Innovating and improving the quality of tourism promotion

Resolution of the 17th Provincial Party Congress for the term of 2020-2025 determines to focus on developing the tourism industry, striving to become an important economic sector by 2025, and by 2030 to become a spearhead economic sector of the province. To achieve these goals, the province determines that the work of propaganda, promotion and tourism development plays an important role.

The first Chinese tourist delegation to visit Lang Son province in 2023

In the past time, the Party committees, authorities, departments, commissions, sectors and localities have directed to strengthen the work of information, propaganda to raise awareness about tourism development; strengthen promotion, publicity and build a safe and healthy environment for tourism development.

The synchronized participation

Mr. Duong Minh Tue, Deputy Director of the Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism said: In order to exploit and promote the advantages of tourism development in the province, over the past time, we have promoted tourism promotion activities by many measures such as: focusing on market research and development; focusing on supporting tourism businesses in the province to research and approach target tourism markets through participating in tourism promotion events; encouraging businesses to strengthen tourism promotion and advertising, building their brand; connecting travel agencies across the country…

Notably, the propaganda of tourism through cultural events, tourism, fairs, investment promotion conferences has been promoted by the province’s Culture, Sports and Tourism sector. From 2022 up to now, the sector has participated in nearly 100 tourism promotion events, such as: tourism program through the Northern Vietnam heritage region, Ho Chi Minh City Tourism Festival, Vietnam International Travel Mart (VITM) in Hanoi; tourism investment promotion conference in Tuyen Quang; Ky Hoa Festival; Peach Blossom Festival – Lang Son Spring and activities to celebrate the Party, celebrate the Spring …

Along with the participation of specialized agencies at the provincial level, districts and city have also actively implemented many tourism promotion activities. Mrs. Hoang Thuy Ninh, Deputy Head of Culture and Information Division of Lang Son city said: From 2022 up to now, specialized units of the city have coordinated with media agencies to make 10 clips, documentaries and nearly 20 articles promoting tourism; published more than 50 news, articles, photos of tourism events of the city on websites, tourism websites, published more than 10,000 copies of festival brochures and promoted the peach garden experience tour in association with spiritual tourism.

Not only Lang Son city, the districts in the province also actively propagate and promote the local tourism strengths by many diverse forms of propaganda, such as fruit and plant festivals, such as Van Quan star anise; Chi Lang custard apple; Bao Lam persimmon; Seedless persimmon…  In addition, district-level specialized units register products to participate in the list of “Top 100 culinary specialties and souvenirs of Vietnamese culinary organizations” voted by Vietnam Record organization; implemented the project of the program “One commune, one product” of Lang Son province in the period of 2019 – 2020, with a vision to 2030 to develop a variety of specialty products, typical of the province to serve the needs of tourists’ culinary, souvenir, cultural tourism…

Officials of the Provincial Tourism Promotion Information Center give visitors a hat with Lang Son tourism logo printed on it

Modern and diverse media

Along with the participation of all levels, sectors and localities, over the past time, the provincial press agencies as well as the central press agencies residing in the province have contributed significantly to tourism propaganda and promotion. With diverse communication methods, the application of modern media and technology in propaganda has contributed to the innovation of the work of information to tourists.

Specifically, at present, the Provincial Radio and Television Station continues to maintain the “Colorful Border” program to promote Lang Son tourism images on the radio; Lang Son newspaper focuses on exploiting the outstanding advantages of electronic newspapers and social networks to increase the effectiveness of tourism propaganda and promotion.

Ms. Tran Trinh Dieu Hang, Deputy Editor-in-Chief of Lang Son Newspaper said: Over the past time, the Editorial Board has actively directed strong reforms to improve the quality of propaganda in the direction of intensive print journalism, fast electronic newspapers, multimedia, and multi-platforms. Along with that, the department changed news processing processes, improved professional regulations to suit the direction of information must be fast, modern and flexible on different platforms.

In addition to information reflecting sector activities and the province’s tourism development guidelines and orientations, Lang Son Electronic Newspaper has integrated different forms of expression such as audio, video clips, infographics focusing on the use of photojournalism to enrich the news and articles on tourism in Lang Land, especially bold propaganda in the “Tourism” and thematic topics “Lang Son cuisine”, “Beautiful photos of Lang Son”… On average, each year, Lang Son Newspaper publishes from 300-400 news, articles, photos, clips about Lang Son tourism; in which there are from 50 to 100 clips, thematic pages of in-depth propaganda about major tourism events of the province. Thereby the Newpaper contributed to strongly spreading information about the land and people of Lang Son to visitors.

Ms. Nguyen Ngoc Ha, a tourist from Hanoi shared: I have been to Lang Son 3 times. Before I go, I often go to watch travel and food programs on Lang Son Radio and Television Station and Lang Son Electronic Newspaper. The extensive propaganda of tourism by the provincial press agencies makes it very easy for tourists to find information.

In the first 7 months of 2023, the total number of visitors to Lang Son reached over 3.1 million, increased by 14% over the same period in 2022; revenue is estimated at over 2,400 billion VND, increased by 114.8% over the same period.

Party newspaper agencies cooperate to propagate and promote tourism

In the current trend of development and deep integration, single propaganda will not bring high efficiency, but it will need close association and coordination between press agencies.

In mid-August 2023, Lang Son Newspaper participated in the 22th Conference of Party Newspapers in the Northern Midlands and Mountainous Provinces in 2023 with the theme “Linking to propagate and promote tourism development” hosted by Phu Tho Newspaper. Here, leaders of Lang Son Newspaper and leaders of regional newspapers also exchanged and shared experiences in propaganda and linked propaganda to create strength and success to help the province’s tourism develop sustainably. Accordingly, the Party newspaper agencies all agreed on the content of linking in a comprehensive and close manner in such areas as exchanging  content and information about events, travel programs, new destinations and local tourism activities; participating in tourism events, festivals, seminars, exhibitions and tourism promotion programs; cooperation in the production of multimedia content; building a tourism press network to link, exchange and share experiences; linking promote the use of social networking applications to promote tourism…

Mrs. Bui Thi Thu Huong, Deputy Director of Quang Ninh Media Center shared: In order to promote the tourism economy, Quang Ninh province determines that “tourism cannot develop without communication”, so information and propaganda work must be one step ahead to promote and attract domestic and international tourists. To improve propaganda effectiveness, we maintain cooperation in information exchange with many press agencies, especially local party newspapers.

In order for the propaganda on tourism development in the province to be more extensive, widespread and effective, in the coming time, all levels, sectors, and provincial media agencies will continue to promote propaganda in a variety of forms, through which to communicate and promote the image, land and people of Lang Son to domestic and international friends. At the same time, the Culture, Sports and Tourism sector actively cooperates with the provincial and central press agencies residing in the province to promote propaganda about the organization festivals, tourism events, conferences, seminars on tourism, tourism promotion to improve the effectiveness of propaganda on tourism, suitable tourism products, commensurate with the potential and strengths of the province.