Practical Tech Solutions for Visitor Attractions
Tech Collectives for Visitor Attractions
Funding from The Scottish Tourism Leadership Recovery Fund allowed Traveltech for Scotland to join forces with ASVA (Association of Scottish Visitor Attractions) and two groups of Scottish visitor attractions: Big Houses in the Scottish Borders and Glasgow’s Leading Attractions to create its first Tech Collective Project in Autumn 2021.
Participating Visitor Attractions
The attractions taking part were:
Bowhill House
Key Highlights
Participating in the project gave the attractions confidence to tackle technology and provided validation of their needs and what they wanted and needed to implement for their respective businesses.
Facilitated collaboration in groups with industry experts motivated the businesses to come to decisions sooner on investing in technology to address business efficiencies and staff wellbeing. Practical workshops allowed businesses to map out customer journeys and identify challenges and solutions.
Time and space to work with an industry expert to map out the customer journey and to identify specific challenges for each attraction was hugely valuable and beneficial for business planning and setting goals and strategic objectives.
The project prompted the group to talk specifically about technology and how this could be implemented to help address their respective and shared business challenges
Knowledge sharing and learning from each other has had lasting benefits. Some of the attractions in different parts of the country continue to collaborate and exchange ideas on fundraising and sponsorship. Others are now discussing technology at group meetings which they didn’t before.
Background to the Project
During Covid-19, many visitor attractions were experiencing the same operational, system, and resourcing challenges. Several were struggling with the same issues in terms of understanding their own data or having proper strategies in place to manage it effectively. Most had an abundance of data at their fingertips via multiple data collection systems, processes, and tools, but not the resource, nor the knowledge as to how best to analyse and utilise this data for the business benefit of the attraction. While attractions struggled with data overload, and the pressure to drive revenues, each had to continue to deliver “business as usual” regular operations within a much-reduced team. What’s more, many strategic, back-office staff were having to step into customer-facing roles to fill staffing gaps.
Challenges/Solutions
Challenges
The Tech Collective project aimed to address several of the issues described above in a pilot format, being the first of its kind, it was a journey of discovery for all involved. The aim was to help visitor attractions identify business challenges, then by working with an industry expert, identify tech solutions and then trial and implement the relevant technology for business benefit. Too often, small tourism businesses don’t possess the time or resource to do this. Training is a start but can’t often then be implemented and investing in technology is expensive and outwith the reach of many visitor attractions, as is the technical expertise to put in place.
While urban attractions were experiencing challenges in online visibility, digital reach and market share, the rural-based heritage attractions were experiencing real challenges siting tech for ticketing outside, and inside, due to broadband connectivity, significantly impacting on their strategic business objectives and ability to engage with and respond to visitors.
Common challenges included how to address charging for car parking on site, managing seasonal passes and visitor memberships, getting the right ticketing system for visitors, strategies for revenue generation and digital marketing – getting the calls to action and key digital content right. Identifying technology to help manage internal processes and efficiencies was also a key issue; to help small businesses with perhaps a team of just one or two people administrate bookings, reporting, events and team communications much more effectively, to save time and allow staff to focus on the customer journey; for the benefit of the business.
Solutions
The Borders-based heritage attractions, Bowhill House, Traquair House and Abbotsford identified a variety of solutions to address both common challenges and individual business needs. These included, for Bowhill, mapping out the customer journey first, and then implementing a new ticketing system based on the mapped-out customer journey. Traquair House decided to invest in a new ticketing system to manage day visitors and events, which has radically transformed its back-office and administrative procedures and reporting, making for happier and more productive staff. Abbotsford chose to trial contactless donations which has been largely successful. They also addressed several strategic objectives around membership management and revenue generation as well as digital marketing, brand and social media.
Benefits to Participating Businesses
Rory Powell, House Manager, Bowhill House:
“I found the analysis mapping of the customer journey with an industry expert like Carly Straughan teasing that out of us really, really, useful. The customer journey and how that fed into our systems and what we were trying to implement with the new ticketing system was great. The best takeaway for me. There was real value in the project, being able to test out the technology with the customer journey strategy already mapped out.”
Gillian Steele, Events & Marketing Manager, Traquair House and Chair, Big Houses in the Borders:
I think one of the key benefits of involving the Big Houses of the Borders as a group, in the TravelTech project, was it prompted us to talk with each other specifically about technology and what we needed to do to not only support our existing businesses but make them easier to run. We had never really had this focus as a group before.
Because of cost and resource constraints, visitor attractions such as those in the Big Houses group, have often found it difficult to invest in technology but I think this project helped us focus; drawing out three key important areas for each of us, and then encouraging us to take action on at least one of those.
For us at Traquair, this definitely gave us the impetus to research and ultimately implement an online ticket booking system for both day visitors and events, in May 2023. We chose Beyonk, and it has quite frankly transformed our administration processes for events – freeing up valuable office resource to focus on other things, making the purchase/attending journey smoother for visitors, offering a better experience through our Pay Gate, and finally prompt and accurate reporting of visitor numbers and income.
Charlotte Bray, Fundraising Manager, The Scottish Seabird Centre:
Increasing the touchpoints for individuals to engage with and give to the Scottish Seabird Centre is a key focus of our strategy. These include growing our membership, launching a regular giving ‘Friends’ scheme, growing our online giving via one-off appeals, building our database and increasing the number of opportunities to donate to SSC throughout our visitor experience and programmes. The cost of progressing contactless giving via cashless boxes was too prohibitive for us; we have a limited budget and resources. The Goodbox trial was therefore an ideal opportunity for us.
The Goodbox contactless donation box provided an additional source of valuable unrestricted funding. We were very happy with the amount raised; many people visiting our attraction are not aware of our charitable status, so the donations received were encouraging and many visitors even chose to increase the set donation amount. We were delighted to work alongside Abbotsford, learning from one another as visitor attractions. We see this as a longer-term partnership. We are extremely grateful for this opportunity to test a fundraising device that would otherwise not have been available to us due to cost.
Sandy Maxwell-Forbes, Centre Director, The Great Tapestry of Scotland:
“As a new visitor attraction for Scotland launched in late 2021, we were already thinking of the future and asking questions of ourselves. Our main asset is a static exhibition, which due to its format would prove challenging to appeal to young audiences. The first impression experienced by the young visitor needs to overwhelm and inspire to revisit, recommend and review. So how could technology increase reach and expand into new markets whilst engaging the interest of younger demographics and education. How could we enable the Great Tapestry of Scotland to exhibit progressive modern and emerging priorities? In addition, how could we showcase the Tapestry as a forward thinking tourism business? The most challenging question; where do we start?
The TravelTech for Scotland project gave us the answers and introduced us to New Frontier, a company greatly experienced in understanding and application of Web digital technologies including Blockchain, Metaverse and NFTs. The project picked up pace very quickly with the TravelTech team engaged in coordinating workshops, timely planned phases and the final delivery of NFT’s. We also engaged with two schools and 120 pupils as well as Heriot Watt University and 20 students, teaching them the Metaverse, demonstrating the NFT’s and asking for their feedback on what GenZ and the education sector were looking for to drive our programme even further. New Frontier were a crucial partner leading us on the journey. It has not stopped there however, we are now driving ambitious plans with them to use the NFTS’s in a fully immersive space.
Discover the Tech Collectives Resources
Discover and download the Traveltech for Scotland Tech Collectives playbooks and videos, read more from participating visitor attractions and start your own journey. If you’d like more information on the Tech Collectives get in touch with Lesley or Josh.