Honors Theses
Date of Award
2018
Document Type
Undergraduate Thesis
Department
Marketing
First Advisor
Victoria Bush
Relational Format
Dissertation/Thesis
Abstract
The purpose of this thesis is to compare major and minor European cities based on their marketing mixes and creating the best marketing communication strategies for small municipalities. The secondary research completed for this report was done by reviewing dossiers, professional reports, newspaper articles, and scholarly and government websites, on the subject of travel trends and reasons to travel abroad. Next small and large cities were compared based on their price, product, place and promotion, which also included case studies comparing different sized cities from the same country to each other. A SWOT analysis was also conducted on the three smaller cities from the case studies and the target markets for the marketing communication strategies were defined. Primary research was conducted by interviewing and surveying couples who were part of the selected target market. Lastly, there were three marketing campaigns created for three separate cities with two target audiences. Through this research it was found couples want to visit safe locations, the city's character, and beautiful views. American couples were influenced the most by friends and family as well as travel discounts when choosing where to visit. The conclusion from this thesis is American couples prefer the uniqueness of smaller cities, but they also take other factors such as safety and the general feel of the location into consideration when booking a vacation flight. It is important for cities to use this knowledge to their advantage and create a resonating brand image which entices couples to travel there. Hence, three comprehensive marketing communication strategies were developed to aid small cities in accomplishing this goal.
Recommended Citation
Noser, Sarah, "A Comparison of Small and Large European Cities for Tourism: Implications for Strategic Marketing Communications" (2018). Honors Theses. 830.
https://egrove.olemiss.edu/hon_thesis/830
Accessibility Status
Searchable text