Abstract:

The report is a study done to show that a state government owned entity can also be branded and can be hugely successful in doing so. It also studies various communication strategies undertaken by the Madhya Pradesh to communicates and build a powerful brand. The report also takes a peek at the future of the brand and various strategies that the Madhya Pradesh Tourism is planning to adopt so that the brand is felt at an international level.

A Brand Management Project Report

Brand Management Madhya Pradesh Tourism

Sr. No. Title Page No.

1 Introduction 3

2 Marketing Mix 4

3 Branding Strategy 6

4 Communication Strategy 7

Internal Branding 11

Training and Development 13

Public Private Partnership Program 13

5 Result of the Branding 14

6 Future Endeavour 16

7 Reference 17

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Brand Management Madhya Pradesh Tourism

Introduction

Madhya Pradesh is called the "Heart of India" because of its location in the center of

the country. It has been home to the cultural heritage of Hinduism, Islam, Buddhism, Sikhism

and Jainism. Innumerable monuments, exquisitely carved temples, stupas, forts and palaces

are dotted all over the state. Madhya Pradesh is also known as Tiger State because of the tiger

population. Famous national parks like Kanha, Bandhavgadh, Shivpuri, Sanjay, Pench are

located in Madhya Pradesh. Despite having such a rich variety of tourist spots, Madhya

Pradesh was unable to create any buzz about itself. Before the Madhya Tourism campaign

began, the Madhya Pradesh State Tourism Development Corporation had a very naïve and

simple way of going about promoting their state as a tourist destination. There was no

specific strategy and there was a complete lack of enthusiasm on part of the state government

in promoting its state.

MR. Hari Rajan Rao is considered to be the father of brand of the Madhya Pradesh

Tourism. Under his supervision the Madhya Pradesh State Tourism Development

Corporation created a brand for Madhya Pradesh Tourism. Under his command, MP Tourism

has been able to achieve high brand equity and has been able to do good business.

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Brand Management Madhya Pradesh Tourism

Marketing Mix

Before going on to the actual branding strategy, let’s have the marketing mix of

Madhya Pradesh Tourism.

Product

Madhya Pradesh tourism is a service product by nature and involves tours in the exotic

locales of Madhya Pradesh. There are different kinds of tour products.

Caravan tourism Package – A product which provides tourists with their own caravan

to travel

Eco tourism package – As the name suggests, it is a tour for tourists who love

landscapes and forests

Rural tourism – Involves tours to Amla and Pranpur

Adventure tourism – An interesting tourism concept wherein they invite tourists for

the “Chambal challenge”

Place

Amarkantak, Bandhavgarh, Bhedaghat, Bhimbetka, Bhojpur, Bhopal, Chanderi,

Chitrakoot, Gwalior, Indore, Jabalpur, Kanha, Khajuraho, Maheshwar, Mandu,

Omkareshwar, Orchha, Pachmarhi, Panna, Pench, Sanchi, Shivpuri, Ujjain. These are the

places where th tourism packages are conducted.

Price

Pricing of Madhya Pradesh tourism is competitive in nature. It competes with various

other private organisations such as Mahindra tours and travels as well as others and hence it

has to use competitive pricing.

Promotions

Madhya Pradesh tourism ads are known as one of the best and most creative ads

across India. Each of its TV commercials has been innovative in nature and have attracted a

lot of eyeballs as well as generated curiosity. Besides ATL communications, it also does BTL

promotions through publications as well as sales promotions. The tourism board also has a tie

up with Jet Airways for promotional packages.

Process

Depending on the type of package, the process varies. In case of Caravan tours, the

process would involve loaning caravans to tourists who can than return it in a given amount

of time. Similarly in case of other tours, Guides as well as accommodation is included which

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Brand Management Madhya Pradesh Tourism

completes the whole tour with minimum hassles and maximum enjoyment for the tourist.

Thus the process of Madhya Parades tourism is systematic in nature.

People

The people in Madhya Pradesh tourism consists of Tour operators, Tourist transport

operators, Hotel staff, Tourist guides as well as the main operations staff. Madhya Pradesh

tourism board also has amazing ways of rewarding employees through awards such as

Tourism friendly forester (Whoever maintains forests)

Tourism friendly archaeologist (Taking care of heritage)

Most frequent tourist visiting MP (Encouraging government to take part)

So on and so forth. Thus Madhya Pradesh employs its people flawlessly.

Physical Evidence

Madhya Pradesh tourism has tie ups with the best city hotels, Wildlife sector hotels,

Tourist center hotels, Restaurants and as mentioned the best service people to give the best

experience to the tourists. Madhya Pradesh itself is exotic in nature and the locations such as

Bhopal, Udaigiri and Sanchi are beautiful thus making for excellent physical evidence.

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Brand Management Madhya Pradesh Tourism

Branding Strategy

Given the 8 P’s of the Madhya Pradesh Tourism, the branding strategy seems to be

very consistent and makes the brand comparable to any other private player operating in the

same market segment.

Usually, every place has sufficient good things to attract a tourist which can be shown

in a marketing campaign. The trick to a successful tourism marketing campaign is to string

together all the relevant things to develop a coherent positioning statement. Madhya Pradesh

marketing campaign doesn’t lay much emphasis on the scenic beauty of Panchmarhi,

Dhauladhaar waterfall etc., and focuses on traditional and historic things because that’s what

they have decided to be the projected USP of the state. The brand statement for Madhya

Pradesh is not unique unlike Kerala, which stands for “Exotic” or Gujarat, which stands for

“Religious”. Madhya Pradesh Tourism is not able to define unique brand proposition. This is

because of wide variety of tourist places ranging from forests to old temples to hill station to

tiger reservoirs.

As you can see, the logo itself states that “The heart of Incredible India”, it is a clearly

case of extending brand of the Incredible India campaign. It also leverages the brand equity

that the Incredible India campaign has generated. Although the brand draws heavily from the

original campaign, it sets its self apart from the original campaign by some very innovative

and rather engaging way.

One of the major things that i found while the research was that, the logo and the

brand statement has been used by the tourism board as well as the other vertical of state

government. This helps in communicating an uniform message across all the direct and

indirect communication mediums.

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Brand Management Madhya Pradesh Tourism

Communication Strategy

The first communication strategy says that “Hindustan ka Dil Dekho” and was created

by Ogilvy & Mather advertisement agency. It was launched in April 2006. This campaign

had a theme of Bioscope. The film shows all the tourist spot of in Madhya Pradesh and very

artistically and aesthetically shot. The advertisement received a good response, and helped in

creating a brand equity that Madhya Pradesh Tourism never enjoyed. After the launch of this

advertisement campaign, the perception for Madhya Pradesh Tourism had increased

exponentially. The advertisement was not only path breaking in terms of delivery but was

also able to show its impact in terms of sales.

In late 2009, a refurbished campaign was launched. This time the theme had change to

Eye. Through use of very beautiful eyes a very creative route has been adopted to explain

what had been visited by the tourist and viewed by other. Interestingly, the first ad invited

tourists to come and ‘see’ Madhya Pradesh, while the second ad narrates the tourist’s tale

after he has visited the place. The creative idea for the new ad was, quite literally, taken from

the word ‘sightseeing’.

Fig 1: Hindustan Ka Dil Dekho, the “EYE” campaign

Further this campaign was also extended to radio. Its media partner was My FM

94.3fm. In this activity, the MY FM RJ travelled around all destinations in Madhya Pradesh

and also described the locations, sites, eating joints, handicrafts, people, culture etc. of the

place. The RJ continued his journey as he narrated a brief account of the destinations live on

radio so that listeners can get to hear and visualize the beauty of Madhya Pradesh. The

campaign was also extended to print media. The complete television advertisement was

printed into a strip format and was then promoted through printed media like Hindi magazine

and journals. During the first campaign, the advertisement focused on the inviting the tourist

to Madhya Pradesh. It tried to imbibe Madhya Pradesh as an option while considering various

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Brand Management Madhya Pradesh Tourism

tourist destinations. There was a shift in the second part of the same campaign. The second

phase didn’t invite tourist, but merely show various tourist attractions that are there to be

explored.

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Brand Management Madhya Pradesh Tourism

Fig 2: Hindustan ka dil dekho ad as appeared in the Newspaper.

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Brand Management Madhya Pradesh Tourism

There was again a change in the communication strategy for Madhya Pradesh

Tourism. It was again Ogilvy & Mather that were responsible for the advertising campaign.

This time the campaign stated “MP ajab hai, sabse gajab hai ”. it was introduced in

November,2010. This campaign, the third in a series of hugely popular and successful

campaigns done in the past, is based on the ancient art of shadowgraphy. This art form woven

around an earthy and rustic musical jingle captures some of the unique and surprising facts

about Madhya Pradesh. The new advertisement has been positioned to capture people's

imagination from religion, adventure to history that the state offers.

Madhya Pradesh Tourism also has launched various tour guide books. The guide book

contains detailed information about the place that helps the tourist understand the significance

of the place along with giving information about various tourist places. This helps in

increasing brand recall and hence furthers brand equity. Two new booklets have been

produced by Madhya Pradesh Tourism. The first one is on MICE (Meeting, Incentive,

Conference & Exhibition), the latest trend in tourism. The publication contains valuable

information on the various business facilities, accommodations & other sightseeing options.

It is aimed to target high - end clients from corporate & business world, planning a perfect

business meet coupled with delight, in Madhya Pradesh. Apart from highlighting MPT

properties, due importance have also been given to private hotels of the region.

Fig 3: Cover of the MICE destination guide book

The second in line is a book specially designed for the travel agents to market MPT hotels.

This book contains visuals of the exterior as well as the interior of the properties which will

serve them as a handy tool.

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Brand Management Madhya Pradesh Tourism

Fig 4: Cover of the itineraries guide book

Very recently, Madhya Pradesh Tourism has launched a video log on YouTube. It

consists of all the collection of videos that Madhya Pradesh Tourism has ever marketed. This

creates a unique location for all viewers that seek information about Madhya Pradesh and its

tourist attraction.

In today’s world a website has become most important part of communication

medium for any organisation, and when it comes to tourism industry, the importance of

website increases exponentially due to involvement of foreign citizens. Madhya Pradesh

Tourism has been ahead of the current as far as other states are concerned. It has a

comprehensive website that gives all the necessary information and much more. This website

has helped create a “professional” brand image for Madhya Pradesh Tourism.

Internal Branding

No branding exercise is complete without the stake holders in the brand accepting the brand

as their own and delivering the promises that the brand statement make. Madhya Pradesh

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Brand Management Madhya Pradesh Tourism

Government has shown great intent and commitment in terms of devoting lot of time and

resources in development of basic infrastructure and training the people for delivering the

brand promise. The strategy for achieving the desired objective has been based on the

following :

a) Revitalizing the state tourism development corporation and running the same on

professional lines. All the commercial and non-commercial establishments of the

corporation have been renovated and are now being run professionally. The corporation is

now a profit making entity. The units of the corporation are divided into the following

broad heads.

i. Hotels

ii. Restaurants/Way side amenities

iii. Boat Clubs

iv. Information Counters

v. Sound & Light Shows

vi. Adventure zones

vii. Transport section

viii. Marketing Offices, Regional Offices, Head Office

b) Improving tourist infrastructure – With assistance from the Government of India,

Ministry of Tourism tourist infrastructure is rapidly being improved at almost all

important tourist destinations.

c) Improving connectivity – Over the last few years, roads linking almost all important

tourist destinations have improved. Air connectivity to the state has also improved

considerably with the starting of a number of new flights.

d) Aggressive publicity & promotion – Creative and aggressive publicity and promotional

campaigns in print and electronic media has considerably improved the image of the state.

Regular participation in domestic and international events has also helped.

e) Inviting private investment – Various steps, including creation of a tourism land bank

have been taken to attract private investment for building hotels, resorts and

entertainment centres.

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Brand Management Madhya Pradesh Tourism

Training and Development

In order to hone the skills of Madhya Pradesh Tourism's staff, Madhya Pradesh Institute of

Hospitality Training (MPIHT), organized a series of training in various segments of

hospitality. A staff training programme was held in Hotel Payal, Khajuraho on the 2nd & 7th

of May, 2011, followed by another training session organized in collaboration with the

Institute of Hotel Management, Gwalior and Indira Gandhi National Open University,

Bhopal. The essentials of hotel industry like, food & beverage, housekeeping, front office

management etc. were included in the training.

Public-Private Partnership (PPP) Program

PPPs enable the public sector to benefit from commercial dynamism, the ability to raise

finances in an environment of budgetary restrictions, innovation and efficiencies, harnessed

through the introduction of private sector investors who contribute their own capital, skills

and experience. This program will help government specifically achieve high serviceability

despite having severe resource constraints. The latest guidelines are expected to set the stage

for rapid development of tourism infrastructure by attracting private investment.

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Brand Management Madhya Pradesh Tourism

Result of the Branding

Union Tourism Ministry statistics have recorded colossal growth in the number of

domestic tourist arrivals in Madhya Pradesh, a scenario virtually unthinkable barely a few

years ago. Moving up four notches from the number nine position in 2007, Madhya Pradesh

is now ranked fifth as a destination of choice amongst domestic tourists. With the 2008

figures, a 100 per cent improvement on the 1.10 crore tourist footfalls recorded in 2006, the

state now enjoys a 3.9 per cent market share in the country’s domestic tourism segment.

Fig 5: Madhya Pradesh Tourism’s Tourist Statistics.

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Brand Management Madhya Pradesh Tourism

Fig 6: Graph showing the trend in tourist arrival in Madhya Pradesh

More recently, Madhya Pradesh State Tourism Development Corporation has bagged

three awards in different categories i.e. Best State in the Country, Best Civic Management of

a Tourist Destination in India and in the category of Innovative/Unique Tourism Project in

the country. The award was given at a function of National Tourism Award 2009-10

organised by Ministry of Tourism Government of India. Its Caravan Tourism has been

appreciated across all the section of tourist market and has won “Most innovative Tour

Product” given by GMR Express Travel World Awards. These awards are the fact that the

communication strategy is not only successful in terms of achieving sales but is also

acclaimed by an external entity.

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Brand Management Madhya Pradesh Tourism

Future Endeavours

Madhya Pradesh Government has announced various new incentives in state to promote

tourism as a whole and bring about fundamental improvement in service delivery so that the

brand equity of Madhya Pradesh Tourism can be further strengthen. New set of incentives

include luxury and entertainment tax rebates and exemption for hotels, B&B units and

heritage properties. MPSTDC is also offering lands on long lease at various tourist locations

apart from concession on energy, exemption on registration and stamp duty fees and also to

tourist vehicles on designated routes. The policy also proposes promotion of ecotourism,

adventure tourism and water-based tourism across its large number of water bodies through

private-sector investment and attractive support from state tourism department. Promotion of

sustainable tourism practices, skill development and training for youth etc. are some of the

other areas the new tourism policy lays guidelines on.

Also as one of its kind initiatives in the country, Madhya Pradesh has taken initiative

to form district tourism promotion council to work for tourism development in the area.

Chambal Tourism Promotion Council (CTPC), formed by the Bhind district administration, is

working towards developing tourism and essential infrastructure in the Bhind district. The

Chambal river and its rich marine life and the famous ravines in the region is a great tourism

resource that is waiting to be exploited.

State Government is also working on improvement of air connectivity within and

outside the State through private sector. This is especially significant in case of foreign

tourist that visit India. Because currently there are far fewer flights connecting Madhya

Pradesh’s major cities to other major cities in India, Madhya Pradesh is losing large

customers. Also because of lack of air connectivity, the brand identity created by an

extraordinary marketing campaign is at peril.

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Brand Management Madhya Pradesh Tourism

References

1. http://khojkhabarnews.com/?p=7827

2. http://www.afaqs.com/news/company_briefs/index.html?

id=42736_My+FM+presents+Hindustan+ka+Dil+Dekho

3. http://cuttingthechai.wordpress.com/page/29/

4. http://www.hindustantimes.com/Brand-India/Article1-713809.aspx

5. http://www.hindustantimes.com/StoryPage/Print/713809.aspx

6. http://books.google.co.in/books?

id=ZAcf8BGvx5wC&pg=PA243&lpg=PA243&dq=about+bioscope,madhya+pradesh

+tourism+campaign&source=bl&ots=msD9Pc2Nr9&sig=u74pMo9jPWO40Kfmx83p

W3GJh6A&hl=en&ei=-

FdaTtHhK4eGrAej6PjWCg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=3&ved=0C

CwQ6AEwAg#v=onepage&q&f=false

7. http://www.mptourism.com/web/experience.aspx

8. http://www.mptourism.com/web/pk/Tours_Itineraries.asp

9. http://www.indianmuslimobserver.com/2011/03/madhya-pradesh-state-tourism.html

10. http://www.mptourism.com/web/pk/files/booklet%2011-12%20(orcchha%20matter)

% 20artwork.pdf

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