Welcome to Great Days Out In Scotland campaign, funded by the Scottish Government and delivered by VisitScotland. Now you have been successful in the Days Out Incentive Fund, you can take part in the consumer facing campaign known as ‘Great Days Out In Scotland', offering visitors up to 50% off tickets. Here is all the information your business will need to help you promote the offer to your potential visitors.
Updated 9 February 2022: Taking into account the impact of the Omicron variant on tourism businesses, the timeframe for offering the Days Out ‘Up to 50% off’ promotion has been extended beyond 18 February 2022, in order for participating businesses to utilise their funding. Full changes to the payment and reporting requirements will be communicated shortly to participating businesses by an amendment letter.
What are the benefits of the campaign?
November through to February can often be challenging for visitor attractions and experiences but we want to see as many people as possible exploring Scotland and using this offer. By offering up to 50% off, we hope to encourage people in Scotland to get out and about and reconnect with everything they love about Scotland and all the experiences it has to offer.
We have set up a dedicated landing page for visitors where they can access your business listing.
Do I need to add information to my own website?
We would strongly encourage you to add information to your website to help the consumer as much as possible and make it easy for them to redeem the offer and visit. You can use any of our promotional assets to help with this.
Visitors will be directed to your website from your VisitScotland.com listing and, as such, it is important to ensure you have the offer information easily accessible to the visitor when they reach your website.
Ensure you make any booking requirements clear for the visitor. You may choose to use a booking code to help track redemptions of the offer. For example:
- To claim up to 50% off when booking online please enter the code ‘days out offer’ at the checkout
- To claim up to 50% off call and quote ‘days out offer’
You should also make any booking restrictions clear. For example:
- Tickets are limited. Please pre-book in advance online and enter ‘days out offer’ at the check out
- Excludes group bookings of 15+. Please contact us for group booking enquiries
Wording the offer: when referring to the offer, the correct wording should be ‘Up to 50% off, to a maximum of £20 per ticket’. Please do not refer to any other % discount or £20 off per ticket.
Do I need to add the offer to my VisitScotland.com listing?
Yes. VisitScotland will automatically add the "Up to 50% off" badge to your web listing. However we do need to you to add any specific booking requirements e.g. please quote ‘great days out offer’ to redeem up to 50% off.
In order to help the consumer access the offer details and see who is involved, please ensure your business listing on VisitScotland is updated.
Top tips:
- Ensure your website link is correct
- Check your opening hours are up to date
- Ensure your descriptions reflect the current offering from your business
- Use your listing to explain how the offer can be redeemed at your business. If you have any specific booking requirements, please add them into your copy e.g. please quote ‘days out offer’ to redeem up to 50% off.
What happens if my grant award fund is used before 18 February 2022?
If the grant award your businesses has received is used up you can opt-out so your business listing no longer appears as part of the campaign on the Great Days Out page. All you need to do is untick the Great Days Out box in either your Extranet or TMS and save. The additional offer information you added will then also automatically be removed from your web listing. We have put together a handy step by step guide on how to update your listing with the Great Days Out in Scotland offer.
Step by step guide
Once you have been contacted to say you have been successful in the Days Out Incentive Fund, please update your VisitScotland web listing with specific details of the Great Days Out In Scotland offer – up to 50% off
up to the value of £20.
Visitors will be able to filter on our website to find businesses who are included in this promotion.
Extranet – attraction and activity operators
- Log in to your Extranet
- Select the product listing you want to update by clicking on the business name
- Click the three grey lines in the top left corner and select ‘Edit details’
- Click 'Facilities' on the left-hand side
- Under the heading ‘Promotion’ the Days Out – Up to 50% off box will be ticked
- Click 'Notes' and add specific information about the offer. All offers are up to 50% off up to the value of £20 but you may choose to ask visitors to pre-book using a discount code so you can track redemptions. Tickets must be pre-booked online using the discount code DAYSOUT50. Not valid with any other discount.
- Click 'save' at the bottom of the page
- To opt-out, untick the ‘Days Out- Up to 50% Off’ box and click 'save'
Should you have any additional queries, we’re here to help. Please get in touch by emailing customer.services@visitscotland.com, Monday – Friday 9am – 5pm.
Your extranet
Changes to your VisitScotland.com web listing are simple to action and need to be made direct on your Extranet. Anything you amend in your Extranet updates overnight, and so you will see them on your web listing the next day. If you’ve forgotten your password you can reset this yourself. If you have any issues with this, please email customer.services@visitscotland.com.
Tours Management System (TMS) – tour operators
You need to have published tours displaying on visitscotland.com in order to add your offer details.
If you have only registered on the TMS, or just added your operator details but not your tours, instructions on how you do this can be found on our Tour Management System guide
Once you have your published tour, you can add your offer details by:
- Log in to (TMS) and your dashboard will open
- In the Tours section, click on the relevant tour name
- Scroll down to 'Great Days Out In Scotland' heading
- The 'Up to 50% off' box will be ticked already.
If you are a tour operator and have multiple tour listings, the "Up to 50% off" badge will be automatically added to one of your VisitScotland web listings. You can opt-in other eligible day tours by ticking the 'Up to 50% off' box in your listing.
- Add specific information about your offer - All offers are up to 50% off up to the value of £20 but you may choose to ask visitors to prebook using a discount code so you can track redemptions. e.g. 50% off pre-booked tickets for boat tours, 7 days a week. Please use discount code DAYSOUT50 when booking. Not valid with any other discount. Discount is not valid on bike hire, boat hire or tour tickets purchased in-person.
- Once you have clicked the green 'save and publish' button, your updated tour will appear on VisitScotland.com within 15 minutes
- To opt-out, untick the box beside ‘Up to 50% off’ and click ‘Save and publish’ at the bottom of the page
When you update your web listing, please also make sure you have Starting points, Highlights and Themes added, as these also affect how your tour is searched for by visitors on VisitScotland.com.
If you have forgotten your password - follow the ‘forgot your password’ link on the login page. Enter your email address and click send reset link. You will receive an email with details of how to reset your password and confirmation once this has been done. This reset link expires after 1 hour so if you do not use it within this time period, you will need to resend again.
Should you have any additional queries, we’re here to help. Please get in touch by emailing customer.services@visitscotland.com., Monday – Friday 9am – 5pm.
How can my business promote the Great Days Out In Scotland campaign?
Use your own channels to help promote this campaign and encourage visitors to your attraction. We have a range of tips and ready-made assets below which can help you.
-
1
Wording for your visitors
- Wide-eyed with wonder... Adventure is calling.
- Mysterious castles... The thrill is calling.
-
2
Images and promotional assets
You can access a range of images for free using our Digital Media Library. Simply search for ‘'Great Days Out In Scotland'" for the pre-tagged selection. We have created a range of ready-made digital adverts, also available to download for free via our Digital Media Library, which can be used on your own channels such as social media, emails and website. Simply search ‘'Great Days Out In Scotland'’ to access them.
-
3
Up to 50% off badge
Another asset available through our Digital Media Library is the badge which will be used across the majority of promotion via VisitScotland. This is an easy way for you to indicate the offer on your own channels.
-
4
Staff
Ensure all staff are aware of the offer so as many visitors as possible can redeem the offer. We do not want anyone to miss out!
How much will it cost to promote through my business?
There doesn’t need to be any cost involved. You simply need to shout about the offer through your own channels using the free assets which have been created and are available to you via the Digital Media Library.
You can use your existing booking processes including online or offline sales, with flexibility over your channel choice, providing final ticket sales can be evidenced.
If you use third party platforms to sell tickets, you should review your contractual terms and conditions.
Do I need to run the discount throughout the promotion period?
You can be flexible with which days or weeks you choose to run the promotion within the promotional period. If your offer is only valid certain dates, you should make that clear on your visitscotland.com web listing.
How is VisitScotland promoting the campaign?
Our campaign focuses on the fact that many people have not explored as much as they might have liked over the last few months, but that now is the perfect time to reconnect with friends and family while also benefiting from a discount of up to 50% off.
We will be using a multi-channel approach to ensure we are reaching visitors and encouraging them to visit attractions across the country as part of a day out, or a short break.
Activity starts on 4 November 2021 and will run until 18 February 2022.
In response to the impact of the Omicron variant on tourism operators, participating Days Out businesses are permitted to continue their Days Out promotional offer beyond 18 February, with final reporting required no later than August 2022.
|
Promotional Channel |
Activity |
Timings |
|
Radio |
On air and online promotion across Hits Radio (Aberdeen, Dundee, Edinburgh, Glasgow), MFR, Radio Borders, West Sound and Heart. |
November for 6 weeks |
|
Press |
Online promotion as well as print adverts and front page promotion in national titles such as Sunday Herald as well as 20 regional titles including Stirling Observer and Galloway News. |
November for 12 weeks |
|
Online and in print promotion with Primary Times |
December |
|
|
Social |
Paid adverts on Facebook targeting Scotland audience. |
November for 12 weeks |
|
Digital |
Targeted digital ads for the family market using websites such as mumsnet.com and daysoutwiththekids.com |
November for 12 weeks |
|
VisitScotland Email |
Dedicated email promoting the campaign to the VisitScotland Scotland database. |
November |
|
VisitScotland.com |
Landing page created to link visitors with business offers and relevant days out content. |
November for 12 weeks |
|
VisitScotland PR |
PR activity to promote the campaign to visitors. |
November for 12 weeks |
|
VisitScotland Social Channels |
Instagram mini guide and following participating businesses to help amplify messaging. |
November for 12
|
What is required for the closure report?
VisitScotland will produce a template report to be circulated to participating businesses.
This will be communicated to participating businesses later in 2022, and is no longer a mandatory requirement to receive the final 20% Grant Award payment. Final reporting will be required no later than August 2022.
What if I am a free attraction?
This campaign is offer led, however, free attractions are hugely important to a visitor experience and VisitScotland will ensure such attractions are promoted as part of this campaign.