Mexico Tourism Board: Big data, digital and personalization critical to reach travelers, drive growth

The Mexico Tourism Board announced today the results of a large tourism industry planning summit held in the coastal paradise Campeche, part of the Yucatan peninsula.

The summit, with a theme of Co-Creating the New Era of Mexico Tourism, focused on developing new research, digital and technology platforms as well as personalized marketing efforts to fuel tourism product development, diversification and overall industry growth globally.

Hosted by Tourism Minister Enrique de la Madrid and Mexico Tourism Board CEO Lourdes Berho, the meeting welcomed more than 200 tourism industry professionals from the Ministry of Tourism, Mexico Tourism Board global headquarters and international offices, and representatives from more than 40 of Mexico’s tourism destinations across Mexico.

In 2015, Mexico became the 9th most visited country in the world having received more than 32 million international travelers with growth of more than 9% — more than double the global industry average. With a new strategic plan focusing on leveraging global qualitative and quantitative mega trends, insights from custom behavioral studies from key markets from around the world; the Mexico Tourism industry has charted a path towards sustained high growth by reaching visitors through genuine engagement and personalized promotional efforts especially. Through August of 2016, Mexico’s growth continues at more than 8% versus 2015.

“To reach today’s travelers, you have to understand what drives them from consideration to planning and finally boarding the plane to visit,” states Lourdes Berho. “It’s critical to lead them to buying by engaging them in a genuine way through the content they interact with – which we are seeing is going more mobile. By understanding what they need, we can then communicate what they want in a more direct and genuine way through an easy to reach vehicle they use on a daily basis.”

The Mexico Tourism Board plans to continue to go beyond sun and beach and also leverage Mexico’s rich historical, cultural, gastronomic and mega-biodiversity products to diversify the tourism offering for today’s savvy traveler seeking multiple experiences during a visit.

Connectivity and industry partnerships have also been expanded, with many new, direct routes to Mexico launched in late 2016 and to come in 2017. This all will help in achieving the new ambitious goal of reaching 50 million international visitors by 2021.

“We have charted a new strategic vision for Mexico that includes closer collaboration between the industry, private sector, strategic partners, and one that will allow us to deliver both tourism product and experience innovations as well as a modern and personalized approach to our marketing and promotional campaigns,” added Berho.

A rich agenda consisted of panel discussions, innovative marketing presentations and group workshops. Outside speakers included senior strategists from international marketing and business innovation consultancies as well was Facebook/Instagram, Twitter, Spotify, and Google. New, independent international research was also unveiled looking closely at travelers, marketplace segments and trends across key markets including the U.S, Canada, UK, France, Italy, Germany and Spain, in order to uncover new opportunities in the marketplace.

During the three-day summit, panelists from around the globe and industry delivered inspirational ideas and recommendations and all attendees participated in several small group workshops with in-depth discussions around strategies for specific international markets and audiences, developing tourism product and experience offerings, working more closely across Mexico’s destinations, as well as how to integrate new technology, platforms, and marketing techniques into all existing efforts.

The outcomes from the summit are being put into effect immediately and will be felt across the industry in 2017 as part of a long-term, strategic plan to grow Mexico’s Tourism industry