Market Intelligence

The Tourism Sentiment Score is a measure of a destination’s ability to generate positive word of mouth about its tourism offer, which is vitally important when growing the image, identity and reputation of a place.

The score is based solely on online conversations that reference or affect a potential traveller’s perceptions of a destination, with data gathered from over 500,000 online conversations across all major social media sites including Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and TripAdvisor.  The results are generated from an individual’s perceptions and feelings and not influenced by a survey environment. 

The reports provide information on a monthly basis about the online conversations people are having about Durham, which generates the Tourism Sentiment Score (which ranges from -100 to 100).  Each report takes into account destination promoters - those who are talking about Durham in a positive light, and destination detractors - those who have something negative to say.  The score subtracts the detractor comments from the promoter comments and the result is the Tourism Sentiment Score. 

Each month the reports look at:

• How the Tourism Sentiment Score is fairing over time
• The top 3 drivers of overall awareness for that month, for example accommodation, events,  visitor attractions
• The top 3 areas which are driving the positive sentiment
• Trends for the month, highlighting opportunities for further growth in these areas
• Shifts in conversations, i.e. areas which have been less talked about that month

The results from the report can be used to further engage and push key messages about certain topics via social media channels, the impact of which can be monitored in subsequent reports.