Media Releases

6 July 2010
A new Tourism Queensland online marketing guide will help Queensland tourism operators better promote their businesses to Australian and overseas visitors, Tourism Minister Peter Lawlor said today.

The announcement of The Big Marketing Guide coincided with this week's Tourism Futures conference in Brisbane.

Mr Lawlor said the guide was a fantastic resource for Queensland's thousands of new and small tourism businesses.

"This introductory online guide will help tourism operators with their marketing activity and includes useful topics such as domestic and international marketing, media and public relations and branding," Mr Lawlor said.

"It's aimed particularly at new and small Queensland tourism businesses who are working hard to develop their products and establish themselves in the industry.

"This guide is full of practical tips and examples of how tourism businesses can sell themselves to visitors, both here in Australia and around t he world.

"There are more than 222,000 people directly and indirectly employed in the tourism industry in Queensland, so whether it's a restaurant, a motel or a tour company, The Big Marketing Guide gives operators the tools to help them market their products.

"The guide is written in concise, easy-to understand language and gives operators a tremendous starting point for their own tourism marketing, including helpful hints such as how to write a marketing plan.

"In addition, there is an entire section dedicated to the fast-growing sector of digital marketing, which is such a huge part of today's online world and will give operators an understanding of how they can best use the internet in their businesses."

Tourism Queensland CEO Anthony Hayes said the release of the 129-page Big Marketing Guide was also accompanied by the launch of a Grants Guide for tourism operators.

"The Grants Guide helps operators understand which government grants are available to them, as well as tips on how to apply for grants and information on what happens if their application is successful," Mr Hayes said.

"Tourism Queensland's core business is to develop tourism in Queensland and market our state to the world, so I'm very proud of these two new resources for industry."

The Big Marketing Guide is available at http://www.tq.com.au/bigmarketingguide, while the Grants Guide can be found at http://www.tq.com.au/tad.