International Marketing update

VisitScotland has been active in terms of international marketing with travel shows in Spain and Norway as well as reporting the results of the European cities campaign.

Six festivals, 96,000 entrants

Excellent results are now in for the Autumn 2007 burst of international marketing’s award winning cities campaign, attracting visitors from continental Europe to Edinburgh and Glasgow.

The campaign theme was “Six Festivals, six friends, thirty six reasons to celebrate”. It focused on six festivals in Edinburgh and Glasgow over the city break period of October to April. The events include:

• Halloween in Edinburgh,
• Fiddle 2007,
• Edinburgh’s Christmas,
• Glasgow’s Hogmanay,
• Celtic Connections
• and Glasgow International Festival of Contemporary Visual Arts.

The format was a rolling schedule of competitions for a consumer plus five friends to win a weekend at one of the festivals, emphasising that there is a lot going on in the shoulder / off season, giving a reason to visit now

The campaign ran from September to December in Netherlands, Germany, France and Italy. The main campaign partner was easyJet and the Scottish trade provided excellent support in the form of prizes for the six competitions and web deals on the cities web sites.

Quick Facts: 

• Total entrants to the competitions = 96,000. 
• Of those who entered, 43,000 were acquisitions – in other words, people new to our database and have opted in to say that they are interested to receive more information from VS about Scotland. This is an excellent result. 
• Monthly e-mails to the European database of almost 400,000 hot prospects.
• The campaign period saw 280,000 web visits. We are on track to achieve 750,000 web visits to the six cities web sites by the end of the financial year. 

Planning for the 2008 Cities campaign will commence in May.

A Review of Reiseliv

Oslo in January sounds a chilly prospect, but with Reiseliv, Norway’s largest travel show, taking place 10 to 13 January this year, there were plenty of hot prospects lining up to find out more about Scotland.

VisitScotland had one of the busiest stands at the show. Attendance was around 38,000 people. The Norwegians have a keen interest in Scotland and have a very high standard of living, meaning that they are excellent prospects for holidaying here. Norwegians are particularly enthused by golf, walking and the islands. As many of them reminded us during the show, Shetland was Norwegian until relatively recently and the Viking influence is very strong in numerous areas of Scotland. Transport links between Norway and Scotland are very good, with a direct ferry to Scrabster and several direct flights to airports ranging from Edinburgh to Sumburgh.

Reiseliv is an excellent way of meeting the Norwegian travel trade and enthusiastic, wealthy Norwegian consumers. Participation on the stand in January 2009 is a marketing opportunity suitable for any business wishing to target this potential market.


Fitur in Madrid

Spain is a growing market for Scottish tourism and now ranks 8th in terms of total spend. Fitur is Madrid's largest tourism fair, which took place from 30 January to 3 February this year, is an integral part of how Scotland can strategically target this market. The first three days are for trade, with over 70,000 Spanish buyers going through the door and the weekend welcomes over 98,000 consumers.

VisitScotland shares a stand with VisitBritain at the show and next year there will be the chance for up to three Scottish partners to join us for the week. Fitur is an excellent opportunity to meet Spanish tour operators face to face, who appreciate doing business by building relationships and establishing personal contact.

The weekend at Fitur is very busy and Scotland is, after London, the most popular British destination among Spanish consumers. Spain is a particularly important market to target as the Spanish visit, on average, 5 Scottish regions in one trip - more than any of their international counterparts. They visit many places and attraction and are likely to be influenced by receiving personal recommendations- Fitur is one of the best mechanisms for doing so.

Participation at the stand from the 29 January until 1 February 2009 is a marketing opportunity suitable for consortia, hotel groups, incoming agencies or attraction groups wishing to or already operating with the Spanish market.

For further information on these and how to get your business involved please contact your Business Relationship Manager.