English Riviera Destination Website

Simpleview has been tasked with the delivery of a new all singing, all dancing destination website which will sit at the heart of everything that the English Riviera does online and act as a springboard for a dramatic post-Covid recovery.

The English Riviera is a coastal destination in the county of Devon, consisting of three key resorts, Torquay, Paignton and Brixham, and the smaller village of Babbacombe.

The website is one of the English Riviera Business Improvement District’s (ERBID) most important digital assets and currently attracts over one million visitors a year. This major new project is part of an investment of £3M over the next 5 years to promote the English Riviera, supporting 1200 tourism and hospitality businesses.

The project will involve an upgrade of a site originally developed by Simpleview in 2017 and will predominantly aim to improve its mobile functionality and deliver more accommodation and ticketing functionality. Over 65% of visitors browse the site on mobile devices so the new, improved navigation will be simple and intuitive.

The new site will set out to extend the season based around lifestyle, wellbeing, outdoors and eco-tourism, retaining the ‘Naturally Inspiring’ branding and focusing on the promotion of the English Riviera’s Great Outdoors and related activities including coastal walking, cycling, golf, kayaking and swimming. Full screen video with soundtrack will make an immediate impact and compel the visitor to want to find out more.

The site’s content will also align with its core brand themes:

  • The birthplace of Agatha Christie and all the related history and heritage
  • Status as a UNESCO Global Geopark (due to its unique Geological heritage)
  • Torquay – No. 1 2021 Trip Advisor Summer Staycation Destination
  • Award-winning coastal offering, popular with all demographics
  • Reputation as England’s Seafood Coast, renowned for its amazing local fish and seafood
  • Host for major events such as the English Riviera Air Show and Agatha Christie Festival

 

All of Simpleview’s signature functionality and features will be deployed, complemented by a host of additional technology and services to engage and inspire:

  • UGC via Crowdriff – allowing ERBID to source source high-quality user-generated content (UGC) and put it to work on the new site, social channels and ad campaigns.
  • Simpleview DAM (Digital Asset Management) – a cloud-based platform which has been designed to be used internally as an efficient storage solution for DMO’s media i.e. photo, video, audio and document library, and externally for distribution to media partners, members and stakeholders.
  • Automated chatbot will enable visitors to ask questions with answers provided, in the destination’s own brand voice, by a digital assistant

Carolyn Custerson, CEO of the ERBID Company comments:

“Digital Destination Marketing is at the heart of everything we do and we are very excited to be able to invest in the very latest technology that will allow us to extend our reach and raise our profile even further as one of the UK’s Premier Resorts.”

The new site will be launched at the turn of the year.

English Riviera website refresh Dec 19
The ERBID 5-year Business Plan pledged to invest in a new fully mobile responsive Destination Website and a new official English Riviera website site was launched November 2017.

A new Be Inspired section has been built into the site including a new English Riviera Blog which is intrinsically linked to our increasing Social Media Marketing activity, including the most recent Award Winning Beaches, Amazing People Campaign.

All 1000+ paying ERBID partners are entitled to a FREE full-page advert on the website with the opportunity to include up to 600 words of copy and multiple images to promote their business.
We encourage you to visit the website and your business page/s and check your content – are you making the best of your advert? For a handy ‘how-to’ guide, visit the Digital Marketing Toolkit.

All images used on the website are also available for partners to use in their own marketing activity simply visit the ERBID Image library and create and account for free use.

Traffic to the English Riviera website is continuing to increase and attracts over 1 million unique visitors per year and 3.4 million page views. The site is a significant site with 1500 partner product pages and over 300 editorial pages promoting the area. The English Riviera BID Company invests heavily in professional Search Engine Optimisation resulting in over 1400 keywords with Page 1 results on Google in the last 12 months.