Tourism Australia and Qantas will be leading a trade delegation this week to Dublin and Cork for two ‘Australia on Tour’ events to promote the new global marketing campaign, There’s Nothing Like Australia, and the Aussie Specialist online training programme. Great food, Aussie wine and the chance to win some fantastic prizes are on offer.
The Australia on Tour event in Dublin kicks off at 6.30pm tomorrow, Tuesday 27th March, at The Morrison on Ormond Quay, while the Cork event will take place on Wednesday 28th March at The Oliver Plunkett, again commencing at 6.30pm.
The new global marketing campaign, There’s Nothing Like Australia, features the personal holiday experience recommendations of the Australian people and uses digital, print and broadcast media to show what is unique and iconic about Australia.
The Aussie Specialist Programme is Tourism Australia’s global online training programme, run with the co-operation of the State and Territory tourism organisations.
Aussie Specialists are a dedicated group of retail travel agents actively selling and promoting Australia around the world. The programme is designed to provide travel agents and distributors with the knowledge and skills to sell Australia more effectively and has won awards for ‘best training programme’ in the UK, Asia and USA.
In January 2010 Tourism Australia launched a new version of the programme, which is now available in 14 languages. Globally, there are over 20,000 registered agents across more than 110 countries.
Despite weaknesses in the economies of some of Australia’s traditional tourism markets, as well as a strong Australian dollar and the impact of natural disasters, visitor arrivals were relatively stable in 2011 compared to 2010, down just 0.2%. There were 5.9 million short-term visitor arrivals to Australia last year – holiday arrivals declined 4.1% while business arrivals increased 4.5%.
In contrast to declines in visitors from the UK (-6.0%), Germany (-4.0%), France (-3.4%) and Italy (-2.5%), visitor numbers from Ireland increased by around 5% last year.
Tourism Australia recently relaunched its global website, australia.com, with a cleaner design, simpler navigation and additional functionality, aimed at helping international and domestic travellers better research, plan and make the most of an Australian holiday. The site is now live in 17 languages.
I would be interested in attending the Australia on Tour event tomorrow evening in Dublin, is it open to all travel agents?
The event is by invitation, but I have contacted Tourism Australia and they are sending you one. See you there!