VisitScotland.com, the information and booking website for Scotland, will launch its new website on 2 April 2008, the most significant change to the UK’s most popular tourism destination website in six years.

Improved navigation is at the heart of the changes. More graphics, maps and pictures and a better range of services will be available to buy directly from the website.

VisitScotland.com hosted a series of focus groups last year, to understand the industry's wishes for the new website. Tourism businesses marketing their properties and services on VisitScotland.com will receive an improved profile with enhanced branding, up to 15 images and approximately 600 words of text.

The new website will be split into two distinct areas, Scotland's Ultimate Visitors' Guide and the Online Travel Shop. The Visitors' Guide will have improved listings on a larger range of services, accommodation and places of interest. The Online Travel Shop will feature new shopping opportunities such as travel tickets, holiday packages and experiences. Other changes include:

• The ability to browse over 14,000 providers with extended opportunities to profile properties with their contact details. Accommodation providers with VisitScotland Quality Assurance will benefit from improved listings and booking opportunities.
• Increased listings and new directory of tourism services and attractions.

VisitScotland.com enjoyed 11 million visitors in 2007 and this is predicted to rise to 12.9 million in 2009. The number of visitors using the website is higher than the number who visit visitwales.com, enjoyengland.com and visitbritain.com combined.

For further information on these changes and the opportunities available to you go to www.visitscotland.org/visitscotland.com-updates 

To view the VisitScotland.com press release go to www.visitscotland.org/media_centre