South Wales Chamber of Commerce director Graham Morgan looks at the importance of embracing digital advances to attract the tourist pound to west Wales

WALES continually punches above its weight when it comes to tourism. Figures released by Visit Wales just this week (April 16) show that 2013 was a bumper year for tourism in Wales, with the country seeing an increase in the number of visitors at a time when Britain as a whole experienced a downturn in domestic visitor numbers and spend.

The Great Britain Tourism Survey for 2013 shows that British residents made 9.93 million visits to Wales, 3.4% up from 2012 (9.60 million). Wales outperformed Britain as a whole for which trips were 2.5% down compared with 2012.

Expenditure associated with visits to Wales rose by nearly 7% with visitors spending £1.7 billion while on holiday in Wales during 2013. Expenditure on trips to GB as a whole fell by almost 3%.

The figures prove that Wales continues to attract more than its fair slice of the action, and as the sun shines during the Easter break, it’s tempting to sit back, relax and take five.

However, it’s important that we don’t take our eye off the ball but continue to shout about what tourist businesses in Wales can offer, not only to British visitors, but to those coming from Europe and further afield.

Making the most of digital opportunities is key. As well as ensuring that your website is constantly updated with fresh content to help with its Search Engine Optimisation, thought should be given as to whether certain pages need to be translated into other languages so that international tourists can understand it.

Everything possible needs to be done to make sure that your website is selling your business on a global scale as this really is your shop window to visitors worldwide.

Social media also has an important part to play. Are you building a relationship with Facebook fans and Twitter followers, sharing updates and engaging in interaction?

Do you have a Pinterest page where you can upload pictures of your business in all its glory? And what about a YouTube channel where you can upload video content?

All of these things take time, but they are cost effective ways of reaching out to your audience and giving them a compelling reason to visit you.

Businesses may even want to think about bringing in extra resources to ensure they can put these measures in place and deal with any subsequent enquiries.

The chamber is on hand to help business to make the most of the opportunities that exist and, and I would encourage them to get in touch with us to tell us what support they need.

We will be holding a series of Fibre for Breakfast seminars in conjunction with BT which will be an opportunity for businesses to see the benefits of moving their networks to superfast broadband.

For more information contact Evan Davies on 07791 585835 or email evan.davies@southwaleschamber.co.uk.