Blog post -
That's the Spirit
It’s been over a year now since we launched our first ever global campaign – Spirit of Scotland – which has helped catapult our country’s profile to a significant high.
Where did the ‘spirit’ idea start? Well our market research told us that people felt our landscapes were beautiful, yes they thought the people were nice and yes, they found our history awe-inspiring, but you could find those things in many destinations across the world. The one thing that made Scotland different was a special feeling they had only felt while in our country. Whether it was watching the dark clouds gather over the spine-tingling Glen Coe or during ceilidh dancing in a bar in Glasgow with new Scottish friends made that evening – there was something deep within, that they only felt in Scotland. That is #ScotSpirit.
Today, we’ve launched a short video presenting some key statistics from the first year of our Spirit of Scotland campaign that show substantial growth across the board from social media engagement to business referrals.
Over 66 million potential visitors worldwide have viewed the ‘Spirit’ films and documentaries which star people who live and work across the country including Andy, the lone piper and Ben the scallop diver. The hashtag #ScotSpirit has seen 1,000 daily uses by national and international visitors, businesses and locals sharing what the spirit of Scotland means to them. This has contributed to unprecedented engagement across VisitScotland’s social media channels with followers across Twitter, Facebook and Instagram averaging an increase of 100%.
Digital ventures have also proved successful with our VisitScotland online community welcoming 5,000 members and over 6,000 people creating their own bespoke itineraries on the VisitScotland Trip Planner tool, plus 30,000 downloads of our ScotlandVR app in its first month.
Critical to the campaigns success so far has been industry adoption with 7 out of 10 businesses in Scotland stating they were aware of the campaign. By engaging with our online content, becoming virtual tour guides on the online community, signing up to the VisitScotland Information Partner Programme and working in partnership with VisitScotland to create inspiring and informative online content we’re showing the world the true Spirit of Scotland through significant collaboration.
But I don’t want to spoil it all for you, so take a look at the film and let me know your thoughts on the campaign so far. Watch this space for the next stage of the Spirit of Scotland…
Topics
- Tourism
Regions
- Scotland
