Marketing em tempos de crise

: turismo de lifestyle

Abstract

The current internship report is a result of a curricular internship that took place in the travel agency Sporski – Snow Specialists. Aiming to connect the difficult times of Portugal‘s national economy with strategies of marketing crisis, this report intends to identify marketing strategies that can contribute to minimize and reverse the negative effects of an economic crisis when applied to niche tourism. The Sporski and Takeoff case study aspires to analyze the strategies of both these travel agencies, exclusively focused on the niche of lifestyle tourism, and plans to classify which strategies minimize the predictable sales fall. Following Maxwell‘s interactive method, we choose to use the qualitative method: semidirective interviews as well as participant observation, during the internship period. The present investigation is based on three theory axes: crisis marketing, services marketing and niche marketing. Among our main conclusions, we were able to find a permanent need to maintain or increase the marketing investment in times of economical crisis in order to guarantee the companies‘ ability to respond effectively to clients‘ necessities. In times of economical crisis, when companies count with low budgets, it is fundamental to gamble on direct marketing campaigns. Special attention should be given to online opportunities, even more so knowing that this media is a reliable source in sales efforts. Nevertheless, niches are a way of dealing with difficult times. By denying an undifferentiated approach and betting in specialization, companies can become highly profitable, develop loyalty costumers, and guarantee stability that is ultimately crucial to survive these crisis moments. Furthermore, we aspire to contribute to a better knowledge of crisis marketing and hope that new studies can strengthen this investigation area, promoting an academic discussion deeply connected to the business world.

Date of Award	Oct 2012
Original language	Portuguese
Awarding Institution	Universidade Católica Portuguesa
Supervisor	Carla Ganito (Supervisor)