BNR

Crisis PR or how to save the season

In the recent days the Ministry of Tourism has reported the results from the campaign of Bulgaria's promotion as a tourist destination that closed in December 2014. Financing for the campaign has been provided through European funds and come to approximately 3.5 million euro. No one however has made any comments so far about the effectiveness of this campaign. Hopefully it has served to make Bulgaria more recognizable and may result in attracting more tourists from West Europe thus offsetting the alarming decline in visitors from Russia and Ukraine.

Crisis PR is the term that officials from the Ministry used to describe the promotional campaign in Russia and Ukraine during 2014, a year of hardships for the sector. According to statistics the decline of holidaymakers from those countries has come to 3.7 and 8.7 percent respectively. Suffices to say that these are priority markets for Bulgarian tourism relying heavily on Russian-speaking tourists that often choose the country's seaside resorts.

Press conferences with Bulgarian celebrities and historians telling exciting stories about the this country's millennial heritage, TV shows and promo videos, billboards about Bulgaria in Moscow and Saint Petersburg, articles in dozens of websites and a series of information tours for Russian and Ukrainian journalists in this country were aimed to keep intact Bulgaria's share on those markets. Promotional campaigns have also been held in Germany, Romania, Poland and Sweden with the idea to make up for falling numbers of Russian and Ukrainian holidaymakers. It is assumed that messages about Bulgaria have reached about 60 million viewers in Europe. The idea was to accentuate heritage that according to the latest poll of the Ministry, has the greatest potential to impress foreigners.

It is a different matter however whether the slogans used in foreign media are original and impressive enough. They go like this: One Destination for All Seasons and Amazing, Impressive, Hospitable or Come to Know Different Cultures and Stories. In this way we are not likely to change Bulgaria's image of a cheap seaside destination and to attract well-off holidaymakers with diverse interests to whom this country has a lot of offer. According to the Ministry however the promotional campaign abroad should not be measured with the growth in the number of tourists. „We have tried to create a positive attitude to us abroad, enhance knowledge about Bulgaria as a place for holidays”, explained Anelia Genova, project manager.

The problem is that forecasts for the summer of 2015 are somewhat cloudy, and not only for Russian-speaking tourists. Recently, Minister of Tourism Nikolina Angelkova met with officials from some of the foremost tour operators in the world, Thomas Cook and Neckermann who said they expected a difficult summer season for Bulgaria. Now hopes are pinned on the less fussy and not at all affluent Bulgarian tourists who love the Bulgarian Black Sea coast and seem ready to tolerate noise, disorder, overbuilt resorts and inflated prices. The problem is that over the recent years, Bulgarian tourists have increasingly turned to holidays in Turkish and Greece who keep up aggressive advertising and value for money. Well, the Ministry does have a plan on how to reclaim Bulgarian tourists. It has resorted to crisis management. A national advertising campaign has been developed to urge Bulgarians to visit fifty little known tourist sites. In this way curious Bulgarians will enrich their knowledge, support local economy and offset the decline in foreign tourists threatening the summer season.