Share this:

Four exceptionally well-informed speakers gave their analysis of the industry at the 2010 WTA Annual Conference on 22nd October, and lifted the veil on some powerful new marketing opportunities:

TOURISM MARKETING

Over 100 million people use a web map each month.

Mobile phones with maps are already telling visitors the who, what, where and when about their destinations, how to get to there and what to do during their stay.

Many smartphones are already location-aware, enabling visitors to ‘point and find’ things at their destinations.

Over the next two years mobile phones will overtake PCs as the most common way to access the worldwide web.

Searchers become 150% more engaged with a property’s website if there are more than 20 photographs on it; according to TripAdvisor research on their own site.

TripAdvisor can now be used by owners to manage the reputation of their properties by counter-managing bad reviews and responding to good reviews and saying sorry or thankyou to create new sales opportunities.

Property owners can receive TripAdvisor reviews by email as soon as they’re published.

VisitBritain YouTube videos notched up 300,000 views in August.

Social networking is not just for kids; the average age of Facebook users is 37 and the fastest-growing age group is 55+.

Social networking and crowd-sourcing can be used to vote the ‘Top 50 Places’ in Wales’, the ‘Top 50 Aspirations’ generic to Wales, and to produce a ‘Global Guestbook for Wales’.

There are already 10,000 checked-in places on Facebook where visitors have been and reported their findings to Facebook ‘Place’.

Driven by geo-spatial data, the worldwide web has evolved from a web of interconnected pages to a web of inter-related information available anytime, anywhere via hand-held mobile devices.

TOURISM INDUSTRY

Tourism is the fifth biggest industry in the UK and its growth will be led by the private sector through partnership and collaboration.

The UK’s share of the UK domestic market for holidays is set to rise from 36% to 50% owing to staycations.

The UK aspires to move from seventh to fifth most popular international holiday destination over the next three years.

Tourism is one of China’s five economic pillars of growth with China soon becoming the number one English speaking country in the world.

All these opportunities and more are available to accommodation providers in Wales at http://wales.info/admin/ourpackages2011.asp with mobile phone services and maps already installed in members’ Wales.info wbsites ready for 2011.

A new Online Booking membership category also makes its debut for 2011 to help speed round-the-clock booking transactions.

Call 0800 422 00 88 or email tourismwalesuk@eviivo.com direct quoting your property name and Unique ID to waive up to £295 set up charges before 31st December this year.

Advertisement