Destination Helensburgh Update
Argyll and Bute Council · 13 May 2025
Back to Helensburgh and Lomond Area Community Planning Group — 13 May 2025 and its agenda
Text extracted from the council's PDF. Layout and reading order may differ from the original.
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What has Destination Helensburgh delivered so far? 2024 VISITOR INFORMATION CENTRE AND WEBSITE: OVER 9K IN-PERSON & 83K WEB VIEWS ▶ Our Visitor Information Centre (VIC), is an authorised iKnow partner of VisitScotland. ▶ The VIC hosts information on local events, activities and attractions, and in 2024 welcomed over 9K people, with c. 28K visitors and over 83K page views on our website. ▶ Our What’s On Calendar currently has over 200 events listed for the rest of 2025, with more added every week. In 2024, 4.2K users visited the What’s On Page on the website. Other most visited pages include Eating and Drinking, Shopping and Dog Friendly Helensburgh & Lomond. We see peak traffic around dates like Valentines’ Day, Bonfire Night, and right now in March 2025 the Helensburgh Book Festival is one of our most visited pages, showing that people come to us to find information. ▶ We sell tickets on behalf of local organisations for their events at no cost. 2024 SOCIAL MEDIA: OVER 496K REACH ▶ Our November-December posts promoting local shops and activities had 269.8K views on social media across 63.8K users with an engagement rate of 9.8%. ▶ 104 local shops, restaurants and accommodation providers were posted about in the campaign which focussed on Festive Shopping and #ShopLocal #EatLocal #LoveHelensburgh. ▶ We post once a week on social media with a round up of local events, and this is very popular, reaching over 221K in 2024, with 3.8K engagement. ▶ We reached over 496K via our social posts in 2024 (Facebook/Instagram). 2024 MEDIA ADVERTISING: TOTAL POTENTIAL REACH 1.98 MILLION We placed advertising in the following publications (both print and online editions): ▶ Scots Magazine – 4 Issues. ▶ Holiday West Highland Spring/Summer and Autumn/Winter - 80K print copies distributed to over 500 outlets across the region. We also provided editorial content to promote the local area. ▶ West Coast Festivals Guide. ▶ Landmark Press Bedroom Folders Loch Lomond, Cowal & Bute 2024-2025. destinationhelensburgh.org
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SINCE WE STARTED IN 2021: ▶ Have spent a total of £25.8K on promoting the local area, including a successful application to the VisitScotland Destination & Sector Marketing Fund. ▶ Hosted 3 Social Media Influencer visits to the area – during the campaign period total reach 353.7K, engagement 41.5K. Plus, blogs on the influencer pages which they repost continue to gather even more views and engagement. ▶ Organised a digital video promoting the area to be displayed on the giant digital billboards at Glasgow Queen Street for 2 weeks, estimated footfall 861K, plus poster billboards in 6 major ScotRail stations, and 80 smaller panels on various trains across Glasgow suburban routes and the Glasgow to Edinburgh route. Also organised a Destination Helensburgh banner to be displayed at Glasgow Queen Street Station for the launch of new ScotRail Highland Explorer active travel train. ▶ Provided content to include Helensburgh in the ‘Friendliest towns to visit in Scotland’ entry on the international TravelAwaits website, which was then featured in 2024 in the Daily Record. ▶ Welcomed guests from visiting Cruise Ship Silversea Silver Endeavour. We worked with the shore excursion company to organise tours with local providers; a shuttle bus into town; notified shops about the opportunity; and greeted passengers at Rhu Marina with a bagpiper, shortbread and a map of local attractions. ▶ Delivered familiarisation trips for guest experience staff from Cameron House, and developed opportunities for visitor growth by engaging with tourism stakeholder organisation. ▶ Used a local company to create 4 seasonal videos promoting the area which can used each year, and used a local professional photographer to capture images to promote the area. ▶ Provided the content for the Discover Helensburgh App developed by Argyll and Bute Council. ▶ Created a shopping map of the town for visitors, and take part in Argyll & Bute Loves Local Gift Card campaigns. ▶ Engage with tourism industry stakeholders at events. destinationhelensburgh.org