As part of the Marbella council’s Tourist Marketing Plan to attract more ‘mid-high spending’ tourists and improve the region’s image abroad, the local government has approved its application to tender for a PR/communications agency to work to this end.

According to Jose Luis Hernandez, tourism councillor of Marbella, the PR initiative is one of the three-part Marbella Tourist Marketing plan being developed over four years. The other two components of this strategy centre around improving quality of build and services offered in the region.

To win the bid, worth €2.4million in total, the selected PR agency must devise a communications strategy outlining how they would plan to give the region widespread coverage internationally to promote the city’s brand and hit back at inaccurate media reports in the world’s press.

The company would also “elaborate and supervise” all city-related press releases, articles, features, statements and interviews and assume the proposal, design, spreading and public relations for events and advertising and marketing campaigns. Additionally the agency must support the organisation of seminars, congresses, symposiums and press trips for relevant media.

Hernandez added that to make the final stages of the tendering process, all communication agencies applying must be “well established nationwide or, if possible, internationally” and that the scheme is being funded, in equal parts, by the City Council Tourism Department and the Tourist Plan subvention.

One of the PR agencies heavily involved in the initial consultation phase of the communication plan was PR firm Max Clifford Associates. The firm’s director and namesake told OPP that his company would not be tendering for the contract as, to have a real impact, it should have been done before its property market suffered a steep decline.

“They [Marbella council] invited me last October to discuss this proposal and said that they wanted to get me involved,” explained Clifford. “I knew what was going wrong. I suggested organising some positive media coverage involving a documentary we were going to make with Simon Cowell and other celebrities that were going to buy out there.”

Clifford, who owns a property in the region, said that six months after the initial consultation phase, a spokesperson told him that it is a great idea but no one wanted to pay for it.

“They were serious about it then, but I explained that the longer you leave it the harder it will be to correct. Fixing this will be difficult but not impossible. If there is a good PR company that uses stars and media outlets to promote the area, educate the travel and property writers and stop programmes like Marbella Belles that were so horrendously damaging, then they can stop the negative perception abroad.”

Story from Overseas Property Professional