Posted by : trraju on Nov 03, 2003 - 03:11 PM General

Shopping centre Bluewater, which attracts 27 million visitors a year, is drawing up an international marketing strategy with the establishment of its first database of foreign holidaymakers.
The Kent-based leisure and shopping centre is expanding its target market and launching one-to-one communications with visitors from the US, Japan, France, Ireland, the Netherlands and Belgium.

The aim is to profile the data and create a database of worldwide shopping enthusiasts for future campaigns.

The new approach comes within a year of the retail specialist creating a UK marketing database through its quarterly customer magazine (PM December 6, 2002).

Retail, travel and leisure marketing agency Fox Kalomaski has been appointed to the brief. The aim is to capture a slice of the £4.75m that 12 million visitors from the six countries spend in this country each year.

The initiative is being launched in partnership with VisitBritain, which will supply Bluewater with up-to-date personal data from its tourist office.

Bluewater head of marketing Alan Jones says: "Targeting travellers will give us a greater return on investment than raising our profile through direct consumer ads across the globe."

For more information and stories in this area visit the UK's top direct marketing title at http://www.precision-marketing.co.uk