Guest lecture, delivered to masters students at Università Ca' Foscari Venezia, Italy, covering digital marketing, social media, mobile and e-learning technologies. Prepared and delivered April 2011.

1. Tourism Marketing and Technology
Andrew Daines
29 April 2011

2. About me: Andrew Daines
• Travel and tourism industry professional
– 14 years with VisitBritain
– 3 years in the commercial travel sector
– European Travel Commission Marketing & Technology
Network chairman (2010) and vice chairman (2008‐9)
– Business and Tourism Management graduate
• Main interests
– Travel
– Food and drink
linkedin.com/in/andrewdaines facebook.com

3. Agenda
• Overview: from electronic brochures to
permanent, deep relationships
• The NTO / DMO perspective
– Development of a National Tourism Platform
– Using technology to support offline channels
• Social media
– VisitBritain’s social media strategy
• Mobile: 24/7 social media

4. Year Global online
population (millions)
2000 361
2002 587
2004 817
2006 1,093
2008 1,574
2010 2,050
Source: Internet World Stats

5. The future?

6. Case study
Development of a National Tourism
Platform for Britain

7. The role of the DMO (or NTO)
• To increase the value of the destination’s
tourism industry, including:
– To increase spend by visitors
– To reduce seasonality
– To increase the spread of business
– To ensure long‐term sustainability

8. The web: an electronic brochure

9. visitbritain.com: objectives
Consumer needs:
• Ideas and inspiration
• Information, to make an informed choice
• To be able to book easily
• An assurance of quality
Industry needs:
• Advance sales of perishable product
• Low‐cost ways to make sales

10. visitbritain.com: a shop window

11. Accommodation data – pre‐2005
Scotland
TRIPS interface
Britain Visitor
Centre
Northern England
TRIPS interface
Central England BTA Overseas
TRIPS interface offices
Leased line
Southern England connections TRIPS
TRIPS interface
Database
South West
England TRIPS
interface
London
TRIPS interface
Wales
TRIPS interface
BTA / ETB
TRIPS interface

12. TRIPS database
• Reasonably comprehensive in terms of
quantity of data, but limited in depth
• Data collected and managed by, national and
regional tourist boards
• Data updated once per year
• Extracting data difficult – distribution limited
to visitbritain.com, overseas offices and
Britain Visitor Centre

13. Evolution of
Destination Management Systems (DMSs)
• Destination management ‘in a box’
• Product database at its core
– Mechanism to collect and manage data
• Product data populates a variety of services
• ‘Self‐service’ or ‘serviced’ models
• Long‐standing DMS suppliers:
– Tiscover
– New Vision Group (NVG)
– New Mind

14. DMSs emergence in the UK – late
1990s onwards
Call centre
Destination
Management Website
Product
database
System
Brochure
production
Kiosk
Destination Website
Management Product
database
System Tourist
Information
Centre
Member
comms
Destination
Website
Management Product
database
System Hotel TV

15. Destination Management Systems
• Met the requirements of the destination, in
terms of functionality and budget
• Product data much richer than TRIPS
• Ability of offer lots of services to tourism
businesses – but limited distribution
opportunities available

16. Overall situation
• Duplication of effort regarding product data
management
– Confusion for tourism businesses and visitors
– Inconsistencies
• No national value‐add services (e.g. booking)
• Limited distribution of content
• Failure to meet consumer and industry
expectations

17. A call for action
• 2001: the year of:
– Foot and Mouth outbreak in the UK
– Large parts of country devastated by flooding
– Fuel crisis
– 9/11 Terrorist Attacks
• 2002: English Tourism Council:
– E‐tourism in England strategy
– Partnership formed with the
10 English regional tourist
boards to create EnglandNet
(the National Tourism Open Platform)

18. E‐Tourism for England, 2002:
Key objectives
• National product database: data collected once only
• Bookability of accommodation and other product
• Systems flexible, to enable distribution onto new
platforms, e.g. mobile
• Integration at a Britain level with systems used in
Wales and Scotland
• Global distribution via British Tourist Authority
networks
• The prize: England gains competitive advantage as a
destination by serving consumer and industry

19. EnglandNet:
Key objectives at outset
• Investment into Destination Management Systems by
Regional Tourist Boards and Destinations should be
protected
• Flexibility for Regional Tourist Boards and Destinations
to choose their own systems / solutions
• Integration with global players – Global Distribution
Systems, Travel Agents, Tour Operators, etc.
• Core requirement: common approach ‐ interoperability

20. EnglandNet /
National Tourism Open Platform
• Services
– National Tourism Product Database (2004)
• Accommodation, attractions, events, activities, destination guides
– Interoperability Gateway (2004)
– Polling Service (2005)
– White Label Product Search (2009)
– Product Search / Polling Application Programming
Interfaces (APIs) (2009)
– Portable Travel Channel (2010)
– Smartphone Application (2010)
• Core principle: open platform

21. National Tourism Product Database
• 50,000 accommodation products
• 12,000 attractions
• 6,000 events
• 700 activities
• 1,000 destination guides
• One product, one owner
• Product owners:
– National product owner
– National, regional or destination tourism organisation (default owner)
– Marketing Group

22. Content supply: product owners

23. National Data Aggregation
Official product
ratings / awards
National
Tourism
Product
Database VisitBritain
Destination
Management
Application
Interoperability
Gateway
Property Nation / Nation / Nation / National National Marketing
Management Region / Region / Region / Product Owner Product Owner Group
System Destination Destination Destination
Tourism Tourism Tourism
business business business

24. Look Book – ‘Polling Service’
• Real‐time availability and price checking for
accommodation product
• Non transactional
• Provides a ‘deep link’ to one of 40 sales agents,
where the transaction can be completed
• Sales agent partners:
– National, regional and sub‐regional tourism
organisations
– National Product Owners
– Marketing Groups
• Over 16,000 unique pollable products

27. Polling Service: key benefits
• For the tourism businesses:
– Wide range of sales agents / commercial models
• For the consumer:
– Wide range of bookable accommodation product
– Opportunity to compare prices
• For VisitBritain:
– Opportunity to offer bookability without handling the
transaction
• For national product owners / OTAs
– Open platform – routes to market

28. Global, national and regional distribution
VisitBritain
offline / print
Third party
websites
Global and Other online
national National devices
websites Tourism
Product
Database
Third party
offline
Interoperability
Regional Gateway
campaign
TIC extranet
Cross‐regional
campaign

29. White Label Product Search deployment

30. Polling Service deployment

31. API deployment

32. Portable Travel Channel

33. Smartphone Application

34. Performance: White Label Product Search
Polling Service
2007/8 2008/9 2009/10 2010/11
Number of referrals 17,637 18,929 82,422 272,554
Value of referrals 4,588,343 4,161,855 17,015,325 64,274,618
(£)
Number of 1,228 2,297 10,898 13,741
bookings
Value of bookings 187,982 391,545 1,803,750 2,335,907
(£)

35. Conclusions
• NTOs can add value by providing leadership and
an environment for collaboration
• Working together isn’t necessarily the easiest or
quickest option
• Each stakeholder must have a clear
understanding of the role every stakeholder plays
• Stay focused on the end goals and prizes

36. Case study
Using technology to support offline channels

37. Supporting offline channels – why?
• Despite size and growth of the online
population, a significant number of visitors
book travel through traditional agents
• Ensuring travel agents know about product
and are incentivised to sell it is key
• How can technology be deployed to reach
travel agents and maximise efficiencies?

38. Introducing BritAgent
• In late 2010, VisitBritain launched BritAgent, an
online, self‐study programme for travel agents

39. BritAgent
• Tailored to local markets, the agent works
through a series of modules, at their own
pace, then undertakes an assessment

40. BritAgent
• Agents need to achieve 80% or higher to pass
the assessment. When they have passed each
module’s assessment, they become a qualified
BritAgent.

41. BritAgent: key benefits
• For travel agents:
– Increased knowledge should make it easier to sell
Britain
– BritAgent contains lots of information about
commissionable products – increased earnings
– Receive regular, exclusive communication from
VisitBritain (London and local offices) – including
product news, promotions, offers and
competitions

42. BritAgent: key benefits
• For the travel industry:
– A highly targeted route to market for product and
service providers
• Inclusion in modules or assessments
• Inclusion in e‐newsletters, online resources
• Sponsorships opportunities
– Qualified BritAgents best placed to qualify for
product knowledge / familiarisation trips

43. BritAgent: stats to date
• 4 modules
– Britain The Basics, Destination Britain, Selling The
Experience, MICE
• 17 markets
– USA, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Hungary,
Czech Republic, Netherlands, Poland, Russia, UAE,
India, Korea, Thailand, China, Hong Kong, plus global
(English)
• Over 5,000 registered students
• Over 500 qualified BritAgents
Source: VisitBritain, March 2011

44. Social Media

45. The world’s population is connected
through social media channels
• Facebook has 664,000,000 subscribers
• Half the population of North America have a
Facebook account (almost a quarter of the
population of Europe)
Source: Internet World Stats, April 2011

46. Travel specific social media: WAYN
• WAYN: Where Are You Now?
• “The world’s largest social networking
community focused on location and lifestyle”
• 15 million members in 193 countries
• Originally launched 2002 – relaunched 2009
• DMO partners include Tourism Ireland,
VisitSweden, German National Tourism
Organisation
Source: WAYN, October 2009

47. Travel specific social media:
TripAdvisor
• Launched 2000, now with over 25 million
monthly unique users, 10 million members
• One of the few western social media sites to
be available in China

48. Visitors like user reviews and ratings
Source: TripAdvisor, March 2009

49. Savvy businesses embrace TripAdvisor

50. Notice the integration with Facebook?

51. Hyatt Key West embraces social media!

52. Case study
VisitBritain’s social media strategy

53. Why use social media channels
2000000
1800000 VisitBritain
1600000 Sweden
1400000 VisitBritain USA
1200000
1000000 VisitBritain TV
800000
600000 Yahoo
400000
200000 Social Media
0
01/04/2010
Source: VisitBritain, October 2010

54. VisitBritain’s core social media
platforms
• Facebook – one voice
• Twitter – one consumer voice (separate VB
corporate voice)
• Flickr – an area for VisitBritain and for VB’s
advocates
• VisitBritain.tv – YouTube
“Fishing where the fish are”

56. Using LoveUK to build the Britain brand

58. Flickr
• Over 50,000 views of photos on the VB Flickr
account

59. Flickr: source of 95% of images on
visitbritain.com

60. YouTube / VisitBritainTV: 300,000 views
of Britain content, August 2010

61. Source: VisitBritain, January 2011

62. Tips for VB staff:
help VisitBritain in 7 simple steps
• Join VB groups, Like VB pages, follow Twitter streams...
• Join the conversation – add links, pose and answer
questions, share photos...
• Always Like / Tag / Star / Favourite VB stories
• Share VB content using social sharing tools and
retweets...
• Build your personal social profile and become and
influencer in your own right...
• Tell friends / networks / peers about VisitBritain and
get them to participate...
• Listen for social dialogue about Britain and join in...

63. Social media: points to note
• Not about visits it’s about content, and
placement thereof.
• Not about telling, it’s about listening then
suggesting.
• Social Media isn’t free! The tools are, but it
takes time and patience.

64. The Next Big Step…
• Facebook isn’t getting smaller
• Geo‐location is getting bigger
• Combine the two…

65. Mobile: 24/7 Social Media

66. Did Apple change everything?
At October 2010, Apple had sold over 73 million iPhones
Source: telecoms.com, October 2010

67. Mobile headlines
• October – December 2010: 36% of US / 29%
European mobile users accessed online content
Source: ClickZ, February 2011
• Smartphone adoption grew considerably in
2010:
– 63,000,000 smartphone handsets in the US
– 71,651,000 in France / Germany / Italy / Spain / UK
Source: Marketing Charts, February 2011
• Italy has the highest penetration of
smartphone users aged 15‐24 (47% of this age
group)
Source: Marketing Charts, January 2011

68. Mobile and social media
Top four mobile social media brands:
US Europe
1. Facebook 1. Facebook
2. MySpace 2. YouTube
3. YouTube 3. MSN / Bing / WindowsLive
4. Twitter 4. Twitter
Source: Social Times – Your Social Media Source, January 2011

69. Geo‐location and social media
600,000
500,000
400,000
300,000 Gowalla
200,000
100,000
0
Registered Users
Source: VisitBritain, January 2011

70. Geo‐location and social media
5,000,000
4,500,000
4,000,000
3,500,000
3,000,000
2,500,000 Gowalla
2,000,000 FourSquare
1,500,000
1,000,000
500,000
0
Registered Users
Source: VisitBritain, January 2011

71. Geo‐location and social media
600,000,000
500,000,000
400,000,000
Gowalla
300,000,000
Foursquare
200,000,000 Facebook
100,000,000
0
Registered Users
Source: VisitBritain, January 2011

72. Facebook Places

73. Growth of Facebook Places
January 2011

74. Growth of Facebook Places
Yesterday

75. Facebook Places: Facebook Deals

76. Facebook Deals: Coming soon to Europe...

77. ...but available now in the US

78. Final thoughts and conclusions

79. • What are the biggest challenges for DMOs /
NTOs?
• How important is local content in a global
environment?
• Should DMOs / NTOs / tourism businesses
abandon their websites in favour of social
media platforms?

80. Sources of information / inspiration
• www.visitbritain.org
• www.newmediatrendwatch.com
• www.visitengland.org
• www.facebook.com/deals
• www.tripadvisor.com
• www.wayn.com

81. Thank you
Andrew Daines
andrew@andrewdaines.com
www.linkedin.com/in/andrewdaines