Key Objectives (KO’s):

• Improving the performance of existing tourism businesses, with strong emphasis on quality improvement
• Capitalising on the predicted growth in VFR tourism (Visiting friends & relatives)
• Strengthening selectively the borough’s tourism offer
• Growing business tourism
• Exploiting Ashford’s location en route to/from the continent and at the heart of the county
• Developing a special promotional focus on Tenterden and the ‘String of Pearls’
• Maximising the benefits of tourism partnerships through ensuring active participation
• Consolidating the importance of Tourism Information Centres in Ashford & Tenterden through service improvement in line with established best practice
• Addressing Ashford town’s poor visitor profile, working closely with the Ashford’s Future delivery team
• Monitoring the impact of all actions and feeding results back into the strategy and action planning processes

Key Measures of Success (KMS):

• Improved signing, training &increased membership of quality initiatives, targeted marketing campaigns
• Great local days out marketing campaign, residents passports, marketing campaigns to attract local people
• Feasibility studies into new attractions, grow the range of events & festivals, encourage McCarthurGlen visitors into town centre & rest of the borough.
• Create brand awareness of Ashford as a conference destination, feasibility study of conference centre linked to sport/culture, campaign for companies to conference locally
• Promote benefits of Ashford as a stop off destination to / from the continent, Welcome Host training courses, and special language training for tourism businesses
• Develop a themed short breaks campaign for String of Pearls and include in new Tenterden Brouchure, maybe extended to Cranbrook & Rye
• Review partnership outputs and effectiveness on a regular basis, work with tourism partners on research and product development initiatives
• Review the Tourism Information Centre provision with partners, develop a destination management system to enable on line booking, introduce mystery shopper to Tourism Information Centres
• Include tourism priorities in Greater Ashford Development Framework, work with Ashford Town Centre Partnership to create a sense of place, improve visitor signage in town, increase B&B’s in town
• Benchmark against other Kent districts, review action plans, monitor and review the outputs of related strategies: Economic Development, Cultural , Ashford’s Future

Key Performance Indicators (KPIs):

• BV170 Museums | Performance Indicator
• Benchmarking against other districts
• Value of tourism each year
• Number of tourism jobs each year

Author & Contact: Sarah Barber

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