In recent times, various sectors, localities, units, and businesses in Son La province have actively applied digital technology, contributing to building and promoting the image of Son La tourism. The Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism has strengthened the application of digital technology in communication, promotion, and tourism development, implementing multi-platform communication campaigns on digital environments such as Facebook, YouTube, TikTok, and Zalo.

Numerous video clips, short films, digital publications, and virtual reality (VR 360) tours have been produced and released, vividly showcasing the natural landscapes, unique culture, and people of Son La, allowing tourists to explore the destination online anytime, anywhere.

Aiming to build a modern, smart, and sustainable tourism industry, Son La's tourism sector has continuously promoted digital transformation at the management and operational levels. A notable achievement is the launch of the "Son La Tour" smart tourism ecosystem. "Son La Tour" is a smart tourism ecosystem built to connect tourists, locals, and businesses on a digital platform. This marks a significant step in Son La's digital transformation, aiming to develop tourism in a modern, smart, professional, and friendly direction. The transparency offered by this ecosystem will increase the attractiveness of the tourism sector to tourists and investors, and improve the efficiency of state management in the tourism field.

Popular tourist destinations in the province are widely promoted on social media platforms.

Previously, the launch of the "Moc Chau Tour" software in 2023 and "Quynh Nhai Tour" in 2024 also marked a turning point in the digital transformation of tourism in these localities. These intelligent software applications help digitize destinations, products, and services ranging from tourism, cuisine, culture, traditional products, OCOP (One Commune One Product), and local specialties to providing information on accommodation, restaurants, and eateries… enabling users to fully experience tourism in Son La.

Many tourism cooperatives in the province have quickly embraced social media platforms and utilized them as tools to promote unique local tourism products and services. Short videos and beautiful images of magnificent natural landscapes, local life, culture, and distinctive cuisine are recorded and posted on social media.

According to assessments from tourism cooperatives in the province: Social media is a fast and effective communication channel, helping cooperatives promote and quickly reach tourists everywhere. The cooperatives maintain a team of young, tech-savvy staff to create videos and images, update them daily, create appeal for tourist areas, and widely promote local tourism.

Over the years, Son La province has also implemented scientific and technological projects on tourism development; building, managing, and developing the Son La tourism brand domestically and internationally, along with guiding and protecting intellectual property rights in tourism business. Currently, initial steps have been taken to apply VR (virtual reality) technology to build a model for visiting the Son La Prison National Special Monument, and to digitize five historical sites to meet the information needs of tourists.

The Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism has intensified the implementation of various solutions to support localities and businesses in carrying out digital transformation in tourism. Through consulting workshops, seminars, training courses, and tourism development networking events, effective solutions have been suggested for managing and developing tourism services. Business activities are implemented through various forms, both direct and online, including marketing, product promotion, market research and expansion, consulting, customer care, and online transactions such as buying, selling, and payment. This helps save costs for businesses and meets the needs of tourists anytime, anywhere.

Digital technology is increasingly involved in the development of tourism. Not only is it an effective promotional tool, but digitalization also helps state management agencies better manage tourism activities. These are initial results demonstrating the adaptation to the increasingly strong digital transformation of Son La tourism.../.

Le Hang