Founded by David Edwards in 2019, Scattered Clouds will connect you with tourism market intelligence that is readily, and often freely, available, and help you interpret that information to make informed decisions.

The ways in which Scattered Clouds may be able to assist you in getting the most from your own in-house data and the ‘big picture’ stuff that is out there are probably more ‘à la carte’ than ‘set menu’, but include:

• Delivering workshops that will enable you and your team to understand what data exists, where to find it, whether it is reliable at a level meaningful to you, and, if there are gaps in your knowledge, how best you might address these

• With so much tourism sector information washing around you perhaps need support to distil it all, as it is challenging to detect what is just flotsam and jetsam, and what is a relevant message in a relevant bottle

• Pulling disparate pieces of information together to tell a coherent story, be this in relation to a source market, market segment, or simply a ‘state of the nation’ synopsis, is a core Scattered Clouds strength

• By being undaunted at the prospect of digging around in an Excel file; for some people numbers and figuring out how to calculate a percentage can be a little unnerving, whereas for others there is nothing more rewarding than creating a pivot table or bubble chart that leads to a digestible narrative for what the data means

• Having started using one of the many free survey software packages available, you are perhaps struggling to make sense of the answers; it could be that you just need a spot of help with the analysis, or a guiding hand to tweak questionnaire structure and phrasing, so your survey starts to deliver meaningful insights 

• Encouraging you to think in a structured way about the factors that will shape the future for your destination or tourism business, be these macro or micro in nature; while making sure everything is fine-and-dandy today is vital, neither the world nor the way in which people interact with the tourism sector stands still. In such a fiercely competitive sector it is best to be prepared for change

• Providing you with a steer on what sorts of things you might want to know about your visitors and customers along with guidance on how best to find the answers; for example, do visitors leave as advocates or detractors, which contribute the most to your bottom-line and are they who you think they are?

• Acting as an interlocutor between you and fully-fledged market research agencies to ensure that any research briefs you write ask the right questions, that the ‘deliverables’ stand the best chance telling you things you didn’t know and are actionable, plus of course whether you need to commission research in the first place or simply be connected with data that already exists

• Helping you create a framework to figure out the extent to which the interventions you make (jargon for marketing) are having the intended impact, through an evaluation process that will help you to focus on outcomes rather than outputs

• By sharing the findings of research and analysis in a variety of formats, from written reports to face-to-face seminars, but regardless doing so with an aim of conveying conclusions in an informative but also entertaining fashion.

Why not learn more about David Edwards, read his Blog, or even get in touch with Scattered Clouds.

For regular insights follow David on Twitter @ScattClouds