Few destinations can lay claim to a viral tagline, boasting twitter trending and a flurry of social media spoofs, but the Philippines’ ‘It’s More Fun in the Philippines’ tag has done just that - and the proof is in the (coconut) pudding.

The Philippine Department of Tourism this week announced a 16 percent visitor arrival growth in the first quarter of 2012 compared to the same period last year, with numbers reaching an all-time high of 1,148,072.

“The world is now starting to see that ‘It’s More Fun in the Philippines’ is not just a bunch of words on a streamer. It is a competitive argument for choosing the Philippines as one of the world’s top tourist destinations,” Tourism Secretary Ramon R. Jimenez, Jr. said.

Within hours of the campaign’s launch in January, #It’sMoreFunInThePhilippines became the number one trending item on Twitter while do-it-yourself ads bombarded Facebook, CNN reported.

Roland Benzon was one of those creating their own Facebook ads and told CNN he was drawn to the democratic nature of the campaign.

"Usually it's top down," he says. "The government does something and we just sit there passively reacting to it and voicing our opinions. Here it wasn't that way. We actually made the ads."

And in a country that can boast being Asia’s first democratic nation, it’s unsurprising that some of the ads weren’t exactly kosher. One ad, featuring a still from the YouTube famous inmates of the Cebu Provincial Detention and Rehabilitation Center dancing in unison to Thriller, has the words: Prison: More fun in the Philippines.

“But I think they are good for tourism as well,” a local cab driver told e-Travel blackboard.

“They show that [Filipinos] have a good sense of humor.”

“The funny ads are still traveling the internet even months after the official ones so it’s keeping us in the news, I guess.”

According to the country’s tourism secretary, the first quarter’s results are on track to meet the Philippines’ target of 4.6 million international visitor arrivals.