A little while ago we posed some questions to you all about summer trade, and the opportunities and challenges ahead for the tourism sector.
More than 100 of you took the time to answer our questions and we’ve looked at every single one.
Your answers showed us the varied experiences over the past few months and your diverse thoughts about the future.
Overwhelmingly, 91% of you felt supported by us through the pandemic.
Given that, 69% picked our COVID updates as our most useful service, with TWIT (50%) and regional marketing and promo opportunities (46%) rounding out the top three.
When it came to future opportunities, most of you felt that continuing to market the region and our unique experiences in the short-term was front of mind to get people excited about travelling again.
You also wanted to see more advanced training, awareness of future events to avoid double-booking and more opportunity to work together as Team Tourism for the success of the region.
Concerns for the future came from any potential of future lockdowns and restrictions, the challenge to shift the work-from-home mentality and of visitors heading overseas rather than travelling domestically.
Want more? Download a more detailed summary of the survey.
Now for the big question: what are we doing with these responses?
There were so many golden nuggets in your answers that have helped us add some new initiatives to our plans over the next 12 months.
We discussed your feedback at both our board and team planning days and below are some of the actions we’ve come up with.
- Continue our targeted marketing and awareness activities to ensure Geelong and The Bellarine stands out and travellers are inspired to experience what makes our region unique.
- We will share more of our marketing initiatives and wins through TWIT and member channels so you can see how we’re promoting the region and where.
- We will be delivering more advanced training to strengthen the capabilities of our industry and those working at all levels of the business.
- Delivering a Sustainable Destination Masterplan that underpins all our advocacy efforts to ensure we stand behind and drive the right investment, growth and development opportunities.
- Continue to provide a high level of support and advocacy for our members so they have the skills, knowledge and resources to navigate the challenges of the future. Including, continuing to advocate for additional worker accommodation during peak season and for support for trained hospitality and tourism staff to enter the local workforce.
- We’ve recently introduced coffee catch ups in each sub-region, encouraging Team Tourism members to form connections and potentially new collaborations.
- We will work with Events Geelong to share future major and local events to help you forward plan and minimise double-booking.
- Our COVID updates and hub on the website are here to stay – hopefully we won’t need them over the next 12 months!
Thank you again to everyone who completed the survey.