Tourism is an important part of any community and can bring economic benefits, but it’s also a relationship between people and places. If you want to make sure that tourism in your community is done right, then integrated tourism planning is for you! Integrated Tourism Planning (TIPS) will help you create an integrated tourism plan for your community by identifying its values, vision and goals. If done regularly, TIPS helps keep everyone up to date on how things are going with tourism in your area.
TIPS to create an integrated tourism plan for your community
This tool will help you identify tourism opportunities, develop strategies to realize those opportunities and set goals that are measurable. TIPS helps communities plan for the future by creating a shared vision and common understanding of the role of tourism in their community. TIPS is designed to be used when developing an integrated tourism planing for your community, but it can also be used as part of other planning processes.
TIPS is not a template or a checklist; rather it is a series of questions aimed at generating dialogue about how tourism planning can contribute to achieving local objectives or goals. The tool consists of three components:
- An introduction which provides an overview of how to use this approach;
- A process guide which provides additional information on how best to complete each phase; and finally…
- A sample worksheet demonstrating how this process might look if applied at different levels within government (local government, provincial/territorial government).
TIPS helps communities to explore tourism in their areas
TIPS is a process that helps communities explore tourism in their areas and decide what they want to do with it. The process identifies a community’s values, vision and goals and then helps the community decide which tourism activities best match these things.
A TIPS team of 10-15 members from the community is formed. They meet for about 6 months to develop a plan for tourism development based on local needs and priorities. As part of this process, members attend workshops that teach them how to use TIPS for their own communities (or you can use our online workshop!).
This ends up being a great way for people who are interested in working together on something new like a project or event because they learn from each other’s experiences while building trust through shared work space over time! You may want some kind of structure or format so everyone has an idea what they’re getting into when signing up, but feel free to customize it as needed depending on your group size/needs etc.
Who might benefit from Integrated Tourism Planning?
Everyone can benefit from Integrated Tourism Planning.
- Community groups: If a community group such as a Chamber of Commerce, Business Improvement Association or Neighbourhood Watch is interested in developing an understanding of the tourism impact of their community, then they may find it useful to undertake an ITP. This will enable them to fully understand how many people visit their area and when so that they can plan for future development and growth.
- Businesses: Businesses which operate within a particular geographical area can also benefit from undertaking an ITP as this will provide them with important data about their market segmentation which will allow them to tailor their marketing activities accordingly. For example, if you are running a food truck business that operates only on weekends during the warmer months, then you would want to target tourists who visit the area during those times rather than focusing on locals who live nearby all year around (unless they happen to be looking for new dining options!).
Benefit from Integrated Tourism Planning
You probably know that tourism is important for your community. But if you do not have a say in what goes on in your community and you feel tourism is important, then TIPS will help you make the most of it.
Communities, organizations and businesses can benefit from TIPS. If you have a say in what goes on in your community and you feel tourism is important, then TIPS will help you make the most of it.
TIPS is a process that helps communities explore tourism in their areas and decide what they want to do with it. With TIPS, we help communities find out how tourism fits into their vision for the future. We help them explore what attracts visitors to their area: What type of visitor comes? Who stays there? How long do they stay? How much money are they spending? What kind of business opportunities could exist here if we made our town attractive to tourists visiting this area?
When should you do integrated tourism planning?
Integrated tourism planning is a process that helps communities explore tourism in their areas and decide what they want to do with it. The TIPS process identifies a community’s values, vision and goals and then helps the community decide which tourism activities best match these things.
The TIPS process can be applied at any time in a community’s development path. In some cases, it is most useful at an early stage of growth when there are few or no established businesses or attractions; in other cases, it may be more appropriate when the community has already started to develop its own brand but needs help integrating this into its plan for future development; finally, TIPS can be used as part of an ongoing strategic planning process.
Anytime! Doing the TIPS process regularly keeps everyone in your community updated on how things are going with tourism.
TIPS is a tool that can be used as often as you like. It’s easy to update your TIPS template, and doing it regularly helps keep everyone in the community updated on how things are going with tourism.
If you want to do TIPS more often, that’s great! Just remember that each time you do TIPS it only covers one month. So if you do it twice a year, for example, then each piece of information will only be relevant for six months at a time.
Tourism is an important part of your community
Tourism is important to your community and integrated tourism planning can help all involved. Tourism can bring money into your community and help build relationships with other communities, as well as countries.
You don’t have to travel far to find examples of the benefits that tourism provides. Many people find work in the tourism industry or are employed in businesses that support it, such as hotels or restaurants. This creates jobs for people who live in your area, which helps keep them from having to move elsewhere for employment opportunities.
Tourism also brings new ideas and cultures into our lives; this helps us learn about different ways of thinking about things and how others live their lives differently than us and that’s not just beneficial for our own personal growth; it also helps us understand how different groups think about issues like politics, religion, gender equality and many others on a global scale!
Conclusion
There you have it: a simple introduction to integrated tourism planning. It’s a great way to explore what tourism means to your community, and how it can help improve lives and livelihoods.