Communicating Sustainability

You might be a champion of sustainability and your tourism business might be addressing all sustainability issues – environmental, social and economical, but do customers know it?

Solar powered Koh Mak Seafood Restaurant, Thailand

Communicating sustainability practices is important both for educating the visitors of solutions to problems and for marketing – telling a story to customers can change their experience for the better.

While some might not communicate sustainability at all, others might communicate failing sustainability messages, perhaps  because the sustainability messages are put out as a list of facts without thought to how they might be received.

If you have some great environmental or social initiatives, you should tell people about them, be proud of it and influence others to follow. How can you do that?

• Read Green Hotelier’s Know How Guide on Communicating sustainability to guests
• Watch who, why, what, where, when to tell of your sustainability practices.
• Tourism Destination Sustainability Communications: 7 Common Mistakes to Avoid When Telling Your Stories – See more at: http://www.trainingaid.org/news/tourism-destination-sustainability-communications-7-common-mistakes
• International Tourism Partnership recently conducted a free webinar on Communicating Sustainability that you can listen to.
• Learn from the academic study “Sustainable Marketing of Tourism in Protected Areas: Moving Forward”