Marketing Plan On Frasers Hill In Pahang State Tourism Essay

Malaysia is a country in South-East Asia, located on a peninsula of the Asian shares a border with Thailand. In an effort to diversify the economy and make Malaysia’s economy less dependent on exports the government has pushed to increase tourism in Malaysia. Malaysia has become third largest source of income from foreign exchange, ¹ and accounted for 7% of Malaysia’s economy as of 2005. ² As of 2009, Malaysia ranks 9th among the top most visited countries in the world, after Germany.

There are several tropical islands in Malaysia; some have been voted the most beautiful in the world. The islands in Malaysia are:

Labuan , Langkawi, Pangkor, Penang Island, the western half of Penang, which is heavily industrialised, Redang Island, Tunku Abdul Rahman National Park, Perhentian Islands, Kapas Island, Lang Tengah Island and Sipadan

Beside tropical islands, Malaysia has several national parks and nature reserves. The national parks and nature reserves are:

Bako National Park, Sarawak – famed for its wildlife, especially bearded pigs and proboscis monkeys, Batang Ai National Park, Sarawak, Gunung Mulu National Park, Sarawak, Gunung Gading National Park, Sarawak, Lambir Hills National Park, Sarawak, Niah Caves National Park, Sarawak, Loagan Bunut National Park, Sarawak, Kinabalu National Park, Sabah – home of 4100 metre peak Mount Kinabalu, Taman Negara National Park – the self-proclaimed World’s Oldest Rainforest, spanning Kelantan, Pahang and Terengganu, Endau Rompin National Park, Johor.

Source: Place of interest of Fraser’s Hill (http://malaysiabudgethotel.com/destinations/pahang/fraser-hill.html)

Executive Summary

Fraser’s Hill

Its name derives from Louis James Fraser, a solitary Scottish pioneer, who setup a tin ore trading post in the 1980s³. Later it was turned into one of the tourist attractions in Malaysia.

Location

Fraser’s Hill includes seven peaks and is located at the altitudes between 1,220 and 1,525 meters above sea level. Year round temperatures are between 17°C – 25°C. The resort is situated 64.6 miles from the capital city, Kuala Lumpur.

At the foot of the steep ascent, at an altitude of only 800m, is The Gap, where a colonial rest house remains open. Then winding 8km single track road up from The Gap is open in alternate directions each hour; the drive takes 30 minutes.

Some visitors prefer to walk up, spotting birds and enjoying the noticeable fall in temperature4. A new alternative road was opened in 2001, but from time to time this is closed due to landslides5.

Place of interest

Golfing

The first golf course in Malaysia is constructed on Fraser’s Hill in 1925. The 9-hole course was built on former tin mines. Then 18-hole course was added at Jeriau, abot 3km from the main town in the 1970s.

Source: Fraser’s Hill Golf (ttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Fraser’s_Hill_Golf_Course.JPG)

Bird watching

Bird watching at Fraser’s Hill is a notable centre. The hill has over 270 species of local and migratory bird flocking here together. Each year the Annual International Bird Race is held in the second weekend of June, organized by the Fraser’s Hill Development Corporation in collaboration with WWF-Malaysia and the Malaysian Nature Society.

Participants throughout the world converging on the hill station in a team competition. They need to identify and record the highest number of species of birds stated in the official check list.

Other Place of interest

In Fraser’s Hill, there are many more place of interest such as Clock Tower, Jeriau Waterfalls, hiking at Hemmant Trail, Bishop’s Trail, and Pine Tree Trail and Tennis.

Situation Analysis

Fraser’s Hill has become popular and growing in the 60s and 70s, and now it has gradually it reaching maturity and moving toward the decline stage. Fraser’s Hill seem not been well perceived by the locals and foreign tourist in recent years.

The arrival of the tourist and occupancy rates of hotels and resorts have decline in recent years. The tourism industry players have brought this problem to the federal government.

Source: product life cycle: Fraser’s Hill (http://www.quickmba.com/marketing/product/lifecycle/)

To analyze the environment of Fraser’s Hill, let use the SWOT analysis to analyze.

SWOT analysis

Strength

Fraser’s Hill has its beauty of it. It surrounding by green, forest, cool and fresh air. It gives people “peace of mind” and also its cool and invigorating weather throughout the year.

Since Fraser’s Hill was established by Birtish, it has been built up with some British design of chalets and hotels. Therefore this will enhance the British image in Fraser’s Hill which can bring people an image of ‘little Britain’ as an attraction for tourist to visit this place. This could let the people who had been to Britain get the feel and people who never been to Britain to get the feel of how Britain is.

Opportunities

This could be the best reason to attract more visitors then it could gain its market share. The natural greenery, forest walks, fresh air and exotic flower landscape is the main attraction for tourism. There are potential to popularise Fraser’s Hill as more and more people are aware of staying near to nature.

Weakness

The major problem is the road condition to Fraser’s Hill only single track road. Even though new track has been built but it was not usable due to landslide has deter local and foreign tourist to visit Fraser’s Hill.

To overcome this problem, the road should be rebuilt or modified to become two track roads which allow more traffic go up to the hill and come down of the hill.

Other weakness is that there are not many activities going on in Fraser’s Hill. The local and foreign tourist especially the younger generation find Fraser’s Hill have become boring and no excitement at all.

Threats

As the decline of the Fraser’s Hill attraction, this could result to deter the development of Fraser’s Hill to become an attraction place of interest. This cause the tourist arrival rate has declined, accommodation sector in Fraser’s Hill has running low. This is mainly due to lack of critical mass for Fraser’s Hill, which ahs caused the tourism industry players such as the hotel and resort operates unable to operate at economical or sustainable level. This causes some of the restaurant and hawker operators in Fraser’s Hill operate their business on weekend and school or public holidays only as this is not economical and profitable to sustain the business during weekdays low season periods.

Furthermore, site enquiries also revealed that most of them run the businesses on part-time basis and this could cause limited supply and variety of fine dining offer at Fraser’s Hill.

Objective Setting

Company Mission

Fraser’s Hill development mission is to bring back the attraction of the resort to local and foreign tourist. It aims to fill up the vacancy of accommodation sector in Fraser’s Hill. This could allow the tourism industry to operate at economical and sustainable manner.

Marketing Objectives

Specific objectives – to bring back the attraction and popularisation of Fraser’s Hill and to popularise the International Bird Race held every second week of June each year. This Fraser’s Hill International Bird Race is actually a fun event where human participants and nature lovers, from Malaysia and overseas, will outdo each other to sight, identify and record the most number of bird species within a set time frame and location in this cool highlands.

Achievable – As Fraser’s Hill currently loss it popularity and attraction, therefore it would need some campaign to bring the awareness of this hill resort to local and foreign tourist. It could be achievable to promote it attraction in Tourism Malaysia Board and also during the MATA fair.

Time – Fraser’s Hill has lost it popularity for sometime, there for it would need some time to recover and accepted as one of the attraction by the local and foreign tourist. It would take one to two years for it to develop.

Strategy Development

Choice of growth strategy to analyse Fraser’s Hill are using Ansoff Matrix.

Source: Ansoff Matrix (www.tutor2u.net/business/strategy/ansoff_matrix.htm)

Below are strategy development suggestions to achieve Fraser’s Hill mission.

Market Penetration

By applying market penetration, modifying the image of Fraser’s Hill could bring some fresh changes and attraction to the tourist. This would not divert to different direction or market but make it more interesting and maintain its score beauty.

Market Development

Market development are use to enter into new market. Fraser’s Hill has its market; they are target to company weekend break, family gathering, seasonality tourism holidays, school and industrial holidays. It could also attract those younger generation who like sports, like hill climbing, rock climbing, jungle trekking, and bird watching and get to know types of flora and fauna.

Based of these two strategies, Fraser’s Hill not only maintain and keeping the existing customers but also able to attract younger generation to come over to visit, who are now willing to spend time with the families for relax and recreation. The also create awareness of the younger generation to get closer to nature.

Marketing Mix

Now, we would use tactic to make them work. We can have a short term plan to inform or create awareness to new market especially about the change we are now. We can create awareness by doing advertisement or advertorial in most popular local newspapers, travel magazines to inform changes we had made or what are our attractions again. Meanwhile we can have some promotion like free breakfast for 2 nights stay etc.

The tactical applications are:

Product

Fraser’s Hill is a product that is profitable. It is a tourist attraction place for foreigners as well as local people and weekday long-stay guest. This could be the proposed plan for Malaysia Second Home Programme.

Price

The price is varies according to accommodation provided by different tenants. Having a discussion meeting with those tenants not to charger higher price as compare to Genting Highland or especially to Cameron Highland who is our competitor.

Place

Fraser’s Hill is located at a very suitable place with cool weather throughout the year. It is between 1,220 and 1,525 meters above sea level and year round temperatures are between 17°C – 25°C. As Malaysia is a hot year round country, therefore is a benefit for tourist to chill at the hill resort.

Promotion

Create some promotion activities such package with accommodation and jungle activities organisation in for a group and jungle trekking for individual. Such as accommodation package stay of 3 days inclusive free breakfast or accommodation package stay inclusive of activities and meals.

Fraser’s Hill could implement strategic alliance with bus company to have a direct transport from big city such as Kuala Lumpur to travel to Fraser’s Hill, this could save lots of trouble for people who would to go to Fraser’s Hill without any transport. It could also work well to foreigners who come to visit Fraser’s Hill. This could save the tourist hassle to look for transportation arrangement

People

People play a crucial role in the tourism sector especial Fraser’s Hill. Expertise with knowledge of Fraser’s Hill is crucial as it would be the main source of information delivered to the tourist.

Local people living in the surround area are important as well. They would provide the history and development of Fraser’s Hill as they see it develop from the early age.

As people who work in the resort or recreation park will need to gain product and service knowledge of Fraser’s Hill surrounding area as they would need to recommend to the tourists the attraction, activities and position of each attraction.

Process

In order to provide a good customer service, the people of the organisation should be trained but also it is important to have an efficient and effective order process and procedure. An intranet should be installed so that all the relevant departments are able to access to it and response to whatever inquiry or problem that may encounter.

Service feature are important to improve Fraser’s Hill as a tourism attraction. Investment to improve the infrastructures, internet connection, telecommunication and interactive information on Fraser’s Hill need to be accurate and informative.

Accessibility of information and location of Fraser’s Hill need to be easily accessible. Map and travelling would be a very great help to assist the tourist to reach their destination without any trouble.

Physical evidence

Physical evidence is important as Fraser’s Hill is a kind of service to our customer. Hence website design, the ambience has to carry its tagline, objectives and vision i.e. to be a little Britain. The total ambience has to carry English image, design and slogan. The website should always carry it tagline like ”McDonald I’m lovin it”. This will project a full image of what Fraser’s hill is to all customers.

Fraser’s Hill surrounding areas should be clearly noticeable and attractive to the tourist as this would be a first impression to the tourist. Tree and grass need to be trim if it has become obstacle to the beauty of Fraser’s Hill.

Appearance of staff working in Fraser’s Hill need to be as helpful, friendly, easy going, clean and fresh facial appearance, excellent customer service and excellent communication skills. It will bring an excellent image of Fraser’s Hill to the tourist.

Leaflet and brochure information of Fraser’s Hill are accurately printed at actual time (latest information) and actual map with clear instruction or information so tourist could refer to it easily.

Fraser’s Hill would need to invest to create a good website to introduce it place where tourist can easily get information without any hassle. Information are keep up to date with it current weather condition and temperature can be easily found.

Action and implementation

Action

The above marketing strategy and tactics need to turn into action plans. No matter how good is the strategy or tactics been set, it would not be in place if we do not have to appropriate people to make it happen. It will not help at all. Hence research on information about Fraser’s Hill need to be updated. Latest photo of Fraser’s Hill should be update so it looks attractive and feel good when the tourist look at it.

For employees who work in the resort or hotel, training is require, a clear vision and objective need to inform all employees in order for them to carryout their job well and bring excellent service to tourists.

Some plan need to be outsourced because Fraser’s Hill may lack of expertise on it field such are marketing, advertisement, and training. By outsourcing, it would proof the efficiency and effectiveness of promoting Fraser’s Hill to regain it glory and well know to local and foreign tourist.

Advertisement need to plan in advance according to it budget. As Fraser’s Hill are not doing so well now it would need to advertise it within it budget. Fraser’s Hill will not choose to advertise on the media as it is a very expensive cost to advertise. There are other options for it to advertise. It could advertise with local travel agents, leaflet, website, and hospitality, Tourism Board Malaysia, MAS Airlines, Air Asia, and sponsoring of golf tournament.

By this mean of advertising, it will help Fraser’s Hill to promote and reach out to people about it location and attraction.

Implementation

Implementation of marketing plan includes three activities:

Allocating tasks and responsibility

Once a specific plan has in place, then the next steps is to allocate the tasks and responsibility. As for Fraser’s Hill;

Advertisement – is the responsibility of it marketing people to draw up an appropriate concept to bring the message to the tourist.

Training – is the responsibility of it human resources people to train the employees with the latest information about the surrounding area and attraction place.

Operations – Day to day job to maintain Fraser’s Hill operations would be taken care by it Operations Manager to make sure that every area are cover and operate efficiently.

Communication – Public relations are very important. Therefore, communication with the public, media and journalist is very important as it will bring a great impact on Fraser’s Hill re-launch it present as an attraction to the people.

Scheduling of marketing activities

Below is the Gantt chart for Fraser’s Hill project schedule 2010/11.

This project will take 7 months for it initial planning. Research for improvement will take place for one and half month from September to mid-October 2010. Then follow by the strategy planning which will take place for one and half month from October to mid-November 2010. The marketing will start at the end of October to end of November 2010. Then the advertising will be running for longer period from December 2010 until February 2011. This will takes three months to advertise Fraser’s Hill. Then training will be held for two months from February 2011 till March 2011.

This would give a proper view and time management on how the project will be able to execute successfully and this prevent any wastage cost.

Gantt chart – Fraser’s Hill Project Schedule 2010/11

Setting the marketing budget

As Fraser’s Hills have not been doing well, there the cash flow will be very thing. The method of budget will be percentage of it sales (as the sales figure are unavailable), the other options will be based on historical budgetary records. It would be estimate the budget for this advertisement would approximately £15,000.

Monitoring and Control

Once the marketing plan starts to be implemented, the next task of management is to monitor and control what goes on.

Monitoring

This is to check that everything is going according to plan and according to time set as in the Gantt chart. As this is an ongoing project, the key performance indicator will be evaluating to check how far the progress of the plan is.

Control

Control means taking corrective actions as early as possible if things are not going according to plan.

After all these advertisement planning, implementation and training, we need to monitor the progress, and control from time to time. So that, the initial stage of the plan would not go far away from the objectives.

There are few option of control can be down such as benchmarking, balanced-scorecard, the marketing audit, profitability control and sales control. The best method of control is the benchmarking method.

Benchmarking

This is the process of comparing the Fraser’s Hill products and services and processes to those of competitors such as Cameron Highlands to find ways to improve quality and performance.

Appendix

SOSTAC Model

SOSTAC is summarizing the main steps of strategy marketing by Paul R.Smith (1990).

Situation Analysis is looking at analysing where we are now using SWOT analysis, PEST analysis, Marketing Mix or Competitive Position.

Objective is looking at where we want to go using Ashridge Mission model, 5P’s model or SMART.

Strategy is looking at how we going to get there using market segmentation or positioning.

Tactics is looking at some details of the strategy using Tools communication.

Actions are looking at implementation putting the plan to work using Action plan, RACI model, CSF or KPIs.

Control is track progress through measuring, monitoring, reviewing, updating and modifying using compare performance management or balance scorecard.