Muslim Friendly Tourism:
Developing and Marketing MFT Products and Services
In the OIC Member Countries
43
2.4 Current Trends in Marketing MFT Products and Services
The fragmented nature of tourism markets in general has led to a certain level of cooperation
between products and service providers at one level and between them and their respective
governments at another level especially in the area of Marketing MFT Products and Services.
There is also an increasing utilization of both digital marketing and travel conferences as
tools to increase visibility and attract Muslim travelers. In this section, a review of these
current marketing trends is presented with examples.
1. Public Private Partnership Initiatives77
Governments across the world have cooperated with tourism products and services
providers in support of the development of the MFT sector in general and in marketing in
particular. Areas of public private partnership include raising awareness among tourism
products and services providers of the MFT market potential and Muslim consumer needs,
supporting providers in developing and certification of MFT products and services, and
engaging in destination marketing.
The next section of the report on current government policies details how certain
governments such as the Japanese and South Korean have tried to raise awareness of the MFT
market importance. In addition to this, several governments, including that of the Philippines,
have helped the private sector in their efforts to develop products for Muslim travelers and to
acquire Halal certification.
With respect to marketing efforts, a number of tourism authorities, including Australian, Thai
and South Korean tourism authorities, have published guides for Muslim travelers to help
them locate MFT products and services.
Government bodies have also been active in holding industry/trade events to create channels
of communication between local tourism operators and those from targeted countries. Both
Malaysia and Thailand have been quite successful in using this marketing strategy to promote
their MFT sector.
A third strategy used by governments in the area of marketing MFT is building strategic
partnerships with entities in target countries such as airlines, media representatives. This
strategy has proved quite successful in promoting the MFT sector in Australia that has
collaborated with partners in Dubai including airlines and media representatives.
2. Cluster Marketing
Given the fact that the tourism industry is intrinsically diverse and is dominated by small and
medium tourism enterprises (SMTEs), creating local partnership between tourism businesses
and other stakeholders is inevitable. Through tourism clusters, SMTEs cooperate to build a
tourism offering able to compete globally. Cluster marketing has a number of benefits
including exchanging experience and more effective resources utilization. Common branding
enables SMTEs to improve their marketing positioning and create joint marketing and
77 For more information, details and references for examples in this area, please refer to the “Destination Marketing” part
under the next section of the report “Current Government Policies Related to MFT”.