Perhaps you heard about the hurricane that hit Mexico on September 14th. Odile swept in and devastated an entire peninsula, including the Los Cabos area. Cabo relies heavily on tourism to drive the economy. Tourism is the only industry, and of course, to keep the cycle going, they need a constant flow of tourists.

This came to an abrupt halt last month after the hurricane. 30,000 tourists were immediately evacuated, and the airport only reopened this past Friday, October 3rd. Hearing of the crisis in the area, tourists are scared to return to Cabo, and no longer view it as a relaxing vacation get-away.

To help salvage the economy, the Mexico Tourism Board is prepared to initiate a campaign that relies heavily on social media. The goal is to restore consumers’ trust in Los Cabos, and keep them coming back. A few features of the campaign, as reported by Travel Weekly:

• Users who posted photos about the storm will receive direct messages with updated photos of the same area, along with the message “take a look – we are back.”
• Some of these users will also receive complimentary vacations to Cabo now, so they can become ambassadors.
• #unstoppable is the hashtag to be blasted during the campaign
• Celebrities will be hired to personally respond to users who posted images of the storm, encouraging that user that Cabo is back on its feet
• A video will be made, showing tourism workers ready to welcome visitors back to Cabo
• Artists will create art installations out of debris from the storm.

Hotels, airlines, travel agencies, PR specialists and tourism officials are all working together to implement the extensive social media marketing campaign.

Can social media save an entire town? We’ll find out…

**Update: click here <– for more info on the similar VISIT FLORIDA situation of 2011.