Edinburgh to have new marketing body
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Edinburgh is set to be promoted by a single body with the name Marketing Edinburgh in a bid to launch a co-ordinated approach for tourism and investment.
The organisation will build on existing public-private partnerships in the city. The initiative was given the backing of the City of Edinburgh council after they viewed analysis of the promotional strategies of other UK cities.
The new body will launch in April next year and will closer co-ordinate city promotion activity. Destination Edinburgh Marketing Alliance, Edinburgh Convention Bureau and Edinburgh Film Focus will all be subsumed into Marketing Edinburgh. Between them, the three bodies helped attract nearly £79m in investment last year.
There is core funding being made available and the body has a target of raising £5m annually by 2014. An executive team has yet to be appointed.
Chief executive of Edinburgh chamber of commerce Ron Hewitt says: “The establishment of Marketing Edinburgh is a significant advance. For years, this great city has lacked a co-ordinating marketing body with sole responsibility for attracting investors, visitors and talent to the city.”
Marketing Edinburgh will work with national tourism body VisitScotland, which restructured earlier this year.
The Scottish city hosts the annual Edinburgh Festival and Edinburgh International Film Festival.
Tourism body Visit London is still not absolutely confident whether it is to be spared the axe from the government’s public sector spending cutbacks. Visit London’s main channel for funding, the London Development Authority, is to close and discussions are still ongoing over how the tourism body will receive support.
YouGov Insight:
Holidaying
· Two thirds of consumers have taken short breaks in the UK over the past year.
· However, the recession and its aftermath have taken a heavy toll on short haul, short breaks. Just over one fifth of adults have taken a European short break over the past year.
· Those who have continued to take European short breaks are most likely to be young single men under 25: essentially, confident travelers who have been less affected by the recession than older consumers.
· 1 in 4 young men between the ages of 16 and 24 have taken short breaks in Europe in the last year. This is well above the average of 15% across all demographics.
· 1 in 4 YouGov respondents said that having friends or relative in the area had a bearing on the choice of destination for their last short break.
· Half of ABC1s said that they just don’t like lying on the beach, while only 37% of C2DEs feel the same.
Click here for more information on this YouGov market report
Readers' comments (3)
Wayne | Tue, 23 Nov 2010 4:29 am
Fantastic... I hope. Edinburgh is a wonderful city and has so much potential. As a marketer who has lived in and visits there annually I have longed to see decent, sustained marketing to create the sort of cumulative effect required to see a real return on investment. But please... Let's have some 'real' marketing... get to the senses of the audience. Get off Princes Street and the Royal Mile. Market those areas (William St. shopping, Stockbridge strolling, the Botanics, Dean Village, Arthurs Seat... so many others) that really are the great little 'discoveries' for the tourists and locals alike (so many don't even know of Water of Leith walkway... ). I look forward to seeing some real results.
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ali ahmadyar | Tue, 23 Nov 2010 2:45 pm
sounds like a waste of £5 million and a failed initiative, visit scotland is hardly the most innovative body to work with, i suppose Edinburgh needs the visitors it can get to justify the investment in the trams.
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Kenneth Wardrop | Tue, 23 Nov 2010 3:17 pm
Wayne - like your comments - you can be assured this is exactly what Marketing Edinburgh and the Edinburgh Inspiring Capital Brand is all about. Our summer campaign 'This is my Edinburgh' presented a resident's insight in to the best and quirkiest of Scotland's inspring capital and has been well received. Kenneth
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