Kerala, God's Own Country, bestowed with enchanting backwaters and pristine beaches is stealing the limelight in social media circuit and its tourism Facebook page has been ranked the Best Facebook page in 2017.
"Kerala Tourism has been able to successfully convey the reasons Kerala is a destination that should be on every traveler's itinerary," Tourism Secretary, Rani George said in a release.
The state tourism's Facebook page has garnered 1.5 million likes to be rated top among the states in the country in 2017, according to the release. It said Kerala, with its breathtaking scenic beauty, pushed Jammu and Kashmir and Gujarat Tourism's Facebook pages to the second and third place respectively.
Facebook carried out the ranking based on total engagement with tourists that included reactions, shares and comments on the page between January 1 and December 31, 2017. Facebook recently released the data on the top-ranked Facebook pages of government bodies, ministries and political parties in the country.
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Following the news, Kerala Tourism Director P Bala Kiran received the award at the Facebook office in New Delhi. Social media site Public Policy Manager (India, South and Central Asia) Nitin Saluja presented the award. And Tourism Minister Kadakampally Surendran congratulated the team for the achievement.
The Kerala Tourism department's presence on social media had conveyed the message to millions across the world that the state is a destination that should be on every traveler's itinerary, George said, adding, "The laurel from Facebook was heartening."
The Facebook page ranking comes at a time when Kerala Tourism had upped the Digital marketing budget to 15 per cent and been communicating to the people across the globe in "exciting ways", Kiran said.
He also said that Kerala Tourism's activity on social media space has been able to keep travelers from India and abroad engaged with interesting and innovative posts on the projects and activities undertaken by the department.