Tourism Tasmania Report JOHN FITZGERALD CEO, Tourism Tasmania
Last month our tourism and hospitality businesses celebrated the 2016 Tasmanian Tourism Awards. It was a wonderful evening and a great opportunity to acknowledge business excellence and recognise everyone’s efforts in delivering quality experiences to visitors in our state. On behalf of the team at Tourism Tasmania, congratulations to all finalists who won an award and I wish all our Gold Award winners every success at the Qantas Australian Tourism Awards in Darwin next February. For me, seeing all these great tourism experiences in one room reinforces the depth of amazing experiences we have throughout Tasmania. Our research consistently shows us that word of mouth is a powerful way to promote Tasmania. So imagine the potential for the state if we can harness the promotional power of visitors and our amazing experiences to generate lots of positive word of mouth recommendations. Well this summer, we are aiming to do just that. Over the next few months, we expect to see over a quarter of a million visitors in Tasmania. That’s potentially a quarter of a million people on the ground promoting our state by sharing their great Tassie experiences with friends, family and colleagues back home. And we reckon we’ve got the kind of experiences that they will want to tell others about. So from 5 December through to 28 February, whenever a visitor or local does something distinctly Tasmanian, we want them to share their #TassieStyle experience through social media, and we want your help to encourage your guests to do this. As the main point of contact, you're in the best position to encourage your guests to get involved and share their experiences online. We’ve been working with Tasmania's regional tourism organisations, the Tourism Industry Council Tasmania, the Tasmanian
Hospitality Association and others to get the word out, and the response so far from our tourism and hospitality industry has been tremendous. But don’t worry if you haven’t yet become involved, because it’s not too late to join in. Best of all, there is no cost to you to participate and there’s everything to gain for your business and your region. This is obviously a great way for your product to gain widespread exposure to a large domestic audience of potential customers and increase sales. We'll even work with you to give you the materials you need to encourage your guests to share their experiences online. If you're interested in being involved and would like to find out more, go to www. tourismtasmania.com.au and register to participate in our #TassieStyle campaign now. While the number of holiday visitors coming to Tasmania continues to grow, we feel that through advocacy campaigns like this, we can continue to create even more demand for travel to Tasmania. Just over 12 months ago, the T21 – Tasmanian Visitor Economy Strategy 2015-2020 was launched. For the first time in almost two decades, the new T21 brought together many agencies, businesses, organisations and individuals that contribute to and benefit from visitors coming to Tasmania. The new T21 set out four priorities to guide the growth and development of Tasmania’s visitor economy and achieve a number of goals for the state. So far we have been progressing well towards the various T21 goals. And while the rate of growth has created a few supply-side challenges for us in the short-term, the industry and government are working together and investing to meet or manage the demand. Your Association is also playing its part in the T21 strategy through its work in building skills, industry capacity and customer service.
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