Proceedings of The International Conference on Social Sciences in the 21st Century
Year: 2019
DOI: https://www.doi.org/10.33422/ics21.2019.07.375
The Use of Mascots in Marketing Communication to Promote Tourism in Thailand: A Case Study of The Northern Provinces
Suchada Wattanarak and Jantima Kheakao
ABSTRACT:
This study synthesized the researches, on the use of mascots in marketing communications to promote tourism in Thailand, the marketing communication tools that used mascot and reason to use them. The Five studies related to mascot to promote tourism in northern of Thailand published during the year 2014-2018 were retrieved from ThaiJo DB and content analyzed. The findings were as follows:
1. It was found there were 2 marketing communication tools that used mascot to promote tourism in northern Thailand, PR and sale promotion. Mascot found in PR materials such as in posters, animation media and signs backdrop. In sales promotion, mascot was used in activates and souvenir products
2. It was found that there were five importance reasons in using mascot to promote tourism in northern Thailand; 1) to communicate about their respective provinces and localities, 2) to create awareness and recognition to tourists, 3) to create value added to local products and services or provinces, 4) to create destinations’ uniqueness and attract attention to tourists, and 5) creating emotional bonding between tourists and the target destination , respectively
Keywords: mascot, tourism, city, province, northern Thailand.