Recorded Webinar - International Travel & Tourism Markets: Traditional vs. BRIC

On May 30, 2013, the U.S. Department of Commerce's Office of Travel and Tourism Industries (OTTI) and the Global Travel and Tourism Team, along with Travel Market Insights, shared a new way to look at using research data to make marketing decisions. Brand USA completed the picture by providing an update on key international markets and their work in those markets.

The UNWTO projects that emerging markets will grow faster than traditional overseas markets. What does this mean for the United States and your destination or business? In the United States, the top four traditional markets (Japan, United Kingdom, Germany and France) have long dominated the arrivals market. In 1996, the market share of these four countries for all overseas countries was more than 50%. Where is it now? That same year, the BRICs (Brazil, Russia, India & China) represented less than 6% of all arrivals. How has this changed since then?

The strong growth from the emerging markets has forced many travel and tourism businesses to look more closely at their international marketing efforts. On the one hand, everyone is talking about the emerging markets. At the same time, many U.S. destinations and businesses have made years' worth of investment in the top traditional visitor markets. This webinar, "Traditional vs. BRIC," took a unique look at how four emerging markets stack up against four traditional markets for overseas visitor arrivals to the United States.

During the webinar, Office of Travel & Tourism Industries' data on arrivals, spending, port-of-entry, visitation and other key traveler characteristics were utilized to provide a different way for destinations and travel businesses to determine what markets are the best match for them. In addition, by using traveler characteristics data, targeted promotional plans may be developed to focus upon the strengths of these markets.

If you ask this question, "On what markets should I be focused in the next five years?", and missed this webinar in its live presentation, here's a great opportunity for you to glean the information that was provided by three presenters:

Ron Erdmann, Research Director, Office of Travel & Tourism Industries. Mr. Erdmann has been in the research and analysis space for more than 30 years, providing market intelligence and planning assistance to travel and tourism industry organizations that aids them in attaining international marketing success.

Scott C. Johnson, Principal, Travel Market Insights. Mr. Johnson has been working with travel industry clients for 23 years to assist them in using the OTTI data for market decision making and approaches.

Michael Carroll, Vice President of Marketing for Brand USA. Mr. Carroll has significant expertise in branding and marketing, and provided specifics about how the travel and tourism industry's efforts can drive international visitation from these markets.