WalesCymru.com

Today a colleague emailed details of a new listing on the Welsh Assembly’s Sell2Wales website. It appears the Assembly is inviting suitably qualified companies to quote for “Writing the WEFO (funding) application for the Digital Tourism Business Project“.

So what is this all about and more importantly what can a £24m ‘Digital Tourism’ project do for Welsh Tourism?

According to the Project’s RFQ the “Digital Tourism Business Project aims to transform both the data infrastructure and strategic landscape of Wales.”

The intention is to “deliver an environment whereby the tourism industry … can use a definitive and accessible information feed as part of a platform for marketing and the development of innovative business networks” and “prepare tourism in Wales for integration into a wider digital business network.”

In order to achieve this it is proposed that the project will:

• Provide innovative opportunities for tourism SME’s to fully embed ICT in business marketing and business processes including environmental best practice.
• Create virtual tourism business networks in order to create wider industry penetration and increase business generated in the online/digital marketplace.
• Establish an innovative digital tourism business framework to encourage additional digital/online business enquiries and ensure that efficient technological structures are in place so that enquiries generated can be easily and quickly converted by SME’s to improve bookabilities at all levels.
• Provide networking opportunities for tourism SME’s to capitalise on business opportunities stimulated by Visit Wales and encourage technological improvements & enhancement to key partner websites to further assist businesses
• Create a new e-CRM approach to working with tourism SME’s and establish support channels for SME’s
• Establish and implement a SME engagement Programme with ICT surgeries, focused tourism ICT advice and signposting to other providers

As a user of VisitWales data WalesCymru.com applauds this initiative. Access to high quality multilingual profiles, feature lists, accessibility details and availability - all updated by their owners in real time - can only help in the digital marketing Wales.

Let’s hope the project can deliver this promise, is inclusive in coverage, and embraces open systems and internationally recognized data formats.

The only concern is likely to be with the investment averaging £20,000 per operator. Some may question if this a good use of public money.