Portrait of Marine Tourism Branding Training held virtually by the ITS Abmas team.

ITS Campus, ITS News – The natural potential in the Pasir Putih Tourism area (WPP) of Dalegan Village, Gresik Regency, certainly requires an optimal marketing strategy to achieve maximum results. For this reason, one of the Institut Teknologi Sepuluh Nopember (ITS) Community Service team, which involved lecturers and students, is trying to introduce a business model to develop marine tourism in the area.

The team, chaired by Deti Rahmawati SIP MT, carried out Marine Tourism Branding training based on Local Wisdom for Inclusive Tourism. Deti said, in general, the problem of developing marine tourism is the second focus in Indonesia. The development of the coastline will be one way that its development and utilization are geo-oceanography in Indonesia.

“Apart from that, we specifically saw the difficulties of the local community in Dalegan Village in marketing the potential for nature tourism and trade to be wider,” she continued. WPP is not far from Surabaya, the capital of East Java Province, and is classified as a beach that is still “holy”, clean, and has various souvenirs.

Visitors who come there are still classified as quiet, even relatively declining according to data from the related office of Gresik Regency, several years ago. This was then supported by the assumption from the Deti leadership team’s research that the potential marketing strategy of Dalegan Village, from branding to packaging of superior products there, still needs improvement.

Deti Rahmawati SIP MT, a lecturer in ITS Development Studies, during a virtual Marine Tourism Branding training for the people of Dalegan Village, Gresik Regency

The lecturer at the Faculty of Creative Design and Digital Business (FDKBD) stated that advertising activities should be held to image the destination to shine and be known more widely by the market. She created a business model for creating branding with the team, using the Destination, Origin, and Time (DOT) approach; Branding, Advertising, and Selling (BAS); and Paid-media, Own-media, and Social-media (POS).

“All three must be correlated to be able to show comprehensive and comprehensive problems so that an inclusive business model is created,” concluded the lecturer, who was born in Bogor. Also supported by the unique potential and potential of human resources, the virtual training related to Marine Tourism succeeded in moving at least 50 people from various lines.

Starting from the DOT marketing strategy approach, all participants were given the input of knowledge that the destinations to be developed, the origin of tourists, and the time patterns of visits to be considered in mapping the potential village development. Furthermore, BAS teaches that branding is closely related to taste or awareness of the intended object. “It is also necessary to encourage the desire to advertise and take sales action,” she said.

The community in the White Sand Tourism area (WPP) of Dalegan Village enthusiastically listened to the ITS Abmas team’s virtual presentation at the Marine Tourism Branding training.

Finally, according to Deti, insights regarding POS media placement will also strengthen the business model built in the WPP area. “Utilization of electronic media, the media itself, to social media, everything must be optimized,” she said, explaining the POS approach method.

Even though the pandemic hindered it, the synergy between the village government, youth organizations, traders, and a group of PKK women who looked healthy and were so enthusiastic made Deti sure that, at least since the start of this service, the benefits from the village economy if presented were up to 5 to 10 percent. “It is not significant, so we hope it will continue and can be developed gradually later,” she said.

Because this program can be a solution to the people of Dalegan Village’s problems so far, they also hope that they can continue to be assisted again, even to the execution in the field. In line with the community’s expectations, Deti also hopes that the program he initiated, together with five other lecturers, can help develop the local community’s knowledge and skills.

While thanking the village government and beach managers, she hopes that the pandemic will end quickly and the condition of tourism in the WPP area of ​​Dalegan Village can recover. “So that in the next year, the condition of tourism there can rise and the self-image of WPP in Dalegan Village will become more fragrant, coupled with the emergence of a new brand of smoked fish which is its signature,” she concluded hopefully. (qaf/ris/ITS Public Relations)

An overview of the Marine Tourism Branding marketing strategy explained by the ITS Abmas Team to the Dalegan Village community during training