🌎 Putting It All Together: Segmentation for a Destination
You've studied the theory demographic, geographic, psychographic, behavioural segmentation, customer value and more. Now it's time to see how all of that works in the real world, applied to an actual destination. This is exactly what the iGCSE examiner wants you to do: take your knowledge and use it to explain real situations.
A destination in tourism means any place that tourists travel to a city, a country, a resort, a national park, or even a theme park. Every destination has multiple types of visitors and smart destination managers use segmentation to attract the right visitors at the right time.
Key Definitions:
- Destination Marketing Organisation (DMO): A body responsible for promoting a destination to tourists. Examples include VisitBritain, Tourism Australia and the Dubai Tourism Board.
- Target market: The specific group of consumers a business or DMO focuses its marketing efforts on.
- Positioning: How a destination presents itself to appeal to a particular segment e.g. "luxury", "adventure", "family-friendly".
- Visitor mix: The combination of different tourist segments that visit a destination.
💡 Why Does a Destination Need to Segment?
A destination can't be everything to everyone. A beach resort that tries to attract party tourists AND quiet family holidaymakers at the same time will struggle those two groups want very different things. Segmentation helps destinations focus their message, develop the right products and avoid attracting visitors who damage the experience for others.
🇬🇧 Case Study: Barcelona as a Destination
Barcelona is one of Europe's most visited cities, welcoming over 15 million tourists per year. It is a brilliant example of a destination that targets multiple segments but has also had to rethink its strategy due to overtourism. Let's break down how Barcelona segments and targets its visitors.
📍 Who Visits Barcelona?
Barcelona attracts an enormous range of visitor types. Each segment is drawn to the city for different reasons and the city's tourism board Turisme de Barcelona uses different marketing messages and products to reach each one.
💼 Business Travellers
Barcelona is a major conference and events city. The Mobile World Congress alone brings over 100,000 delegates. Business travellers stay longer, spend more and use premium hotels and restaurants.
🌞 Leisure Tourists
Families, couples and groups come for beaches, Gaudí architecture, food and culture. This is the largest segment by volume and includes both budget and premium visitors.
🎉 Young Party Tourists
Barcelona's nightlife and low-cost flight connections attract large numbers of young tourists, particularly from the UK. This segment has caused significant tension with local residents.
📊 Segmentation in Action: How Barcelona Targets Each Group
Turisme de Barcelona doesn't just wait for tourists to arrive it actively targets specific segments using tailored campaigns, products and pricing strategies.
🏭 Cultural and Heritage Segment
Barcelona promotes its UNESCO World Heritage sites particularly the work of Antoni Gaudí, including the Sagrada Família and Park Güell to culturally motivated tourists. These visitors tend to be older (35–65), higher income and spend more per day. Marketing is placed in cultural magazines, travel supplements and through partnerships with airlines like Iberia and British Airways.
🍽 Food and Lifestyle Segment
Barcelona is marketed as a world-class food destination, with La Boqueria market and Michelin-starred restaurants. This targets psychographic segments food lovers and lifestyle travellers who are willing to pay premium prices for authentic experiences. Social media, food blogs and influencer marketing are key channels for this group.
📚 Case Study Focus: Barcelona's Cruise Tourism Problem
Barcelona is the busiest cruise port in Europe, receiving over 3 million cruise passengers per year. However, cruise tourists typically spend very little in the city they eat and sleep on the ship and only visit for a few hours. This means they contribute to congestion and environmental damage but generate relatively low economic value. Barcelona has begun to de-market cruise tourism and instead target higher-spending overnight visitors. This is a real example of a destination choosing quality over quantity in its targeting strategy.
🔎 Repositioning: When a Destination Changes Its Target Market
Sometimes a destination decides to change which segments it targets this is called repositioning. It usually happens when a destination has a problem: too many low-spending tourists, a damaged reputation, or overtourism in certain areas.
🇬🇧 Case Study: Blackpool Repositioning a Seaside Resort
Blackpool was once the UK's most popular domestic holiday destination, attracting working-class families from the North of England. As cheap package holidays to Spain became available in the 1970s and 80s, Blackpool lost its core market. The town then became associated with stag and hen parties, budget tourism and a declining image.
In recent years, Blackpool has actively tried to reposition itself by targeting new segments:
- Families through investment in Blackpool Pleasure Beach and new attractions
- Cultural tourists through the Blackpool Illuminations, which now attract 3–4 million visitors per autumn
- Conference and events visitors Blackpool's Winter Gardens hosts major political party conferences
- Short-break domestic tourists marketed as an affordable UK break for families post-pandemic
This shows how a destination can use segmentation not just to attract tourists, but to change the type of tourist it attracts shifting from low-value to higher-value segments.
📈 What Blackpool Gained
By targeting families and cultural tourists, Blackpool increased visitor spending, improved its image and reduced anti-social behaviour associated with the stag/hen party segment. The Illuminations alone generate an estimated £80 million for the local economy each year.
📋 What This Teaches Us
Repositioning is not easy or quick. It requires investment in new products, consistent marketing and time. A destination cannot simply announce it is targeting a new segment it must deliver the experience that segment expects.
🌍 Targeting Different Segments at Different Times: Seasonality
One of the most powerful tools a destination has is targeting different segments in different seasons. This helps to spread visitor numbers throughout the year and reduce the problems of peak-season overtourism.
📅 Case Study: The Scottish Highlands Seasonal Targeting
The Scottish Highlands face a classic tourism challenge: huge visitor numbers in summer (June–August) and very few visitors in winter. VisitScotland has developed a segmentation strategy to tackle this.
☀️ Summer Segment
Families and international tourists (especially from the USA, Germany and Australia) visit for scenery, castles and the North Coast 500 driving route. This is the peak season high volume, competitive pricing.
🍂 Autumn Segment
Older, higher-income travellers and photographers visit for the autumn colours and red deer rutting season. VisitScotland actively markets "autumn breaks" to this segment through specialist travel media.
❄️ Winter Segment
Ski tourists visit Cairngorm Mountain Resort. Wildlife enthusiasts come for red squirrels and golden eagles. New Year (Hogmanay) attracts domestic and international visitors to Edinburgh and beyond.
By targeting different segments in different seasons, VisitScotland helps local businesses stay open year-round and reduces pressure on the environment during peak summer months. This is a clear example of segmentation being used as a management tool, not just a marketing tool.
👥 Building a Visitor Profile for a Destination
When a DMO plans its targeting strategy, it creates detailed visitor profiles descriptions of the ideal tourist for each segment. These profiles combine demographic, geographic, psychographic and behavioural data.
👥 Example Visitor Profiles: Dubai
Dubai Tourism targets several distinct segments with very different profiles:
- Luxury traveller: Age 35–55, high income (ABC1), international (UK, Russia, India, China), motivated by status and exclusivity, stays in 5-star hotels, high spend per day (£500+)
- Family segment: Age 30–45 parents, middle to high income, attracted by theme parks (IMG Worlds, Legoland Dubai), beach resorts and safety. Typically from Europe and South Asia.
- Shopping tourist: Motivated by Dubai's tax-free retail, particularly from South Asia and the Middle East. Often combines shopping with leisure. High retail spend but may use budget accommodation.
- MICE traveller (Meetings, Incentives, Conferences, Exhibitions): Business-motivated, high daily spend, uses premium hotels and venues. Dubai actively competes with Singapore and Hong Kong for this segment.
📊 Evaluating a Targeting Strategy: Is It Working?
The iGCSE examiner may ask you to evaluate a targeting strategy that means saying whether it is effective and why. Here are the key questions to ask:
✅ Questions to Evaluate a Destination's Targeting Strategy
- Is the segment large enough? A niche segment may not generate enough revenue to justify the marketing cost.
- Is the segment reachable? Can the destination actually communicate with this group through available media?
- Is the segment profitable? High-volume, low-spending tourists may cost more to host than they generate.
- Does the product match the segment? A destination marketing itself as "luxury" must actually deliver luxury facilities.
- Is the strategy sustainable? Does targeting this segment cause environmental or social harm?
- Is there competition? Are rival destinations already targeting the same segment more effectively?
📚 Case Study: Iceland Rapid Growth and Its Consequences
Iceland targeted the adventure and nature tourism segment from around 2010, using social media and the Northern Lights as key selling points. Visitor numbers exploded from 500,000 in 2010 to over 2 million by 2018 in a country of just 360,000 people. While economically successful, the rapid growth damaged fragile landscapes and overwhelmed infrastructure. Iceland has since introduced visitor management measures and shifted targeting towards quality over quantity focusing on higher-spending, lower-impact tourists.
💡 The Lesson for Exams
A targeting strategy that works in the short term can create long-term problems. The best exam answers recognise both the benefits and the risks of a targeting strategy. Always consider: economic impact, environmental impact and social impact the three pillars of sustainable tourism.
📚 Extended Case Study: New York City Multi-Segment Destination Targeting
New York City (NYC) is managed by NYC Tourism + Conventions (formerly NYC & Company). It is one of the world's most complex destination marketing challenges because the city appeals to almost every possible segment simultaneously.
🌎 How NYC Targets Multiple Segments
Rather than choosing one target market, NYC uses a differentiated targeting strategy developing different messages and products for each major segment:
- International tourists (geographic segment): Campaigns in the UK, China, Brazil and Germany promote iconic landmarks Times Square, the Statue of Liberty, Central Park. These visitors spend an average of $700 per day.
- Domestic US visitors (geographic segment): Targeted through road trip campaigns, Amtrak partnerships and "weekend break" promotions aimed at people within driving distance.
- LGBTQ+ travellers (psychographic/identity segment): NYC actively promotes itself as one of the world's most welcoming LGBTQ+ destinations, with Pride events, dedicated guides and partnerships with LGBTQ+ travel media.
- Food and culture lovers (psychographic segment): Campaigns highlight NYC's restaurant scene, Broadway, museums (MoMA, the Met) and diverse neighbourhoods.
- Business and MICE travellers (behavioural segment): NYC promotes its convention facilities, hotel capacity and transport links to attract conferences and corporate events.
This multi-segment approach means NYC can maintain high visitor numbers year-round and across different economic conditions. If one segment declines (e.g. international travel during a pandemic), others can partially compensate.
📊 NYC by the Numbers
Before the COVID-19 pandemic, NYC welcomed 66.6 million visitors per year, generating $70 billion in economic activity. By 2023, numbers had recovered to over 61 million. The city's ability to target and retain multiple segments is central to this resilience.
🌟 Exam Tips: What the Examiner Wants to See
✅ Do This in the Exam
- Name the destination clearly don't just say "a city", say "Barcelona" or "the Scottish Highlands".
- Name the segment clearly use the correct terminology: demographic, geographic, psychographic, behavioural.
- Explain WHY that segment is targeted what does the destination offer that appeals to them?
- Use data where possible visitor numbers, spending figures and percentages impress examiners.
- Evaluate, don't just describe say whether the strategy is effective and why, including any drawbacks.
- Link to the marketing mix show how product, price, promotion and place are adapted for each segment.
❌ Avoid These Mistakes
- Don't confuse segmentation (dividing the market) with targeting (choosing which segment to focus on).
- Don't say a destination "targets everyone" even if it attracts many segments, it will prioritise some over others.
- Don't forget the negative consequences of targeting overtourism, environmental damage and community conflict are all valid evaluation points.
- Don't use vague language like "rich people" or "young people" use proper terms like "high-income ABC1 segment" or "18–30 demographic".
📋 Summary: Segmentation and Targeting for a Destination at a Glance
- Destinations use segmentation to identify and attract the most suitable visitors
- DMOs create visitor profiles combining demographic, geographic, psychographic and behavioural data
- Destinations can target multiple segments simultaneously using a differentiated strategy
- Seasonal targeting helps spread visitor numbers and reduce overtourism
- Repositioning allows destinations to change their visitor mix over time
- Effective targeting must be evaluated for economic, environmental and social impact
- Case studies: Barcelona, Blackpool, Scottish Highlands, Dubai, Iceland, New York City