“Whether you define passion as what you would normally associate it with – flamboyance or a strong desire – we don’t see it that way necessarily. Instead, we see it as determination and perseverance to continue what you want to do despite a lot of obstacles.
Singaporeans may not come across as being particularly animated or enthusiastic to most people, but its latest tourism brand campaign ‘Passion Made Possible’ is said to perfectly encapsulate the DNA of the island-nation.
“Whether you define passion as what you would normally associate it with – flamboyance or a strong desire – we don’t see it that way necessarily. Instead, we see it as determination and perseverance to continue what you want to do despite a lot of obstacles.
“That's how we saw ‘passion made possible’ and that’s the kind of ‘passion’ we want to draw out,” explained Oliver Chong, executive director, communications & marketing capability, marketing group, Singapore Tourism Board (STB) at Asean Tourism Forum (ATF) 2018.
The campaign – launched in Singapore and 14 global markets last August and soon, Germany and Australia – makes use of storytelling through personalities and the identification of target segments dubbed “passion tribes”, which include explorers, foodies and action seekers, to share what travellers can be in Singapore.
In addition to the unified brand launch, STB also shared targeted strategies to ramp up arrivals from individual source markets.
To entice more Malaysians back to Singapore, the tourism board plans to focus more on weekends by targeting family travellers.
For Australia, STB will zoom in on key contributing states such as Queensland, New South Wales and Victoria and increase marketing efforts during lull periods. A marketing representative in Melbourne has also been appointed.
In Hong Kong, which saw a 13.8% decline in visitors to Singapore, STB will work more closely with airlines and hotels to make fares more competitive to combat the challenge of LCCs flying direct to destinations like Japan and Taiwan, shared Chong.
As for long-haul destinations, the approach would be to combine Singapore with South-east Asian countries “because we don’t pretend to be the only destination travellers visit after travelling for 24 hours”.