London Olympics- Hopes Geared up for Scottish Tourism
The 2012 Olympics and Paralympics Games to take place in the great city of London has put off many visitors and tourists, who had planned and is planning for a sight-seeing visit. The reasons behind this is said to be the perception of congestion and higher prices. Scotland tourism has seen this as an advantage to boost its marketing activities to draw more visitors to the country.
The official website of Scotland is seem to tactically target those looking to get away from the South East during London Olympics 2012. Visitors to the Olympics or other major events were primarily drawn by the event itself, and could displace “normal” tourists who could be discouraged by perceptions of congestion and inflated prices for accommodation and other services. This has also given more chance for hoteliers and travel businesses in Scotland to surplus their marketing. Continue reading
Scotland Staycations to Boost Economy
Staycations in Scotland seems to boost the country’s tourism sector. New statistics show that this boost still continues. Those who are engaged into hotel business is now calls on this sector to tap into fresh opportunities. The companies like KarmaKerala is more on to focusing on homestay tourism.
The statistics this year (according to the Great Britain Tourism Survey and the International Passenger Survey) shows that between the months of January and June, there was a total of 6.9 million visits to Scotland, up 4 per cent on the same period in 2010. Domestic visits, which account for 84 per cent of all trips to Scotland, were up 6 per cent to 5.9 million, with Scotland outperforming the rest of Britain.
The figures, which include UK and overseas visits, show that the international picture continues to be challenging, although there are indications that Scotland’s biggest market, North America, is showing signs of recovery with a 7 per cent increase in visitor numbers.
These figures encourage Scotland’s tourism sector as the country is moving on to the ‘winning years’, which aims to capitalise on the huge economic opportunities that lie ahead, including the London Olympic and Paralympic Games, Homecoming 2014, Commonwealth Games and Ryder Cup 2014.”
Taking all these positive things into account, Scottish tourism can exploit the trend for “staycations” and, the huge private investment in the sector to make the industry a beacon of economic growth in Scotland.
Seminar on Social Media Impact on Tourism At St.Andrews on 25 October
The Scottish Enterprise is organising a 4 hour free seminar on 25 October 2011 at St. Andrews Links Trust Golf Practice Centre on how social media can influence the tourism industry.
It has found that Social media is fundamentally changing the tourism industry. The businesses like Gobananas are using these tools to get their message across and to draw their customers closer to them.
Since, the social media has found to be effective in tourism business, tourists are “liking” a venue on Facebook, describing their experiences on TripAdvisor, or posting their videos and photos on YouTube and Flickr. Customers are using these tools to choose how and where to spend their leisure time and money.
The seminar on social media is to demonstrate on how these tools works, why they are important and how to make them work for businesses, using inspirational and practical examples.The seminar is done using following steps.
1. Understand the impact of social networking on the tourism industry
2. Learn about the power of social networking for business
3. Learn which sites and which technologies suit your business and your customers
4. See how you can get others to do your marketing for you
5. Improve and strengthen your reputation, your credibility and your customer relationships
6. Be inspired by real world examples and successes.
The e-business experts of the Scottish Enterprise are at your help to give further advice and explore what else they can do to help. The criteria to attend the seminar is you must be into a tourism business.
2010 Marked Record Increase for Scottish Food & Drink Exports
Making a remarkable footprint for the Scotland Hotels Industry, Scottish food and drink exports during 2010 reached a record increase. The food exports alone reached a £1 billion barrier for the first time ever. The largest share of food exports was in the fish and seafood sector, with international sales hitting £620 million.
The figures which were taken from the HMRC export statistics for 2010 show that food exports grew by almost 14% to £1.06 billion, with the combined total international sales for Scottish food and Scotch whisky increasing by 11 percent to £4.51 billion during last year. Continue reading