Digital Marketing: BTB Hosts Conference for Online Advertisers

The marketplace of the future inarguably has its origin in social media.  In fact, many businesses are presently striving to reach new customers and maintain existing ones by interacting with them online. The tourism industry is no different, as every property promises a different experience for the visitor. The Belize Tourism Board, is hosting a Digital Marketing Summit bringing together tourism professionals from around Belize and matching them with top marketers and designers in social media, digital content creation, travel trade and tourism marketing from the region and the world.  Belize has had some experiments with social media marketing, such as the Steve Harvey/Miss Universe incident, the Breaking Bad “Send you to Belize” episode; and the N.F.L. kicking controversy in which national team footballer Ian Gaynair used a soccer ball on Yabra Field to mock the misfiring professionals. They have had varying degrees of success, but according to Maynor Larrieu of the Belize Tourism Board, their primary accomplishment is putting Belize on the map.

Maynor Larrieu, Belize Tourism Board

Maynor Larrieu

“Actually just getting the name out there is a great value if you comparing putting paid advertisement to get the name out there. Actually you mentioned a couple of the great quick wins that we had last year; Steve Harvey being one of the biggest which we are still talking to him to see if he would and could make it to Belize in the near future. But just getting the name out Belize as a primary destination in the minds of many travelers is very important. And one of the things we have leveraged also is that doing it that way it cost us little in comparison to putting a TV commercial. And we also want to inspire the stakeholders to take that initiative to not be afraid to step out of the box. And like you mentioned some of them of work, some of them don’t work but you can’t be afraid to try new things.”