Tourism and Technology: achieving together!
An explosive mix of high profile speakers to inspire you; cutting edge research and intelligence to make you think how you should change your business; and Workshops with leading practitioners - people at the forefront of tourism in Scotland, prepared to spill the beans about their success!
Speakers confirmed so far include:
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Ben Vinod, Chief Scientist and Senior Vice President
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paul sloAne, founder of destination-innovationPaul Sloane is an entertaining, thought-provoking, motivational speaker and a recognized expert on innovation, lateral thinking and leadership. He is the founder of Destination-Innovation, (www.destination-innovation.com) a consultancy that helps organisations improve innovation. |
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Best Practice Inter-active Workshops
Workshops will focus on applying technology to various versions of the visitor journey:
- Look and Book
- On the Ground
- Feedback and Research
- Returners (and we’re building in “Business Systems” here too!)
There will be expert speakers for each workshop, and a chance to talk to a variety of technology companies with new applications relevant to each stage, plus tourism companies who are early adopters of the technology!
Look & Book:
Walk Highlands.
Innovative website offering visitors who are interested in walking in the Highlands all the information they need. Over 350 walking routes with full descriptions, mapping, photos and GPS routes downloadable to hand held devices. The walks are searchable by area or on Google Earth and users can upload there own comments and photos and share their walking experiences. Other information such as weather forecasts, public transport and information about wildlife and history is provided. Accommodation and tourist attractions are attractively listed by area to link in with the walking routes providing a target audience for these advertisers.
occupancy marketing
Occupancy Marketing provide Internet Marketing solutions for the tourism industry. The company manages the online marketing and search engine optimisation for hotel groups and tourism organisations in the UK. Programmes are offered that increase direct, non-commissionable bookings via the customers Web site, improving occupancy and profitability. Occupancy Marketing is based in Edinburgh.
contact: Mark Forrester on Mark@occupancymarketing.com
Web in a box - visitscoland.com
Web in a Box is the exciting new technology from VisitScotland.com which enables accommodation suppliers to take their first steps towards providing an online bookable website, by delivering:
- A straightforward website 'layout assistant' tool to allow you to set up your own attractive site using pre-designed templates .
- A data management tool for updating availability, prices and other information (for your own site and VisitScotland.com simultaneously).
- A secure booking engine to enable you to take credit/debit card deposits for bookings from your site.
SCOTTISH TOURISM GUIDE
Launched at the end of the first quarter of 2007, The Scottish Tourism Guide has recently been enhanced through the addition of a number of new services including a complete guide to 450+ Scottish golf courses; integration with the 5PM table booking service, and online tour bookings in association with Rabbie’s Tours. A ‘text a question’ service will also be introduced shortly. In Q1 of 2008 a printed and online Scottish Tourism Guide magazine will also be launched.
Digital Publishing Service
Making full use of advanced publishing technology, The Scottish Tourism Guide has now introduced a digital publishing service which produces very user friendly, 3D page turning versions of brochures, magazines, catalogues and other publications. The concept enables online readable versions of existing or new publications to be created and made available for instant distribution through the Internet. This enables significant reductions in printing and distribution costs to be achieved and the option to include multimedia on any page further enhances the reader’s interaction and response. As each publication and each page can be tracked, detailed statistics relating to readership pattern can also be generated.
The advantages of producing brochures and catalogues in an online format have been grasped by the major travel companies, magazines and catalogue companies. These same advantages are now available to every size of company in the tourism industry from small hotels to large visitor attractions and this will be demonstrated during the TID event.
Click here for examples.
Contact: Charles Kelly 0773 240 8202
Traveline online Journey Planner.
Launching at TID will be a new page landing wizard from Traveline Scotland. This will allow anyone with a web site to download their own personal journey planner as part of their site. This will allow users to then be able to plan any journeys to/from their location without leaving their own web site. It provides accurate, up to date and impartial timetable information to allow your visitors to get you to your destination by the quickest public transport mode. And it can be seamlessly integrated to your web site. This offers a fantastic potential for tourism operators and it’s free. Downloadable templates are shown below.
Mobile Acuity
Mobile Acuity lets advertisers and publishers enhance the marketing 
potential of their print and TV media. If a consumer sends of photo of an activated advertisement or other media using their mobile phone they can access further information, make bookings or enter competitions. This is a simple and reliable way to get consumers to connect to your mobile internet site without them having to type in awkward web addresses or keywords
Contact: Anthony Ashbrook +44 (0) 131 472 4732
On the Ground:
Zolk-C/ Culloden Battlefield Memorial Project.
The Battlefield Guide service available from the new £10m Culloden visitor centre uses a portable device with compelling content that is triggered automatically as you explore Culloden Moor at your own pace. Through audio accounts of genuine characters who were involved the events of 1746 are brought alive and fact file information, including recent archaeological and weapons research, can also be accessed from the device. Initially available in English and Gaelic the content will be developed in 6 languages to give multi-lingual interpretation to the battlefield without physical intrusion onto this sensitive site. Working in partnership with the National Trust for Scotland, this project will be the first of its kind – leading the field in terms of content and technology-led delivery of an emotive, world class visitor experience.
momedia - Interactive city guides.
Momedia specialise in the development of mobile guides. Each guide provides news, events, entertainment, retail and travel information on your mobile phone.
Users can search for information via a graphical navigation menu, share information via text messaging and locate points of interest via built in maps. These features and content are tailored to suit different markets and destinations.
The mobile software application can be used on all popular makes of phone and distributed from a wide range of manufacturer, operator and mobile sites.
Why carry your laptop when you can use your mobile phone?
ts.com
ts.com offer a fast, online ticket selling service, which enables advance ticketing for tours, festivals, events, visitor attractions, car parking and more.
TS Express offers a free way of offering own-branded ticket sales from your web site including secure credit card payment, and a listing on www.ts.com. Bar coded tickets can be printed at home via email, or can be sent via SMS to mobile phones (using Mobiqa technology). Complementary services include e-Marketing. ts.com also offer a full range of support services including creative design, marketing consultancy, and software integration.
AIMS
AIMS provide the technology and service provision to allow companies to
engage with their customers by sending permissive content to their mobile
phones. Unlike SMS, our proximity technology has zero cost to send content and
is FREE to download for the customer. 
You can send video clips, audio podcasts a photo gallery, visitor information,
send vCards and much more. AIMS have been in business for almost five years
and have built our reputation on service delivery.
Contact: Ian on 0141 585 6392.
Mobiqa - mobile ticketing 
Mobiqa are the world leaders in mobile ticketing and couponing solutions. Our solutions are based on the creation, delivery and redemption of standard barcodes to mobile phones via text messaging. Mobiqa’s award-winning solutions have been successfully deployed for high profile, high volume events and promotional campaigns and are available in over 30 countries across the world.
king macbeth
Macbeth was not simply a product of Shakespeare’s active imagination. Historically, Macbeth was Mormaer or Duke of Moray, a powerful figure who did indeed become King of Scotland. He ruled Scotland for 17 years and was regarded by contemporary chroniclers as a popular king.
Our King Macbeth project aimed to tell the real story of Macbeth across a range of different media, the whole adding up to a compelling user experience. The elements making up the project include; Audio Recordings. A ‘teaser’ recording featuring the voice of Macbeth and a distributed narrative comprising three audio recordings of Macbeth telling the story of one momentous day in August 1040.Rich Media. A multimedia treatment of aspects of the historical King Macbeth. The rich media can stand alone as well as being viewed on the King Macbeth web site. Web Site www.kingmacbeth.com providing information about 11th century Alba, Moray and King Macbeth. Includes a ‘community’ component and Zimbie, an instant-messaging tool.
Tourist Tracks
Tourist Tracks (www.tourist-tracks.com) is the home of MP3 audio walking tours. Tourists visiting UK cities can download the innovative product or buy a CD containing an audio walking tour, with a map to help you find your way around.
Tourist Tracks MP3 audio walking tours let you take in the sights at your own pace, in your own time. Forget shuffling around with a large group or wrestling with a guide book - just load up your iPod or MP3 player, plug in your headphones and let us do the rest. With Tourist Tracks, there's no guide to keep up with. You only need skip to the next audio point when you're ready to move on. Since launching about 18 months ago Tourist Tracks has developed tours in 10 destinations and aims to have 14 live destinations by the end of February - including tours of Glasgow and Edinburgh, which will be launched at the Tourism Innovation Day.
Contact Tim at Tourism Innovation Day
feedback and Research:
Stephen Budd - Host of the Feedback & Research workshop, informs you why you should attend and what you will gain from the day, to hear his views on YouTube: Click Here
Malcolm Roughead - OBE, Director of Visitor Engagement VisitScotland
Malcolm was previously the Director of Marketing. He will now take up the post of Director of Visitor Engagement, looking after the needs of our visitors at every stage of their journey from market research and marketing through to on-arrival information and sales.
Before joining VisitScotland in May 2001, Malcolm had gained extensive experience of developing brands in a number of national and international markets. He has worked and lived in France, Germany and South Africa. Before returning to Scotland with his wife Robyn, he was global sales and marketing director for Guinness World Records based in London where he successfully took the company into a wider media environment. He’s a Fellow of The Institute of Marketing, a Fellow of the Marketing Society in Scotland and a Council member of Strathclyde Business School.
knowat
Knowat has created a unique hand held customer response device, which will allow any tourism business or service, measure and capture data to improve its services and in turn improve performance and profitability. The Knowat system allows businesses and services to gain immediate quality volume customer feedback by using the digital screen to gather responses to questions. 
The results are viewable anywhere anytime via the Knowat server. The information is collated and electronically sent to a server, where the data is filtered by demographics, room/table number and time period allowing managers to gain more insight, tailor questions to target specific services, create loyalty, outperform competitors and increase profitability.
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The Conch
The Conch is a community-powered travel guide for people with a passion for the outdoors. The service aims to bring together everyone involved in the adventure travel journey; locals and travellers, businesses and advertisers, to share stories and advice in their own words and their own voices. 
Highlights of the service include a community-ranking system, user-generated top ten lists and the Holler system, which publishes audio direct to The Conch from almost any phone in the world.
The site launched in ‘public beta’ in November 2007 with an award from NESTA (the National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts). The founder is now seeking investment and other partnerships to move the site to a full commercial launch.
Visitrac
An online survey and benchmarking system developed by LJ Research.
LJ Research use their research expertise and bespoke web-based software to create surveys that the customer will find simple and straightforward to use, and that will deliver accurate and robust customer feedback all year round for tourism businesses. Any tourism related business can use Visitrac to monitor customer perceptions, and service ratings and see what customers say about was good or needs to be improved, be this at an hotel, B&B, attraction, conference, exhibition or event. With Visitrac, you stay closer to your customers and ahead of your competition.
Highland business research
Highland Business Research is at the forefront of "Travel 2.0" research. From destination audits to understanding visitor behaviour, from measuring online interactions to driving website effectiveness, Highland Business Research provides the intelligence to help tourism businesses make sound decisions. Directors Stephen and Vicky are authors of the Tracking Tourism blog, recently named as one of the world's most influential tourism industry blogs. 
Their "Data Detective Kit" will shortly be released, offering businesses a DIY tool kit for better understanding customer behaviour. Additionally, they will be delivering a series of practical workshops from the end of January, starting with a session on "blogging for business".
chardon management ltd - holiday inn glasgow theatre land
Chardon Management Ltd is one of the leading, independent hotel management contract companies in the UK. They currently have contracts to manage 14 hotels around the UK and make use of global brands such as those from InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG) and Best Western. IHG, the largest hotel company in the world, uses the Guest Satisfaction Survey, a global programme originally developed by ITT. The GSS is accurately benchmarked on an ongoing basis and using this, and other internal reporting tools such as actively seeking suggestions from guests on how to improve the service delivered in each department of the hotel, Chardon is able to respond quickly and precisely to changing market conditions and expectations. One of the Chardon managed hotels, Holiday Inn Glasgow Theatreland is consistently ranked top in terms of guest satisfaction in the EMEA region and has won a string of awards for excellence from IHG.
www.chardonmanagement.com OR www.higlasgow.com
extra mile scotland
Extra Mile Scotland is a website created by Johanna Campbell and Gilbert Summers as a platform for positive comment on the tourism industry in Scotland. It allows anyone who has enjoyed good service in Scotland to acknowledge the service giver and share the experience. The site owners have a lifetime experience of the industry and offer marketing and writing skills, based on their knowledge of Scotland. The site itself also has an ongoing blog, with hints, tips and observations on the industry.
Returners & Business Systems:
rabbies trail burners
Rabbie's Trail Burners is Scotland's leading small group tour company who have developed an in-house integrated Reservations and Management system, which gives them realtime management information and remote access from anywhere in the world. The system is seamlessly integrated into their website for realtime online bookings, allows trackable white paging solutions on and affiliate linking from partner websites.
Contact: Robin at Tourism Innovation Day
Larder Bytes
Larder Bytes brings together supply chain development experience, internet communication with locally produced high quality food. Laderbytes is a network of fresh food supply chains which provide choice, optimise quality and freshness of produce, all with a low environmental impact. The system can facilitate and operate any number of outlets delivering quality produce through a network of integrated local distribution hubs which will eventually service all of Scotland.
Contact: www.larderbytes.com or call Jim on 07712 000413.
event consultants scotland
In July 2007 ECS launched their new website, which incorporates a fully automated online booking and payment system, administrated via a bespoke Content Management System. The system was designed specifically for ECS and allows a high level of flexibility in how we manage and sell events online. Since launching the site over 40% of conference and event sales are generated via the site, allowing the team at ECS to streamline business processes and improve efficiency throughout. By offering the online booking system to clients, ECS can offer a superior service to our customers and capitalise on this competitive advantage.
Contact: Susan at Tourism Innovation Day or susan@eventconsultants.com
mercat tours
Mercat Tours was recently awarded 5 stars by Visit Scotland. The company is the market leader in the delivery of quality history experiences led by enthusiastic and knowledgeable guides who consistently exceed customer expectations.Image Logistics have created an integrated management and reservation system for Mercat Tours which provides real time bookings and invaluable regular statistical reports and customer feedback.
This system is also designed to provide our many partners in hotels and hostels across Edinburgh access to our booking site, allowing them to book tours directly for clients on site. In addition, we currently have a PDA in the final stages of development, which will mirror our administration system allowing on street sales staff to process electronically ticket payments and bookings whilst at the Mercat Cross, thus increasing efficiency and standards of customer service.
micros - fidelio uk ltd
MICROS-Fidelio UK Ltd is the world's leading developer of enterprise applications serving the hospitality industries exclusively. MICROS provides solutions that combine unified access electronic point-of-sale, back-office, and corporate-office applications. As the leader in product innovation and service, MICROS-Fidelio is the first information technology company to offer a multi-property, fully integrated hotel system that includes property management, sales and catering, central reservations, revenue management, material management and back office applications including a customer relationship management package specifically designed for the hospitality industry.
Through their global distribution and service network, MICROS-Fidelio serves all segments of the market including upscale, mid-price and economy hotels, but also restaurants, stadia, golf & country clubs, spa and leisure.
programme
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9.15am |
Coffee and Delegate registration |
9.45am |
Conference Opens: Introduction by TIG Chairman - Robin Worsnop Muriel Gray Conference Host. Ben Vinod, Chief Scientist and Senior Vice President Workshops 1 & 2 (Look & Book / On the Ground / Feedback & Research / Returners & Business systems) |
1.00 PM |
Lunch |
2.00 pm |
Workshop 3 & 4 (Look & Book / On the Ground / Feedback & Research / Returners & Business systems) Paul Sloane, founder of destination-innovation Closing remarks by Muriel Gray - Chair and TIG Chairman |
5.00 pm |
Conference closes |
Quick Links
Programme
Speakers
Inter-active Workshops
Praise from the 2007 event:
"High calibre individuals who have actually 'been there and done that' in the tourism industry, so felt highly relevant and motivating. Great mix of the visionary stuff with the practical/pragmatic"