Visit London - marketing and promoting London as a tourism destination

Marketing London

The organisation Visit London, largely funded by the London Development Agency, continues to mount innovative and successful marketing campaigns. The city has seen two consecutive record years for overseas visits and expenditure in the capital.

Here are some of the highlights from the work of Visit London during 2007/08.

Getting results

2007 was a record year for overseas visits to the capital, reaching 16 million. It was a record year for spending by overseas visitors too. There were 500,000 more overseas visits than in 2006, contributing a total of nearly £9 billion to London’s economy.

Visit London's award-winning marketing campaigns helped to boost London's success in overseas markets, bringing proven economic benefit worth nearly £300m.

Marketing campaigns targeted the domestic audience too, bringing visitors from the rest of the UK to the capital, as well as encouraging Londoners to make the most of their city. However 800,000 fewer British visitors stayed overnight in 2007, and spending by these 10.2 million visitors declined by about 3% to a total of £ 2.2 billion.

Highlights of the year

In North America, a major new campaign 'Do London Like a Local' was launched featuring radio, online and outdoor advertising. This was backed by a brand new website featuring local Londoners giving hints and tips to North American travellers.
 
In London and the UK, Visit London celebrated London's network of villages. 'Village Life' saw Trafalgar Square being covered in turf for the launch of the campaign. The Evening Standard and Financial Times ran front-page pictures and the event was reported in newspapers across the globe. A quarter of a million mini Time Out guides to London's villages along with radio, print and outdoor advertising encouraged Londoners to enjoy more of the capital's villages. The PR value alone of the campaign launch was £9.6m.
  
In Europe, Visit London continued to work with Turner prize-nominated artist, David Mach to create a distinctive marketing campaign. The campaign was supported by a unique PR initiative in France which saw London challenge Paris for its romantic image. Consumers were given the chance to visit London and propose to their loved ones live on air.
 
In Japan, Visit London's bunny character continued to captivate the audience with adverts promoting London's world heritage sites.

Maximising the benefits from the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games

Visit London has been developing a strategy to maximise the benefit of hosting the Olympic and Paralympic Games in 2012. The strategy has five strands:

1. Refreshing the London Brand
2. Marketing and PR opportunities (focusing also on commercial partners and the emerging markets)
3. Using the Games to promote London to the domestic market and reverse the long term decline in visits to the capital
4. Attracting major events and creating a business tourism legacy (see below)
5. Making London more sustainable

Visit London joined with VisitBritain to help the Department for Culture, Media and Sport consult the tourism industry and produce a national tourism strategy around the 2012 Games.

Visit London launched a Brand Partnership Unit with VisitBritain to maximise the potential commercial opportunity for London in staging the Games.

The unit aims to develop a small number of long term strategic partnerships with corporations that reflect a similar brand fit with London - both sponsors and non-sponsors of the Games.