Complimentary Upskilling, Marketing & Education Toolkits
Hope, & Confidence. These were the two words taken away by the 900 attendees of the Victorian Tourism Conference last week. I’d like to think there is always Hope on the horizon for our country’s tourism. As for Confidence – each one of us as regional tourism operators can work on our own confidence, by building up our toolkit of resources to empower within.
This article contains essential education, industry resources & marketing skills to draw upon, all in one place, for time-poor ART operators … who are constantly hands-on in operations, and not online much.
It’s also been a common theme in our monthly ART Friday catch-ups, operators asking where the best online toolkits and resources are.
I’ve sectioned the below into various channels that I see best-fit from an education point of view to stay abreast of industry news, complimentary resources, and tools to add to your tourism toolkit, to best help in upskilling.
DMO’s RTO’s STO’s NTO’s
Register for email send-outs from your region’s Destination Marketing Organisation (DMO), any Culinary or AgriTourism Event initiatives in your region, as well your Regional and State Tourism Organisation. Alongside the DMO’s from where your visitors originate from, to get an idea of their own personality:
Eg. For my venue in Northern Rivers NSW, I follow:
Destination North Coast
The Tweed Tourism Co.,
Northern Rivers Food
My State Tourism Organisation (STO): Destination NSW
Also the Industry bodies where my major visitor sectors originate from: Tourism & Events Queensland (TEQ), Queensland Tourism Industry Council (QTIC), Visit Victoria Australia & Victoria Tourism Industry Council (VTIC)
Australian Tourism Data Warehouse (ATDW)
Speaking to Destination Marketing Organisations (DMO’s), and Regional / State Tourism Organisations (RTO’s, STO’s), a common phrase I hear is: “it surprises us how many local regional tour operators don’t know about ATDW, or of our own complimentary services offered.” https://atdw.com.au
The Australian Tourism Data Warehouse (ATDW) is jointly owned and managed by all Australian state and territory government tourism bodies. It collects tourism listing information from local tourism operators on their online platform, and distributes this information on partner websites (wholesalers, retailers, distributors), supporting local tourism businesses in expanding their online exposure, bookings and marketing (so far, more than 90,000 local tourism businesses). It’s an essential educational and marketing tool for operators to be part of.
And for those that may shy away from listing on the ATDW, due to not enough resources or budget to publish high quality marketing content – Tourism Australia has launched a new product to fill the gap in several destinations of Australia:
Leigh Sorensen, General Manager of Tourism Australia, spoke to ART members at our last Friday catchup, on the opportunities for regional tourism operators with the latest TA Resource – the National Experience Content Initiative.
TA looked at the top tourism regions, then decided to go ALL Australian regions, and went to tender for videographers, for the production of 1500-1800 experiences around the country: professional images/ videos that the destination’s operators can use on their own sites.
In respect to ATDW – the content produced by the National Experience Content Initiative will help improve the quality of operator listings: through the provision of these professional complimentary imagery / landscape / videos.
The National Experience Content Initiative is all about the importance of interstate tourism, and how important interstate (not intrastate) tourists are to that destination’s economy. TA aims to shoot up to 10-50 experiences, depending on the value of interstate draw cards for that destination.
The destination is also to align with the 4 brand pillars – nature and wildlife – food and culture etc, of Tourism Australia. The Destination Experiences content will be fed out to TA trade partners and shown in TA social channels – as well as providing an asset for the operator also.
The main outcome of this is to add to the VALUE of Experiences – with all operators in the destination having the potential to add to the Experience.
Tourism Australia also has comprehensive market and consumer statistics on their website, particularly around culinary and Agri-tourism traveller sectors: https://www.tourism.australia.com/en/events-and-tools/industry-resources.html
Economic Development Australia (EDA)
Economic Development Australia (EDA) and Australian Regional Tourism (ART) have collaborated with Urban Enterprise, Planning, Economics and Tourism Consultancy. EDA has fantastic statistics for Tourism & Events: https://www.edaustralia.com.au/resources/category/tourism-events/
Grants & Funding, Free Marketing Resources
It’s uncommon to see State governments offering grants for destination marketing. So when they appear, you don’t want to miss out! Which is a reason to be up-to-date on receiving communications from your RTO, STO, NTO … opportunities such as this in NSW have just become available:
- a grants offer in NSW to attract business events to regional areas. Yes, the marketing spend is $10,000-$30,000 matching dollar-for-dollar – though a few operators could join marketing forces, collaborating to deliver marketing activities, promoting visitor experiences, attractions, tours and accommodation, attracting high value travellers (HVT’s) to your region.
https://dncnsw.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/NSW-Tourism-gets-a-6.5-million-boost.pdf
Strategies for Place Making in Tourism: tourism marketing, nationally & globally.
Destination Think! has many best practice examples of how to create a personality and Sense of Place around a new tourism experience or destination. Well worth a look at their work, to come up with ideas of your own for your own tourism product. https://destinationthink.com/
Keeping your Finger on the pulse globally: World Travel & Tourism Council (WTTC) – to Recovery and Beyond
https://wttc.org/Research/To-Recovery-Beyond
Alongside Innovation/Digitisation & Sustainability, WTTC places great importance on Demand Evolution: Businesses collaborating even more closely with their extended value chains to ensure readiness. Traveller preferences and behaviours have shifted toward the familiar, predictable, and trusted. Domestic vacations, extensive planning, and the outdoors will reign in the short-term, with tourism businesses and destinations already adapting.
Industry Groups on Facebook
Women in Tourism Australia (note: you don’t have to be female to join!). An excellent, supportive community of like-minded Tourism, Hospitality & Event Professionals – full of national contacts, resource links, progressive ideas, and sharing of experiences:
https://www.facebook.com/groups/656601261132577
Event Professionals Australia.
Not just for Event Professionals – there’s fantastic education tools, upskilling and contacts in here:
https://www.facebook.com/groups/668615306614392
Higher Education Institutes – work placement students:
There are several Higher Education Institutes in your state which deliver Tourism, Hospitality, Event Management courses / degrees, many of which require final year students to go on a work placement for a term or longer. The benefits are great, for both the tourism business hosting the work placement students, helping fill a skills / staff shortage gap, as well as the valuable experience gained for these future industry colleagues.
The ART Tourism Hub
Our very own Tourism Hub is an all-in-one Toolkit, with relevant, topical industry news and resources needed for regional tourism operators. It’s very worthwhile to check in regularly on the articles published, resources and webinars offered, as well as jobs posted.
Industry webinars, conferences & conventions:
ART monthly Friday Industry catch-ups – Zoom invitation via your email or on the ART Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/regionaltourismAU
Tourism Australia: their regular Friday Industry webinar series:
https://www.tourism.australia.com/en/news-and-media/newsletters/subscribe.html
The final education resource this article can offer is an exciting one, to add to your diary: the ART 2021 Convention, October 11-13, in Ballarat, Victoria. Save the date, and keep an eye out for information coming soon. Hope to see you there!
And please add any other resources you find helpful in the Reply section here; I’m sure our ART Ambassadors and members have a few others they are involved in, and use regularly!
…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….
Katrina Denoux is one of the Ambassadors for Australian Regional Tourism. A tourism practitioner with her own business based both in Europe and Australia, she is also a registered health practitioner with postgraduate qualifications. She specialises in wellness tourism, gastronomy & agri-tourism, & sustainability; and is a lecturer and speaker on the international academic insights circuit. She feels lucky to be able to combine her two loves: travel & education.