Bed & Breakfast News Christmas 2016 (#43) | Page 15

Visit our website: | bandbnews.co.uk | 15

with an interest in tourism. Tourism
really is everybody’s business.
“As a member of the UK Tourism Industry
Council, we represent also the views of the
Scottish tourism industry at Westminster.
“Our vision is to lead an engaged and
united tourism industry, delivering an
ambitious shared strategy for growth
for 2020 and beyond.

Tourism Scotland 2020
“Tourism Scotland 2020 (TS2020), the
tourism industry’s strategy for growth
was launched in June 2012, to be led by the
industry and the Scottish Tourism Alliance
(STA) under its leadership role took on
the guardianship on behalf of the sector.

“The strategy focused on driving growth in
Scotland’s key markets by strengthening
our key assets and building the industry’s
capabilities. The simple TS2020 framework
(above) became known as ‘the rocket’,
due to its shape.”

“By 2020, the Scottish tourism sector
aim to have:

Scotland’s top B&B owners
share their ‘Secrets’

Grown visitor spend by £1bn in real
terms from £4.5bn in 2011 to £5.5bn in
2020.
Increased Scottish tourism’s advocacy
score from 25% to over 50%.
Increased the average visitor spend
from £358.56 in 2011.
Increased total employment in the
tourism industry from 185,100 in 2011.
Increased total tourism turnover
from £6,221m in 2011.
Marc Crothall, CEO
of the Scottish
Tourism Alliance

Another highlight of the conference
sessions was the chance to hear Carol and
Gordon Bulloch of five star gold B&B
The Dulaig, which won the AA’s 2016 Award
as ‘Guest Accommodation of the Year’ for
Scotland, sharing their ‘Secrets of Success’ and our readers need not miss out on them:
see pages 7-9.

Technology, dealing with OTAs,
and social media
Other conference session subjects included
making the best use of technology, how best
to deal with online travel agents (OTAs), how
to manage your online presence, and using
social media profitably. Experts speaking
included Tom Messett and Matt Bowkett
of eviivo, and Iain Stewart of freetobook.

Guest Scotland 2017
The second ‘Guest Scotland’ exhibition and
conference will be on 1st and 2nd November
2017, and you can REGISTER FREE HERE.