Tourist Potential of Vojvodina and Serbia: Discover, Develop, and Promote.
For the last 30 years, all our projects at Magelan Agency have shared the common goal of strengthening tourism and empowering local organizers and residents to recognize and utilize their inherent values and opportunities.
Magellan's contemporaries, whose name we chose for our agency, were known for capturing the public's attention and convincing people of their ideas. We have followed this path, believing it to be important for all of us. We have strengthened tourism, aware that its branches will not grow if we do not take care of its roots.
Bringing as many foreign guests to Serbia as possible. At Magelan, we recognized this as the greatest potential of domestic tourism. While almost all travel agencies were focused on taking our people abroad, we were pioneers in receptive tourism.
Thanks to this vision, Magelan is now one of the leading agencies for receptive tourism in Serbia. We have equally helped numerous agencies and local tour organizers, as well as the local population, to find their opportunity for growth.
More and more foreign and domestic tourists began choosing Serbia for vacation or business events, contributing to local development.
We launched the Visit Novi Sad tourist portal and brochure in 2001, followed by Visit Vojvodina in 2002, aware that the presentation of tourist offerings must appeal to potential guests.
After identifying our strengths and offers that could attract foreign and domestic tourists, we realized that a digitalized offering was the way to reach them. This led to our next logical project.
In 2005, we created the VisitSerbia.org tourist portal, the most comprehensive tourism presentation of Serbia at the time, with an online accommodation reservation system. The system featured around 130 hotels that regularly updated their information and enabled online reservations.
In addition to individual reservations, the portal generated many group inquiries, making Magelan one of the leading agencies for inbound tourists in Serbia.
By providing faster and easier access, "with a click," the Visit Serbia online reservation system for accommodation contributed to the development of domestic, receptive tourism.
Our efforts to recognize and enhance tourist potential have been rewarded multiple times. One of the most significant recognitions came in 2008 with the "White Angel" award for the development of technology in tourism for the VisitSerbia site and the first online reservation system in Serbia.
Improving cooperation and developing tourism in the Danube region by researching the market, creating tourist products, educating tourism employees, and promoting tourism - these were the goals of the ISTAR 21 Cluster, an association we founded in early 2008 with the support of the Ministry of Economy and Regional Development of Serbia.
Our desire was to unite all the values along the Danube through this project and present this area as a unique tourist product, both domestically and internationally.
Although 25% of the Danube's course is in Serbia, its potential for the country's economic development remains an untapped treasure. This area boasts significant natural and cultural potentials for tourism development that have not yet been adequately valorized. We started from this foundation.
The ISTAR 21 Cluster included all municipalities along the Danube, as well as entrepreneurs – hoteliers, sailors, accommodation owners, souvenir manufacturers and shops, travel agencies and organizations, wine, brandy, and other food product producers, and all other entities involved in or supplying the tourism industry. These are the ones who can ensure better placement of the Danube's tourist offerings.
By uniting in the ISTAR 21 cluster, tourism industry entities and institutions interested in tourism development in the Vojvodina Danube region aimed to contribute to creating an authentic regional tourist product that could be marketed to the European market, being competitive and increasing tourism traffic and profits for all members.
We always thought about the potentials that have not been sufficiently showcased or perhaps not in adequate ways, while also striving to view our destinations through the eyes of visitors.
We believed that tourists attracted to this theme are generally curious to meet people, traditions, customs, and experience new things. They expect an experience and new adventures.
This foundation helped the ISTAR 21 cluster generate numerous ideas, new projects from cluster members, but above all, a change in thinking about presenting our unique qualities. Each project recognized that people remember impressions, which helped us approach them more closely and bring them to us. One of the first ideas generated from this project was to better understand our own backyard.
We took a step back. We initiated development and promotional projects for domestic tourism. To successfully conduct tours in Serbia, we realized that we first had to start with ourselves. From the fact that all of us in tourism and all of us living here need to become aware of what we have and what we are proud of. Then, on that basis, build offers that would be attractive to our guests.
This is how the project "The Wealth of Diversity" was born. Its goal was to inventory resources, identify the best-equipped villages, and develop cultural tourism in the Danube region. We implemented it with the support of the Executive Council of Vojvodina in 2011. We aimed to bring truly "tangible" ideas for people to see, feel, and get to know Vojvodina.
In Europe, there is no such large region with so many different nations, all of whom have been here for at least 300 years. Vojvodina is the only area where six languages are officially used. On the other hand, it was equally important for us to listen to what all those people who come expect to see and what was special for them. Because our views might not necessarily align with theirs.
What is the unique, authentic experience at your destination? This question guided us. We intrigued the municipalities in Vojvodina with the same questions. Through a competition, we selected 17 villages most ready for Vojvodina's tourist promotion from a multicultural perspective.
The project also aimed to revive old crafts, produce and sell souvenirs, preserve traditions, promote authentic products and gastronomy, and enhance the capacities of women and youth in rural areas.
As part of the project, we organized numerous trainings for promoting rural tourism, with participation in many domestic and international fairs (Berlin, London, Budapest, Celje, Belgrade, Novi Sad, Poreč, etc.).
We increased our visibility and tourists' interest. Simultaneously, we "awakened" villages in Vojvodina and the Danube region, enhancing their tourist potential. We continued developing the idea through new projects. Among them, the idea persisted that now, knowing what we have, we should get closer to the tourists we want to see at these destinations. Thus, we became pioneers in digitalizing the domestic tourism offering. More details about the project can be found on the website www.bogatstvorazlicitosti.rs.
In 2011, we created the SerbianAdventures.com tourist portal for online booking of excursions in Serbia in collaboration with the Provincial Secretariat for Economy and Tourism of Vojvodina, aiming to unify all travel offers in Serbia.
The system displays offers from over 30 organizers and features more than 200 excursions. In addition to online booking, clients can leave comments. The site is promoted through social media and regular mailing campaigns to site subscribers.
Apart from improving site functionality, Magelan helps other organizers who lack experience in creating their offers to increase sales. The partner portal is YUTA - the association of travel agencies of Serbia. The portal has a developed partner network.
From idea to realization in less than 28 days. Such was the enthusiasm driving us in executing the Wine Passport of Serbia project. We worked on it from 2015 to 2016.
The project aimed to increase the visibility of lesser-known wineries and motivate "ordinary" tourists to start visiting wineries independently. In 2015, the Wine Passport was first promoted and organized in Serbia during the Open Wine Cellars Day.
The Wine Passport resembles a real passport. Using the passport requires initial registration, and each page of the passport, where a winery is presented, has space for a stamp confirming the visit. Those who collected the most stamps would win a prize trip. In addition to the passport, all wineries were presented on the website www.vinskipasossrbije.com.
We were the first to initiate and promote birdwatching to popularize this activity, aiming to extend the time spent in nature and raise awareness of the importance of protecting natural assets, birds, and their habitats.
Another motive for this project was the recognition that in many countries, birdwatching brings significant revenue, attracting tourists year-round, who then require accommodation, authentic food and drink, and local guides.
In 2010, we organized the First Birdwatching Fair in Serbia, "Birdwatch Serbia," in the Special Nature Reserve in Zasavica. For the first time, we gathered representatives of all Serbia's natural assets, experts in ornithology, biology, ecology, sustainable development, mountaineers, scouts, campers, photographers, and other nature enthusiasts. The fair also saw participation from ministries, tourist and non-governmental organizations, media, school groups, and many others.
We opened another important chapter for domestic tourism.
Culminating our work and a logical follow-up to all our knowledge and experiences, we identified all potentials and problems faced by domestic organizers. This led to the new project that practically united everything we observed and worked on in the past three decades.
In 2020, we created the BOS4.tours platform, the most advanced technological solution for promoting tours and destinations. It provides an opportunity to unite and strengthen mutual businesses, where each partner becomes part of a comprehensive domestic tourism offering in a unique marketplace for tourism, leisure, and enjoyment in nature.
BOS4.tours is designed to meet the needs of tourists, agencies, guides, accommodation owners, institutions, and everyone involved in tourism and related sectors. The platform serves as a marketplace for booking and selling offers, a social network for knowledge exchange and experience sharing, and an online database for promoting tours and all services and experiences relevant to tourists.
The BOS4.tours platform features a simple administrative panel with user-friendly steps for registration and offer submission, where an offer can be presented in multiple languages and with various details.
The BOS4.tours platform also includes a social network component, enabling users to connect, share experiences, and gain insights into other users' activities.
The BOS4.tours platform is continuously upgraded and improved to meet the ever-changing needs of the tourism industry and the growing demands of tourists.
If you have the same goal and would like to work together with us on it, we would be delighted. Please get in touch.
Biljana Marčeta, Founder and Owner of Magelan Travel Agency
