Tourism analysis is not a new concept. Since tourism is an important economic driver for many communities, most tourism-focused cities invest significant resources to collect visitor data to inform funding decisions for tourism development initiatives.
Visitor data collection and analysis has traditionally been based on hotel data and survey data. This is a good starting point, but the options for tourism analysis have evolved significantly in recent years. The next generation of tourism market analysis uses consumer analytics based on either transaction data or mobile device data to go deeper. It gives cities, convention and visitors bureaus (CVBs), and destination marketing organizations (DMOs) a more comprehensive understanding of tourism market dynamics.
If tourism is one of your city’s priorities, here are three reasons to consider upgrading to an analytics-based tourism analysis.
Tourism Analysis Can Show You Who Your Visitors Really Are
Do you know who your visitors are? Traditional tourism analysis methods may provide basic information on age range, income range, gender, and other key demographics, but these facts don’t get to the heart of what makes your core visitor segments unique. What are your visitors’ lifestyles? What are the best marketing channels to reach them? What types of shopping and dining options are they likely to enjoy?
Marrying visitor data with psychographic data on visitor households gives a much clearer picture of who your visitors really are than demographics alone. Once you know who your core visitor groups are, you can quickly identify other households that share the same characteristics. This allow you to focus your marketing campaigns on the consumers most likely to respond and make tourism development decisions informed by your visitors’ preferences.
Tourism Analysis Can Reveal Your Top Visitor Origin Markets
Which markets are your primary source of visitors today? Do your top markets vary by season? Which markets aren’t currently a primary source of visitors, but have high concentrations of households with the same consumer profile as your core visitors?
Using tourism analysis to identify your top visitor origin markets allows you to concentrate your media buying in the markets that are likely to yield the best results.
Tourism Analysis Can Identify Your Top Combinations of Visitor Attractions
You may already work with local visitor destinations to identify admissions volumes, but do you know which combinations of attractions your tourists most commonly visit?
Understanding the top combinations of visitor attractions is important because it helps to identify opportunities to bundle offers in your marketing promotion. Using mobile device data to conduct a destination analysis allows you to present multi-destination packages designed to appeal to your visitors and encourage longer visits.
The Bottom Line
Tourism analysis is an important tool for optimizing your city’s tourism marketing programs. Today’s analytics-based approaches can leverage new alternative datasets to identify who your visitors are, pinpoint where you should focus your marketing efforts, and answer other important questions about your tourism sector.
Explore Buxton’s tourism analysis options to learn more.
