels without investing at least 10% of their expected revenue in their marketing. This, Herbert says is the biggest hurdle the industry faces. There are too many Internet sites offering free or low cost advertising in order to attract advertisers. These Internet sites cannot afford to advertise or invest in the IT structures required to produce the enquiries but they succeed in undermining the financial balance of the industry. We seem to live in a price driven society, where people are tempted by price as opposed to quality. Ultimately, the cheapest option nearly always turns out to be the most expensive. A few hundreds pounds saved on advertising is likely to result in a few thousand lost in revenue.

Herbert advises anyone who is considering advertising on the Internet to check the Alexa ranking of any Internet site before committing themselves to spending money. Alexa will tell you what levels of traffic any Internet site is getting and if the traffic trend is up or down. He advises everyone to compare the traffic levels of any web site with his main company portal to dispel any false claims from companies offering the earth.

In order to stimulate and find new markets, Where on Earth are heading up a consortium to advertise on UK television starting in January 2005. The company is inviting all serious businesses involved in tourism to join in the joint venture. He emphasises the word serious because he believes that any company who is serious about obtaining bookings for their clients has to look at this advertising medium as the only real solution to stemming the decline.

Main portal site: http://www.whereonearthgroup.com
Checking the traffic through web sites: http://www.alexa.com
Advertising consortiums: http://www.whereonearthgroup.com/consortium.php
Advertising on 60+ web sites: http://www.whereonearthgroup.com/advertise.php
UK TV advertising: http://www.scopula.com

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