In 2017, I wrote a piece for Kongres Magazine titled “How to Market a Damaged Destination.” Unsurprisingly for those who know me, I didn’t hold back. I’d been working through one of the more complex stretches in Türkiye’s tourism landscape and poured all of my frustration — and hope — into that piece. I believed that with enough transparency, consistency, and pride in place, we could rebuild trust. We could bring people back.
Eight years later, I still believe in much of what I wrote. But I’ve also had to adjust my lens.
I’ve come to realise that destination marketing isn’t just about overcoming adversity or polishing perception anymore. It’s about reframing what “appeal” even means.
Buyers are more informed. Planning teams are more risk-conscious. And with the explosion of social media and real-time access to every headline and whisper, perception is shaped long before a proposal hits a client’s inbox. Add in global complexity, internal company politics, and shifting values, and suddenly destination choice becomes less about beauty shots and more about trust, clarity, and fit.
This shift is showing up in the data too. According to SITE’s Destination inSITEs research, planners are rethinking the type of destinations they prioritise. Nearly 70% expect to use destinations they’ve never used before, while close-by locations and all-inclusive properties are trending upward. It’s not about playing it safe—it’s about balancing fresh ideas with manageability. That’s a nuanced difference, but an important one.
However brilliant a marketer you are — and I say this as someone who has tried — you can’t out-market complexity. But you can encourage people to engage with it, and maybe even develop a deeper understanding of the place and people behind the program.
Over time, I’ve stopped trying to make destinations “make sense” to everyone.
Instead, I try to communicate their full story with care, with context, and with the passion I feel for them. When that’s done well, clients don’t feel like they’re being sold to. They feel like they’re being invited into something meaningful: something designed with intention, not just aesthetics.
So maybe the real question isn’t “How do I reposition my destination?” but instead: What do I want people to understand about it that they couldn’t find on Google? That’s where I think we, as destination professionals, still hold a lot of value — not in controlling the narrative, but in humanizing it.
That’s the shift I’ve made. And if I’m the only one who needed eight years and a lot of grey hairs to figure that out, so be it.
Dig into SITE’s Destination inSITEs report to discover what’s driving incentive travel destination selection — and how destinations are growing their incentive travel market share.
