This study explores the impact of marketing on tourism development in Nigeria. It critically and contextually examines marketing’s pervasiveness and dynamism, the current marketing strategies used to promote Nigerian tourism destinations and evaluate their effectiveness. It highlights tourism marketing, its key elements, objectives and characteristics, tourism markets, tourism marketing mix (7Ps) and market positioning of tourism products and services, among others. Findings reveal that despite Nigeria’s abundant cultural and natural tourism resources, the sector is underperforming due to fragmented marketing efforts, low digital engagement, and inadequate branding, among others. The study highlights the need for a unified tourism brand, improve digital marketing, public-private partnerships and enhance infrastructure. The study concluded that the absence of a strong national tourism identity, coupled with infrastructural challenges and lack of collaboration between public and private stakeholders, significantly undermines efforts to attract tourists. For Nigeria to fully harness the potential of tourism as a tool for economic diversification and national development, it must adopt innovative, strategic and coordinated marketing approaches. We, therefore, make the following recommendations which focused on leveraging modern marketing techniques to unlock the tourism sectors food potentials as a driver of economic growth and national development; create a unified and appealing brand identity (e.g. slogan, logo, and campaigns} to position Nigeria as a must – visit destination and invest in professional website, social media campaigns, influencer partnership and SEO to reach global travelers, among others.
Keywords: Marketing, Tourism Marketing., tourism marketing mix, tourism markets and tourism products and services
