The value of Visit Stellenbosch Membership

We’re always grateful for the continued support of our members. Our commitment to our members remains the same and stronger than ever.

Our mission? To inspire visitors to stay longer, do more and visit us again. In doing this, we strive to unlock tourism potential, enhance our national and international image, and create more opportunities for our communities to thrive.

At the heart of our mission lies a determined focus on tourism-led social solutions, specifically in terms of job creation, skills improvement and enterprise development.

At Visit Stellenbosch, we want to provide you with all the practical resources, information and expertise you need to align your marketing and messaging with that of Visit Stellenbosch’s and help amplify the message of Destination Stellenbosch for the benefit of all stakeholders in our tourism ecosystem.

Here are five things you should know:

1. A rising tide lifts all boats
The more that people support and visit our destination, the more businesses and employees will benefit. Ultimately, it’s our job to keep the destination alive (especially during these challenging times) and to attract more visitors, inspiring them to stay longer, spend more money and visit us again. To do so, we need to focus on the aspects that make our destination unique and special and make people want to visit. These aspects aren’t always equally weighted, and the reality is that some experiences or businesses serve as more critical drivers for tourism than others.
This means that sometimes, the larger and most recognisable attractions receive exposure from a destination marketing perspective. The Eiffel Tower, for example, makes people want to visit Paris, while the lesser-known café down the street probably doesn’t have the same drawcard. In this case, Tourism Paris needs to promote the Eiffel Tower over the café, lovely as it might be. This being said, we are acutely aware that we are a member’s organisation and each member has something special to offer, making our total product offering compelling and memorable. So, we do everything possible to ensure coverage and exposure for all. Let’s trust the process, even if that means giving more exposure to certain products, at times, over others.

2. Visit Stellenbosch is not responsible for sales
With a few exceptions, we continue to focus our time and effort on destination marketing and to build and strengthen the Stellenbosch brand. Through campaigns, activation and events and using our resources optimally we continuously build sales funnels which create an optimal environment for members to leverage opportunities and convert leads and prospects to sales. You can help us by empowering us to focus on selling the destination experience and to engage with the campaign and events which will create opportunities to make sales.

3. We are passionate about your business success
Due to many external factors, we do often tend to fall under member scrutiny. We understand that some situations can be frustrating, but the Visit Stellenbosch team is unwavering in our dedication to our destination. We understand our responsibilities, and more importantly, we love where we live, what we do and will strive to see our destination become as successful as possible, which includes you and your business. You can assist us by supporting our strategy, collaborating with and assisting the team. We are here to support you and give you the tools you need.

4. Visit Stellenbosch is taking a long-term view
As a tourism business, you are undoubtably worried about next month’s sales and, if they don’t look good, you might find yourself looking to your DMO for help. And while this is a valid approach, it is equally important that Visit Stellenbosch implements a long-term strategy toward building Stellenbosch’s brand, reputation and demand over the long term. If we don’t, we risk losing visitors to other, more visible destinations in the end. You can help us by letting Visit Stellenbosch focus on a long-term view for the ongoing growth of tourism in Stellenbosch.

5. Trust the process
It’s so easy to form an opinion about marketing based solely on what it looks like. For example, one might say, “I like this ad/I don’t like that one,” or, “I like the colour of this website/I don’t like that one.” Often these opinions could be based on what the competition is doing. If stakeholders pay too much attention to how campaigns look, a DMO could follow suit instead of implementing the most effective marketing for our destination and for the potential visitor. We might overlook opportunities with digital campaigns, email marketing or social media to save the budget for more costlier channels. These decisions are not necessarily made intentionally, but because stakeholders, whether directly or indirectly, have influenced the decision-making process. You can help us by focusing on the objectives and the results and being open-minded about where and how the organisation markets itself, and the platforms it creates for participation.

Through our ongoing workshops and member sessions, the Stellenbosch Playbook, our Visit Stellenbosch website, notice board, toolkits and more, our core commitment continues to be to promote Stellenbosch as a leading destination and help you to do just that too.

Here are more benefits of being a Visit Stellenbosch member and if you have not done so yet, register on the Visit Stellenbosch Member’s Portal where you will find all kinds of tools and resources and if you are looking for something that is not there, let us know and we will source or create the information required.

As always, we value your input, suggestions, your support and sharing to optimise all our efforts and ensure that we’re working as effectively as possible towards our common goal.

How to get even more out of being a Visit Stellenbosch member:

• Attend meetings and member sessions.
• Share your stories, events etc. so that we know what is happening and can amplify your message within our communication frameworks.
• Actively participate and work together with us.
• Keep up to date with member resources and toolkits designed to make your life that bit easier – from marketing to social media.