Destination Namibia: How do you Market a Country?

I remember talking to one of Namibia’s tourism officials shortly after they had returned from the 2011 Adventure Travel World Summit in Chiapas, Mexico, and he was pretty excited about Namibia’s prospects in hosting the 2013 summit, knowing it would be the first time the event would be hosted in Africa.  At the time, he specifically mentioned a short marketing video which had been shown as a part of Namibia’s presentation.  Having lived in Namibia now for 18 months, I can only agree that video is the best way to present the adventure tourism wonderland that Namibia represents.  I was excited to get my hands on a copy of the video produced by the Ministry of Tourism and the World Wildlife Federation, in order to evaluate for myself how well Namibia had managed to convey its message to the outside world.

Unfortunately, I didn’t receive a copy of the video and gradually forgot about it, but just stumbled across it the other day on YouTube.  It’s an impressive video, especially when you consider it doesn’t appear from the credits that they went out and hired a big-time international film company, but rather gathered local footage from Namibian media companies, travel companies, photographers, and others.

Possibly depending on how far you’re coming from, Namibia is extremely accessible to tourists and is a photographer’s dream.  It’s also very affordable, as Namibia has opted to build an inclusive tourist industry that doesn’t only cater to the very rich.  And for the time being, it’s still somewhat underappreciated – which means you won’t be surrounded by other cars while you’re watching wildlife, as you might in other “game park” destination countries.

Watching the video it became clear to me that there’s no way we’re going to be able to see everything that needs to be seen before it’s time to leave Namibia.

Find out more about the 2013 Adventure Travel World Summit and/or register for the event.