Wow Philippines (stylized as WOW Philippines) was a tourism marketing campaign used to promote tourism in the Philippines from 2002 to 2012. The name of the campaign also served as its tagline.
Then Department of Tourism secretary Richard Gordon conceptualized the tagline "Wow Philippines" himself in 2002. The government agency then has a limited budget allotted for advertising.[1] The promotional campaign was based on the 24-month Visit Philippines 2003 campaign by the World Tourism Organization which aimed to encourage the Filipino diaspora to visit tourism sites in the Philippines.[2]
The Department of Tourism (DOT) then commissioned advertising firm BBDO Guerrero[3] for the implementation of the campaign. This includes the coming up with promotional materials and the addition of "More than the Usual" as a sub slogan.[1] Also the "Wow" of the campaign slogan is meant to be capitalized which doubles as an acronym. The meaning of the acronym varies depending on the usage of the slogan according to the government agency. The following are some possible meanings given by the DOT are the following:[2]
From 2003 to 2005, several tourism campaigns were conceptualized which include "Biyahe Tayo" (Pfizer and Perceptions Inc.), "I Love Philippines Biyahe Na!" (Smart) and "Pilipino sa Turismo'y Aktibo" (Philippine Tourism Authority, ABS-CBN and Star Music). The following personalities from the entertainment and political field lent their popularity to promote tourism to mainstream audiences during that time:[5] [6]
Between 2007 and 2012, foreign visits in the Philippines increased from about 3 million to 4.27 million.[7] The campaign also generated 2800-4000 jobs.[8]
A remake of "Biyahe Tayo" was produced in 2011 and was re-titled as "Pilipinas, Tara Na!" and also had expanded lyrics with the addition of other artists including Pepe Smith, Zsa Zsa Padilla, Martin Nievera, Jaya, Kitchie Nadal, Kyla, Jay R, Billy Crawford, Aiza Seguerra, Nikki Gil, Yeng Constantino and Sam Concepcion among others, with additional spoken parts from Dolphy and Manny Pacquiao. A few of the artists were absorbed from the original version such as Gibbs, Alcasid, Jim Paredes and Boboy Garovillo (of the APO Hiking Society) and Villegas.[9]
In 2003, the Wow Philippines campaign was named as the Best Marketing Effort of a National Tourism Organization in the overall category in 2002 at the Internationale Tourismus Bourse.[2]