Dunedin visitor KPIs
Michelle Lai has been analysing visitor data to help Dunedin businesses.
Dunedin Host's members are all in the tourism industry, dependent on national and international visitors to the city. Michelle Lai worked with Dunedin Host chair Deane Agnew, for her research project for the Graduate Diploma in Tourism Management. They identified a range of KPIs that would demonstrate relevant trends over recent years to inform Dunedin businesses:
- Occupancy rate
- Average length of stay
- 12 month rolling number of guest nights
- Domestic v international market spending
- Spending by product type
- Passenger numbers arriving at airport
- Cruise ship passenger numbers
Michelle crunched the numbers to show the trends in Dunedin, and then compared what was happening in Dunedin with national figures. She also compared Dunedin with the Waikato region (or Hamilton where data for the Waikato region was not available) because it has similar tourist offerings to Dunedin. The similarities and differences in trends were highlighted in a comprehensive report and in her presentation of her findings at a Dunedin Host meeting in November 2017. A copy of her presentation slides is below.
Michelle also interviewed Dunedin Host members about what information they would find useful, identifying additional KPIs that she recommends be added in future for analysis and reporting. She also recommended that Dunedin Host update the data quarterly and make that information available via an online dashboard.
Deane Agnew is very pleased with Michelle's contribution to Dunedin Host and its members:
"She was a real pleasure to work with, and put in a lot of hard work crunching the numbers."