By Kathleen Cassedy

Introduction: Marketing Strategies In A Changing Environment

Since September 11, travel marketers have had to face the fact that
"business as normal" has forever changed. And it has changed dramatically.
However, the acts of terrorism in the homeland only sped up transitions that
were already underway. The consumer is changing. Marketing is changing. And
travel and tourism products and services are changing. And these are rapid
changes. Peter Yesawich of Yesawich, Pepperdine & Brown calls it the "new
normal."

Those several hundred travel industry marketers, who attended the ATME
2002 Travel Marketing Conference, held at Baltimore’s Sheraton Inner Harbor,
heard from more than seven speakers who shared their crisis management
planning, following the total shutdown of air travel in the United States,
and the immense fears and reluctance of consumers to travel again. Certainly,
Americans have shown their resilience as travel patterns have begun to come
back and sometimes surpass 2001 visitor levels, but at the same time,
marketers have had to create the "deals of a decade" to entice these
reluctant travelers to hit the road, seas, and skies.

The federal government says there will be more terrorist attacks, and
have designed a color-code system of warnings. Will the travel industry be
able to absorb another shock? Will Americans be able to cope with terrorism
that other societies, including Europe, have done? Will travel and vacations
continue under extraordinary times?

While these may not have been the exact questions addressed during the
conference, the lessons learned from the case studies presented can help
shape a marketers crisis management framework developed in advance of any
crisis.

Keynote speaker Donald E. Schultz urged marketers to acquire a managerial
perspective, and to determine the financial values of their organizations’
most valuable assets: their brands. Other speakers spoke about how they
created successful rebranding throughout their organizations, and an
interesting case study was presented about the "refreshing" of the
32-year-old brand mark and tagline, "Virginia is for Lovers."

While the challenges have been many this past year, travel remains a
necessary and, in many cases, pleasurable experience. The world has become
more global, and that means people will want to travel more.