How the tourism industry of Primorye can use “big data”

How can big data be used in tourism? Dialogue on this topic took place on the sidelines of the gastro-tourism forum HoReCa, which was held in Vladivostok in the last days of June.

Information about us, which settles in banks, mobile operators, on various platforms-aggregators, in social networks can be not only interesting, but also useful for the tourism industry. The main thing is that it should be depersonalized, that is, without being tied to specific people.

Working with big data allows you to look at the industry from different angles, taking into account the seasonality, the load of hotels, the popularity of certain vacation spots, tourist preferences, the average age of the guest, booking terms, demand for shopping points, preferences for catering, time of stay in the region, etc. This allows you to get a slice of the target audience, to understand who goes on vacation in Primorye, in what composition, with what plans and desires. Working with such data makes it possible to understand the client’s requests, increase his satisfaction and loyalty, and, as a result, offer him a quality product, show the advantages of purchasing tours to the region, etc. For many participants of the discussion, it was a real revelation that rest in the Khasansky district is preferred by young and active people under the age of 25, but family people, sometimes of venerable age and even with pets, prefer recreation centers in Livadia. Popular shops have also sounded, where tourists rushing to the sea on their cars love to buy food and household goods.

The use of big data has made it possible for coastal recreation centers to stretch the season. And if earlier the Primorskys preferred to spend at home, except that they got out for a picnic in the neighboring fishing line or in the dacha, now many consider it almost a tavern. The last couple or three years of the recreation center for the May holidays are booked in the early days of March. But the share of September accounts for almost 50%. No secret is the participants of the WEF.

The most active guests in Primorye are Khabarovsk residents. They are familiar and understandable on such trips. The flow from Yakutia has almost tripled: people come to us by train through Khabarovsk, by their own cars. Moscow accounts for 8%. Everyone has studied, we need to look at the country further. But Novosibirsk has only 3%. And there are explanations for that. The cost of air travel to the center of Siberia is much more expensive than to the First See. So here the question of transport accessibility comes first.

Why do we need these figures and facts? Or just a big one. Is the flow of inbound tourism increasing? We offer guests a combination of visiting places, hotels and restaurants. Visitors from neighboring regions? Think about the roadside infrastructure for car travelers. Do you see the volume of visits to recreation centers? There are subsidies for projects to create such recreational places.

This allows you to forecast trends, analyze the market situation, improve customer experience, optimize price offers and, as a result, make decisions to develop plans and strategies, create new projects. Thus, geo-analysis helps to plan various events and festivals, determine priority areas for the development of tourism infrastructure, assess the contribution of the industry to the regional economy, said Vitaly Stanislavchuk, head of the project management and analytics department of the Tourist Information Center of the Primorsky Territory (Visit Primorye), speaking to the audience.

Primorye had about 3.8 million guests, this year the region sets the bar for tourist flow for 4 million visits.