Like most industries, tourism is full of terms that can be confusing to understand, so it’s best you acquaint yourself with these terms to make sure you don’t get left behind.

Amenities: Features or additional services available when renting a room at an accommodation establishment. In-room amenities may include satellite TV, hairdryers, Wi-Fi, tea- and coffee-making facilities, while outside the room they may include swimming pools, bars, restaurants and gyms.

Community Experience: This refers to the type of community/local experience a tourism business provides its customers with.

DMC or DMO: Destination Marketing Company or Destination Marketing Organisaton. Cape Town Tourism would be an example as it markets Cape Town as a tourist destination.

FIT: Fully Independent Traveller. This is an individual tourist travelling independently, designing their own itinerary and making their own travel arrangements without being part of any group or imposed schedule.

GIT: Group Inclusive Tour. This is a tour of a destination or event for a group of people, usually with some common affiliation (although, not always), usually with a minimum of 10 people in the group and usually (although, not exclusively) organised through a travel operator and escorted by a tour guide.

Ground Handling: The central function of a ground handling service provider is to facilitate the safe and timely transit of passengers, baggage and cargo through an airport and onto their destination.

MICE Tourism: This is an acronym which stands for Meetings, Incentives, Conferences and Exhibitions.
Passenger Liability Insurance: This covers your liability against potential injury if you are in an accident while transporting passengers (on land, sea and air).

SATSA: South African Tourism Services Association (SATSA) is a member-driven association that offers inbound tourism services companies the highest level of quality in the tourism industry.

SAYTC: The South African Youth Travel Confederation (SAYTC) is a non-profit trade organisation representing the youth tourism industry.

STO Rates: Standard Tour Operator Rates. The total cost to you of your product, including all overheads, consumable and marketing costs plus a profit margin. Additional allowance for a commission structure should still be added on top of this figure.

Walk-ins: Customers who do not book prior to their arrival.

The Marketing Coordinator is in charge of managing all the marketing activities associated with the route, from social media, print marketing and advertising to brand management and communications.

This Guide covers the Marketing Coordinator’s responsibilities. It is important for the route Marketing Coordinator to familiarise himself or herself with this Guide to understand what is required. The Guide will also help other route leaders and members, since it will give them a good understanding of what the Marketing Coordinator’s role should be and what support they could offer.

This Guide should be read together with other Guides covering the various leadership positions.

Why is the Marketing Coordinator’s Role Important?
As the route is a product in itself, it needs to be marketed across as many different types of platforms as possible. Online marketing is the easiest and cheapest method of marketing and, with the advent and rise of social media, the World Wide Web (the Internet) has merged with social media (Facebook, Twitter etc.) to create what is commonly known as ‘The Social Web.” It is almost impossible to engage in online activity these days without coming into contact with social media.

Websites now contain links to their relevant social media channels as well as share buttons, where customers can share content and help drive online traffic back to the website. The more online traffic or “hits” a website gets, the more attractive it becomes.

This means that anyone with a social media account has the power to share content (articles, photographs and video) on any social media channel. Some of these people have become incredibly influential with many people following what they are doing online. For this reason, social media and blogs have become essential for any business operating in the online space.

There are four main areas of responsibility for the Marketing Coordinator:
1. Brand management
2. Social media
3. Production and distribution of marketing materials
4. Traditional advertising
5. Communications

1. Brand Management
As the route’s brand and logo belong to the route, it is important that the Marketing Coordinator oversees the use of the logo in all aspects of marketing. Brand guidelines are provided by Open Africa during the branding process which need to be adhered to at all times in order to protect and maintain the parent Open Africa brand to which the route belongs and the hospitality experience that it represents.

Misuse of the logo (e.g. incorrect colour, distorted size, low resolution) can severely damage or dilute the brand and potentially have a negative effect on all other brands (routes) associated with the Open Africa route network. For this reason, the brand needs to remain consistent and professional so as not to hurt or cheapen it in any way.

2. Social Media
Social media has come a long way since the days of chat rooms and has increased collaboration, provided a platform for people to share ideas and connected people across the globe. It has become an important tool and it’s important for businesses to understand the impact social media can have on them.

Customers can now interact with brands, products and services directly and even become ambassadors for them and vice versa. Brands now have a direct link to their customers, making it possible to receive constructive feedback and deal with customer complaints in the moment. It can also, of course, have negative effects for brands which is why it is some important for someone to manage a business’s social media accounts.

Customer Reviews have become more important than advertising, especially for tourism-based businesses. Now, consumers can write reviews online about their experience at guesthouses, hotels, restaurants and even attractions for other consumers to read. A lot of good reviews can have an extremely good influence on the success of a business while a few bad ones could mean the end. This is why it’s so important to make sure your business is listed on review sites and complaints are dealt with in a timely fashion. TripAdvisor has become the world’s largest and most renowned review site and interestingly, has three times as many restaurants listed on it than hotels.

Many travellers plan their trips by researching online. This means that they read reviews for accommodation and restaurants online before they decide to make a booking. They listen to what their friends have to say about destinations on social media.

Recommended Social Media Channels:
• TripAdvisor
• Facebook
• Instagram

Please see the corresponding guides on how to market using these channels.

3. Production and Distribution of Marketing Materials
The route Marketing Coordinator will manage the production and distribution of all marketing materials and will give the final sign off once he or she is happy with the final product. As the route forms part of the larger Open Africa brand it is imperative that all marketing materials are sent to the Marketing Manager at Open Africa to ensure the parent brand is maintained and not damaged or diluted in any way.

Digital versions of materials such as banners, brochures and signage will be provided to the Marketing Coordinator for future printing needs. The files will be editable to allow for any changes or updates.

4. Traditional Advertising
While traditional print advertising can become costly, many local publications often provide discounted rates which can be a useful platform for routes to advertise. An advertorial is always the preferred type of advert as it looks like an article, can contain images and is generally more widely-read than small adverts placed in advertising sections of publications. Advertorials can vary in length from half a page to a page, to even 8 pages long, depending on the available budget. In the event of an advert being bought for the route, the Marketing Coordinator should manage the process and provide the publication with all the necessary artwork, hi-res images, text (copy) and hi-res logos.

5. Communications and media exposure
The Marketing Coordinator will be responsible for communicating with journalists and encouraging them to visit the route. This also entails coordinating the trips and ensuring that the rest of the route members play their respective parts. See the separate guide on how to invite and host journalists.

The Route Secretary fills a very important role in your route. The route’s effective functioning as an organisation is only possible if the Secretary ensures that the Route Forum’s administrative and information systems functions well.

This Guide covers the Secretary’s responsibilities. It is essential for the route Secretary to familiarise himself or herself with this Guide so that he or she can fill the position as an effective leader. The Guide is also good reading for other route leaders and members, since it will give them a good understanding of what the Secretary’s role should be and what support they could be offering the route Secretary.

This Guide should be read together with other Guides covering the various leadership positions. You may also be interested in the Resource: Template Voluntary Association constitution.

Why is the role of Secretary important?

It is important that best possible candidate is appointed to the role of Secretary and that the appointed person is a good administrator.

The Secretary’s role is mainly to ensure that the route’s administrative systems and communication channels are working well. It is also important that the Secretary understands the rules set by the route’s founding documents and the legal requirements, since they may apply to the route’s functioning.

As a leader serving on the Route Forum, the Secretary should, along with the other Route Forum members, provide the leadership needed for the route to grow and function effectively. This does not imply that the route can not rely on the Open Africa head office to offer help! But it does imply that the route’s leaders, and specifically the Secretary, should be seeking such help when it is needed.

You are coming together in the route to achieve your common objectives with building and promoting a destination route that will bring more economic activity to your area, which will lead to growing local tourism businesses and the improvement in the quality of life of your local communities. While the Secretary may focus mostly on the administrative aspects of leading the route, it is the task of the leaders, including the Secretary, to ensure that the bigger intentions are reflected in the route’s activities and that these activities lead to positive results.

What are the Secretary’s duties?

If the route is formally constituted as a company or a trust, the Secretary will have some legal duties associated with the function of Secretary. These duties mainly relate to keeping all records up-to-date at the Companies and Intellectual Property Commission (CIPC, previously called Cipro) and the Receiver of Revenue (Sars). In some instances, the Secretary may also be the person who must represent the company/trust/organisation for legal functions.

The route’s founding document (constitution, memorandum of association or trust deed) will specify what other formal obligations the Secretary has. These are important aspects of the Secretary’s role, but the responsibilities go beyond those formally listed in the founding document. It is important for the Secretary to study the founding document carefully with the aim to understand the intentions of the document in general, and the specific tasks and/or responsibilities assigned to the Secretary. The Secretary should also be aware of all the provisions of the founding document, so that the specifications and rules are correctly applied.

In addition to the formal or legal requirements, the Secretary is also responsible for the route administration and internal communication. The key outcomes attended to by a good Secretary will be seen in the fact that members are well informed of what is happening, that information is stored to be easily available when needed, that the rules governing the route are correctly applied, and that all legal requirements are met.

But we should look beyond the narrowly defined tasks included in the founding document and defined in the law.

Broadly speaking, there are the areas of responsibility for the Secretary:

• Ensure that the route complies with all legally required administration.
• Manage the route’s information, including filing of important documents, keeping record of decisions and minutes of meetings, and distributing documents.
• Keeping the route’s communication channels open so that all members stay informed.

The systems used by the Secretary may vary in level of sophistication, depending on the route’s requirements. For instance, in one route, a simple paper-based filing system and distributing hard copies of documents may be the best solution, while in another route, an online storing and document sharing platform may offer the required functionality.

There are specific aspects of the route’s functioning where the Secretary plays a central role:

Meetings

For Route Forum meetings, general member meetings, or any other formal route meeting, the Secretary is tasked with:

• Sending our invitations in accordance with the provisions in the founding document for notice periods and the format of the notice.
• Receiving and recording of  proxies or other forms of assigning authority to individuals to represent members at meetings (if applicable).
• Recording attendance at meetings and storing such attendance records.
• Taking minutes and/or record decisions at meetings, distribution of such minutes/records to the required people, and storing these minutes/records for future use.

Membership records

Except if membership administration is assigned to another Route Forum member, the Secretary is responsible for the following concerning membership:

• Receive applications for membership, process applications and communicate with applicants on the success or their applications, or if additional information is needed to process such applications, request such information from applicants.
• Keeping membership records up-to-date and reminding members to provide their new details should there be any changes.
• Sending reminders to members whose membership is about to expire.
• Support the Treasurer in collecting membership fees or other membership payments.

Functioning of the executive

Managing the information needed by the executive is one of the Secretary’s most important tasks, since a well-functioning executive will allow the route to achieve good results.

The Secretary’s role is not only to keep minutes or record of decisions at meetings of the executive, it is also to support the individual members of the executive in fulfilling their duties by ensuring that the route’s information is organised systematically in is accessible when needed.

Information from committees

The Secretary will not be involved in all the route’s committees or task teams, but is responsible for collecting and storing information relevant to the committees or task teams. In this regard, it is important for the Secretary to ensure that one person on each committee or task team is tasked with the secretarial duties of that committee or task team, and to receive the needed information from that person for storage.

The implementation of projects is normally assigned to committees or task teams. It is not the Secretary’s job to monitor the progress of these committees or teams, but it is the Secretary’s job to organise and store the reports submitted by these committees or task teams, and to ensure that these records are accessible for future use.

Use of this Guide

This Guide will help you understand the Secretary’s role in the route. It does not provide you with detailed instructions on the requirements of your founding document – this is why it is important to read this Guide along with the route’s founding document (constitution, memorandum of association or trust deed).

Other Guides, Examples and Resources

Other Guides and Case Studies in the Open Africa Route Toolkit will be of use:

• Guide: How To Lead Your Route
• Guide: How To Have Effective Meetings
• Guide: How to serve as Chairperson
• Guide: How to serve as Treasurer
• Guide: How To Elect Your Route Leadership And Appoint Them To The Best Positions
• Resource: Video: Ken Blanchard On Situational Leadership

Other resources to use

• Robert’s Rules of Order – http://www.robertsrules.org

A budget is an estimate of what you expect your route to earn and spend in the year to come. Budgeting allows you to check how your route is performing financially from week to week, or month to month. Without a budget, you would not know how much was available to spend on which activities.

This Guide explains how to prepare a budget for your route, taking into account your planned expenditure and planned income. It will also explain how to use the budget to support your priorities and control your spending.

Also look at the Guides on how to manage route finances, how to manage a project budget, and how to report on route finances.

Why is a budget important?

A budget can be seen as the financial expression of the route’s priorities and plans. Budgeting does not exist in isolation but is linked directly to what the route wants to do in the coming year and how it will achieve its aims. The budget is therefore an enabling tool, setting out how much the route will spend, when it will spend it, and what it will spend it on.

By planning a budget alongside the planned activities for the year, the Route Forum can check whether it has the resources to do what it wants to do. After all, there is little point in making plans if there are not the financial resources to carry them out.

The budget also provides a regular yardstick or benchmark against which the actual expenditure for each month can be compared. If the actual expenditure is much higher (or even lower) than the budgeted expenditure, then questions must be asked about why this is the case. It is therefore also an important governance tool for the route and its members.

What is a budget and how is it used?

A budget is a forecast or prediction of the route’s income and expenditure for the year – and it is usually split up into months. The example below shows a simple budget for three months, with a profit/loss calculated from the income minus the expenditure. A budget can also include a line for running balance to indicate how much money there should be in your bank balance; this is only a rough estimate, though, because it assumes that cash will come into the account in the month that a sale is made. This is often not the case, as customers (and even donors) do not always pay immediately or on time.

Simple budget for three months (a budget is usually done for a year, but this is three months to make it easier to see):

Budgeting for income

Depending on how your route raises its money, you can fill in the line items that are relevant to you. In the example provided, the route gets its income from three sources: membership fees, route levies, and sponsorship from large corporations. It is not always easy to know exactly how much income will be raised in each month, since it is sometimes difficult to get sponsorship confirmed so far in advance. However, the budget is meant to be an estimate and a tool, so the figures will be what the route is aiming for.

What is important is to use the budget as a goal, and then assess every month how close you have come to achieving that goal. It is not a disaster if an income target is not reached, but it does show you that something must be done about the income in order to meet the expenditure the budget has forecast. Either the income needs to be found somewhere else, or the expenditure must be reduced – if only temporarily.

In other words, the budget must be used for planning and for corrective action. It will show you where you might be going off course, so it must be looked at regularly (at least every month) by the Route Forum, which must come up with solutions if there are problems in getting enough income or in keeping expenditure under control.

Budgeting for expenditure

Working out how much the route needs to spend each month is usually an easier task than estimating the income. This is because the route should be able to plan what resources it needs (office, staff, phone, travel, stationery, etc.) to do what it has planned to do for the year.

Expenditure items usually include items such as office space rental (plus electricity, water and rates), the landline telephone (and broadband) account, a certain allowance for cellular phone calls by staff and committee members, stationery, printing and travel costs. Each route will have its own requirements, and most will try to keep these costs as low as possible (by donating office space, for example) until the route’s income is well established.

There will be unexpected expenses from time to time, but these just need to be discussed by the Route Forum and agreed before the money is spent. The budget helps here by putting a limit on what the route wants to spend each month and requiring a definite decision before anything extra is spent. This way, it is not left up to the administrator, for instance, to decide he or she can go over budget with the spending.

Applying the budget

As noted, the budget must be put to use by the Route Forum before it can be useful (don’t leave it in a file on the shelf until next year!). This means looking at the budget at each monthly meeting, and comparing the route’s actual income and expenditure with the budgeted income and expenditure.

By simply adding another column to the budget example provided, you can see that this process becomes fairly easy. Putting a Budget column and an Actual column next to each other makes it easier to compare the two numbers. The Route Forum’s financial manager or administrator can fill in the Actual figures after every month by using the income and expenditure figures on the bank statement for that month. Putting the Actual figures in a different colour can also be useful.

In the example below, the actual income and payments have been recorded for January, so this may be what the Route Forum would see when it gathers for its February meeting. The method used here is to use different colours to highlight how the Actual figure compares to the Budget figure:

• If the Actual income was lower than the Budgeted income, it represents a possible problem, so mark it in red (signifying danger!); if actual income is on budget (or better than budget), mark it in green.
• If Actual expenditure is higher than Budgeted expenditure, then mark it in red; if Actual spending is on budget (or below budget), mark it in green.

Table comparing Actual with Budgeted income and expenditure each month

Another useful column can also be added to each month: Variance. This is the difference between the Budgeted and Actual figures, expressed in rand. It is useful because it can then be clearly seen how much of a gap exists between what your route expected and what it achieved. The Variances can then be totalled up, giving the Route Forum a clear indication of financial challenges or successes.

Who is involved with budgeting?

The Route Forum’s Treasurer will usually be the one tasked with preparing the budget. They may work on this with the administrator (especially if the administrator must manage the financial paperwork) and even the Chairperson (who often is the person with an overview of everything going on). If the route has office staff, then they may also give inputs – perhaps they are having challenges because certain resources are not being fully provided for by the existing budget.

How is a budget applied to the route?

Once a draft budget is compiled, then the Route Forum needs to see it and discuss it more fully. Only once this is done can it be presented at the AGM for members to consider and approve. Once the budget has been approved in the AGM, it can then be officially implemented by the route as the framework for what can be spent.

A budget is not just a vital internal tool for planning and governance in the route, it is also a key ingredient in your funding applications. Funders and sponsors want to be assured that your route is clear about what it will spend its money on, and that you are not just guessing the amount you have requested. Remember that all funders need to account for how well their donations are spent, so the amount that you request must match the actual impact that your activity has on the route, the community and the local economy.

When you apply for funding or sponsorship, therefore, you must include a clear budget of how the money will be spent. Your case will be strengthened if you are able to show budget (and actual) figures from previous years, which show that you are competent at estimating and controlling your expenditure.

Practical tips

• Know why you are budgeting – keep in mind the importance of controlling spending and staying ‘in the black’ (spending less than the route can earn).
• Have accurate data of your route’s spending – keep good records of all invoices and receipts.
• Have a simple budgeting tool that you understand how to use – start with pencil and paper if you must. There are computer programmes that can help, but don’t use them if you find them too complicated. Rather understand what you are doing.
• Be realistic. Budgeting is like planning a diet – it’s not going to work if you expect too much too soon. Take small steps – especially when starting up.
• Update the actual amounts in the budget every month, and circulate them at the Route Forum meetings, so that the forum has an overview of financial matters. This is vital, since the solution to any problems in spending or income will have to start with this group.

Use of this Guide

This Guide can be used by the Route Forum’s Treasurer and administrator, as well as other members, to allow them to become familiar with the basics of budgeting.

Route members can also use this information in their own businesses, because all enterprises have to budget in one way or another.

Other Guides

Here are some other Guides related to finance and budgeting:

• Guide: How To Develop A Project Budget
• Guide: How To Open A Route Bank Account

Contacts and other support