Date :
03/09/2014
The Edinburgh Fringe continues to have a huge impact on the Capital’s tourism businesses who will be interested to hear that visitor numbers were up 1.4% this year compared to 2013 according to organisers.
Not only were there more visitors, a record more than two million tickets were issued for shows, a 12% increase on 2013, with nearly 50,000 performances staged at the 299 official venues across the capital city during August.
The Festival continues to be a major delivery vehicle for tourists spend. According to the Edinburgh Festivals Impact Study 2011, the Festivals generated over a quarter of a billion pounds worth of additional tourism revenue for Scotland (£261m) in 2010, with the economic impact figure for Edinburgh put at £245m.
The study also found that the Festivals play a starring role in the profile of the city and its tourism economy, with 93% of visitors stating the Festivals are part of what makes Edinburgh special as a city, 82% agreeing that the Festivals make them more likely to revisit Edinburgh in the future and 82% stating that the Festivals were their sole or an important reason for coming to Scotland.
New developments introduced for the 2014 Edinburgh Festival Fringe to enhance audience experience included:
• A new online ticketing experience designed to make searching for shows and buying tickets easier, particularly for the increasing number of people accessing Fringe information on tablets or smartphones
• Visitors to edfringe.com could create their own calendar of events and share booked and favourite shows with friends and family
• Information on venue accessibility was hosted online
• Audience members were able to post reviews of any shows directly onto edfringe.com
• The number of ticket collection points were increased
• New venues and pop-up venues were introduced
On the Fringe’s success this year Kath M Mainland, Chief Executive of the Edinburgh Festival Fringe Society, said: “Once again audiences from Edinburgh, Scotland, the UK and across the globe have been exposed to a completely fantastic cultural experience.
“It’s wonderful that after 67 years the Fringe remains the ultimate destination for audiences who want to embrace the arts. With over 2,183,591 tickets issued, and many thousands seeing the 706 free shows, it seems there is still a huge cultural appetite amongst audiences in Edinburgh and much further afield. In a year that places Scotland on the world stage, the Fringe has once again responded by being the greatest explosion of arts and entertainment on the planet.”
Clearly online activities had a huge impact in attracting visitors and on their experience once here. To find out how you can make the most of digital media to attract and retain customers, check out the information at the TIS Shine Online section or watch one of our digital marketing webinars.