SELL on TikTok, promote the Philippines?
The Department of Tourism (DOT) has partnered with the popular social media company to improve the promotion of services for micro, small, and medium tourism enterprises (MSMEs). On Tuesday, the government agency and TikTok Philippines signed a Memorandum of Agreement (MOA) for a project called, ‘Content Camp: Level Up with TikTok,’ which is designed to equip these tourism MSMEs with digital skills and tools.
Tourism Secretary Christina Garcia Frasco told reporters that among the key performance indicators to measure the success of the partnership, ‘as far as we are concerned.it will include, number one, the increase in revenue; number two, increase in market penetration because their reach is now global; and number three, the conversion. So in other words, it is our goal that it will convert into actual arrivals, actual revenues, and actual expansions in businesses.’
For his part, Yves Gonzalez, Head of Public Policy for TikTok Philippines, said in a mix of Filipino and English that workshops will be held for interested tourism SMEs. ‘Those who still don’t know how to use [TikTok], we will teach them how to use it, while those who already know, we will teach them to level up. We will teach them how to do content creation, effective use of the live feature, as well as advertising. So it’s about really empowering them with digital skills to allow them to level up.’
He added there will be 50 MSME-participants for each training batch, to initially be carried out for an entire day, and accessible via in person or online.
Frasco explained that as the agency has a registry of tourism MSMEs, DOT regional offices can identify and target specific businesses which may be interested in the project and help expand their enterprises. The project will be rolled out nationwide starting November, although pilot areas will be in the National Capital Region and Cebu.
Close to 98 percent of tourism businesses in the Philippines are MSMEs. TikTok has some 2 billion subscribers globally, with over 62 million active users in the Philippines.
The beauty of this partnership is that it aligns with the objectives of TikTok, which has a global reach, and the objectives of Philippine tourism, which seeks to benefit the entire nation. And with that, the execution can be immediately seen in terms of impact, especially with those destinations that need it the most at this time,’ she added, citing Cebu, whose tourism businesses have been affected by the recent magnitude 6.9 earthquake.
‘Considering the vast reach of ancillary services that tourism benefits, we will try to be as diverse as possible.[and] the priority [businesses] are those which already have viable products to sell,’ she noted, be it delicacies, souvenirs, T-shirts, and other tourism-related products.
The DOT chief expressed hope that the Department of Trade and Industry can help support the selling of these tourism products overseas. ‘We do have a convergence program with the DTI,’ said Frasco, citing the Turismo Asenso loan program as an example.
DOT data showed 4.3 million international travelers arrived from January to September 2025, some 2.4 percent less than the same period last year. Of total arrivals, there were only 3.9 million foreign nationals, 3.5 percent less than last year’s 4.08 million, while overseas Filipinos reached 392,317, up 10.3 percent from the same period last year.
The DOT aims to attract 6.7 million inbound tourists in 2026.