Hi-tech tools are increasingly being harnessed to promote SA abroad, with a new global call centre launched in Johannesburg and a national information portal passing the million hit a month milestone.
South African Tourism has opened a new global call centre at CCN House in Woodmead, Johannesburg, manned by operators speaking English, German, French, Italian and Dutch.
South African Tourism previously operated call centres in Germany - servicing the Pan European market - as well as in the US and Cape Town. These are no longer operational.
Moeketsi Mosola, COO of South African Tourism, says the decision to integrate and centralise the information stream is aimed at boosting efficiency and better serving customers.
"This new facility will allow us to service our customers` needs for information about our destination much more efficiently and also provide a live database of marketing information to measure and inform the communications and marketing strategy of South African Tourism," he says.
The call centre, manned by a team of 17 'country ambassadors`, will operate round the clock, seven days a week and is expected to process a minimum of 5 000 telephonic enquiries each month as well as respond to e-mail and fax enquiries.
The operators have undergone an extensive two-week training period on communication skills, product training on SA and an introduction to the country`s core and tactical markets as defined by the Tourism Growth Strategy.
Calls are handled via 26 lines from 16 countries including the US, UK and Australia. The language offering will be boosted from November with the addition of Portuguese and Mandarin. It also services the domestic help-line number: 083 123 6789. Foreign South African Tourism offices will issue releases with the relevant call centre numbers for each country.
Meanwhile, the International Marketing Council of South Africa says its Web site, www.southafrica.info, has celebrated its second anniversary and for the first time clocked more than a million page impressions in a month.
The portal, aimed at providing one-stop information about SA for foreign investors and tourists, contains over 2 000 pages of information, news and directories.
"The Web portal is fast becoming the definitive South African portal - an online 'encyclopaedia` of the country," says Yvonne Johnston, CEO of the International Marketing Council of South Africa.
"The success and growth of the site is a reflection of the growing global interest in SA."
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