VisitScotland has announced the closure of some of its tourism information outlets such as the one at Edinburgh Airport, but it is taking a new approach to ways to keep in touch with visitors.
Instead of high street outlets they are embarking on a two year project to significantly increase the number of ways that information is made available. This will include Coo Vans and digital information on offer at various tourist attractions such as Camera Obscura & World of Illusions and Arnold Clark at Edinburgh Airport.
The 15 million visitors to Scotland will now have every chance of getting the right information in the right way according to VisitScotland.
They now have over 1500 VisitScotland Information Partners across the country to offer information touchpoints in as many destinations as possible. There will be distilleries, B&Bs, social enterprises, bakeries and other local businesses involved in bringing the new digital strategy to visitors.
Annually, visitscotland.com generates 20 million sessions from over 13million users and includes online booking availability, interactive community pages, blogs and a trip planner tool.
In the last 12 months, the redesigned visitscotland.com has delivered 2.7 million referrals worth a potential £560m to businesses (+45% year on year 2016/17). The VisitScotland online iKnow community currently has over 5000 users and over 7000 trips have been created using the website’s trip planner tool. Other digital outreach includes innovative partnerships with TripAdvisor, Booking.com and Digital Tourism Scotland.
In Edinburgh and the Lothians, the high footfall Edinburgh Princes Street VisitScotland iCentre will be one of the 26 iconic new travel hubs, welcoming over 371,000 visitors a year. Located in the heart of Scotland’s Capital, the centre is right next to the city’s main transport hubs and is set to receive investment in the next three to five years.
Founding Editor of The Edinburgh Reporter.
Edinburgh-born multimedia journalist and iPhoneographer.
