The potential of tourism owned by Palembang city has not been optimally excavated. It causes only a few tourist objects are known by people outside of Palembang, both domestic and foreign.Generally, the typical tourist attraction of Palembang city that is known by people outside Palembang is Ampera Bridge only. Though there are many other attractions in Palembang which can be a tourist destinations. Related on it, the problems faced by the City Government is less than optimal campaigns made. A communication strategy is needed to promote the existing tourist attractions in Palembang in order to increase the visits of foreign tourists to Palembang. Especially Palembang will host the 2018 Asian Games XVIII event. Palembang city can use these moments in accelerating the growth of its tourism sector.Based on these problems, the purpose of this study is to find out how the communication strategy undertaken by the Department of Tourism of Palembang City in promoting tourist destinations in Palembang before Asian Games XVIII 2018 through a package tour program "Palembang Asiik". This research will use Lasswell's communication formula to analyze who is the communicators, what messages, what media are used, who the target audience is, and what effects they have. The method used in this research is descriptive qualitative with data taking: observation and documentation. The result shows that communicator in this research, is Association of Indonesian Travel Company (Asita) South Sumatera Province. Messages that are carried through the package tour is safe, exciting, efficient, beautiful, and memories. Media used to promote this program include new media, through Instagram. Target audiences in this tour program are foreign tourists, especially Asia. The effect of this program is increasing the number of tourist.

Keywords: communication strategies, government tourism office of Palembang, promotion tour, Asian Games XVIII 2018,

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