Our Year's Activities
Information & Inspiration Strategy
Our job is not only to provide information - via various channels - but to inspire our visitors to see and do more. Our information has to be rich, descriptive, yet clearly written and in formats to suit all types of visitors.
We continue to inspire our visitors and market Scotland as a 'must-see, must-return' destination. Our marketing activity has gone from strength to strength, generating impressive returns on investment and peer recognition. We've won an impressive range of awards in recent years.
Apart from our marketing campaigns, very often the first port of call for potential customers is visitscotland.com, the website run by the national booking and contact centre, in Livingston. This is a highly successful website with links to the 14 areas of Scotland, together with specialist websites for citybreaks or adventure trips. A number of our websites are written in European languages to target important key customers.
And once visitors are here we're keen to welcome them into our Tourist Information Centres (TIC). This network of over 100 TICs runs from Southwaite in Cumbria to Lerwick in the Shetland Isles. Our staff in the TICs are a dedicated, experienced group with bags of enthusiasm. These qualities are essential to inform and inspire visitors. Recent consumer research has confirmed that most overseas and UK visitors are interested in finding out about the hidden gems of an area, rather than simply reading the Guide Book. And one of the best ways to do this is to visit a TIC where you can discuss your interests face to face with a local expert.
Technology is influencing how we make information available to our visitors. It also makes it possible to provide an information service remotely, ie at an event or even out on the High Street. We have been carrying out a series of projects to test wireless IT devices and have introduced electronic what's on e-bulletins to allow businesses to provide their guests with up to the minute information.
And finally we work hard to keep in touch with visitors once they have returned home. We send e-newsletters and relevant information (but only if customers have given us permission to do so). This is an important communications channel as visitors often pass these on to friends and family. There's no doubt that 'word of mouth' remains one of the most powerful sources of inspiration.