In full tourist development, Sri Lanka will launch a website dedicated to its promotion on the French market.
Thus, in 2018, the destination welcomed 2,333,976 international tourists. In 2009, they were "only" 447 890. The French market does not escape the trend, from 56 863 tourists in 2012, 106 446 visitors to France in 2018 (+ 7%). "France is the sixth largest issuer market for Sri Lanka," said Chandima Abeyrathna, secretary at the Sri Lankan Embassy in France in charge of trade.
A campaign to 500 000 euros
And the Sri Lankan authorities have even more ambition for France. By the end of the week, the destination will launch an "inspirational" website, totally in French, made by the digital cluster of Interface Tourism. "The micro-site is part of a wider campaign that will last 6 months," said Clara Gomes, in charge of the digital cluster of Interface Tourism. The campaign, which also provides for the launch of French-language pages on social networks, must "give a good visibility" to the destination, before setting up a "conversion campaign" in partnership with several French tour operators.
In total, the destination has invested 500,000 euros for this promotional campaign in France. "It's a colossal amount for an Asian country," said Guillaume Linton, Asia's managing director, who is used to setting up operations with institutional tourism players in Asia. "It's a destination that has become aware of its assets. The country is visited all year long and offers a concentrate of all that Asia can offer, "thinks Guillaume Linton. "Finally, the standard of living on site is almost unbeatable and allows us to mount tourist packages at attractive prices."
For Sri Lanka, the potential for tourism growth is still great, for the French market as for others (MICE, honeymoons, gastronomy, ...). For example, the authorities also want to push the cruise segment. In 2018, 72,500 cruise passengers discovered the island during the 53 stopovers it hosted.
By Florian de Paola in the Echo Touristique