Tourism Talk: Exploring paradise and new opportunities
Each week we will be featuring our members' 'What’s On' activities and events, as well as focusing on the many beautiful natural tourism products our destination has to offer.
Welcome to the new Southern Explorer ‘Tourism Talk’ feature.
We are thrilled to be working closely with our local print and online media partners, the South Coast Herald, as we lead the way together in marketing the KwaZulu-Natal South Coast.
Each week we will be featuring our members’ ‘What’s On’ activities and events, as well as focusing on the many beautiful natural tourism products our destination has to offer.
Led by the private sector, it is our intention to position the KZN South Coast as the most visited domestic family holiday destination in South Africa, as well as introducing our 120km stretch of coastline as a desirable eco-tourism destination to the global tourism market.
The region boasts 58 beaches with its endless stretches of golden sand, lapped by the warm Indian Ocean.
Included in this are five Blue Flag beaches and a myriad of gorgeous tidal and rock pools for swimming and exploration respectively.
Our intention to put this focus back on what attracts visitors to the South Coast – the beach!
Our core domestic focus will be targeted at the family beach holiday market, where we will be energetically talking to the dwindling traditional visitor base, as well as to the emerging powerful main market.
We will also continue to engage globally with existing international visitors and to expand this global base to new markets.
It is also our intention to expose the destination’s unique selling points to niche target markets, touching on all things linked to the great outdoors, such as the ‘Sardine Run‘, golf, bird watching, surfing, hiking, trails, abseiling, rock climbing, fishing, game drives and hinterland excursions.
We will also continue to identify new tourism products and assist product owners, such as the ‘Kasified Eksperience’, with various collective broad-based marketing platforms from which to work.
With the inevitable shift in the marketplace towards digital, the mechanics of switching our focus to digital platforms remains key and it’s vital that we present the best possible version of the South Coast to our visitors.
The majority of people research destinations on the Internet prior to making a holiday purchase decision and the KZN South Coast has been in desperate need of a website that presents our destination as a ‘must visit’ holiday stay.
We are excited to have gone live with the first phase of the South Coast’s first collective e-commerce destination website, designed by Sitely Web Solutions, and headed by third-generation South Coast local, Josh Defilippi and his team of international designers.
The KZN South Coast has around 90 000 holiday beds and it is our intention, through a focused strategy, to attract a wider tourism base, to increase bed occupancy levels through re-branding and repositioning.
Apart from the area’s sheer natural beauty, we also intend to highlight the fact that visitors can experience a wide range of accommodation at extremely affordable prices.
Then there’s the favorable year-round weather with ‘best on the planet’ winter conditions, with surf temperatures seldom dropping lower than 22 degrees mid-winter.
The world has changed and the geographical position that we sit in is immensely powerful.
It is surrounded by wide open spaces, indigenous forests, a rich coastal belt as well as the extreme beauty of the rolling hinterland hills, all making the KZN South Coast a most desirable holiday destination.
We can’t wait to get the show on the road, and you can also help us by playing your part.
Please visit our Facebook groups and invite your friends and family to join the cause of helping establish a solid tourism base for the beautiful South Coast.
(Vicky Wentzel, Southern Explorer)
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