The Real Mary King's Close is the proud recipient of the ASVA (Association of Scottish Visitor Attractions) Marketing Award 2009 jointly with fellow Edinburgh attraction, The Scotch Whisky Experience.

Recognising marketing excellence among ASVA member organisations, the awards were presented at ASVA’s ‘Driving Sustainable Growth’ conference at the Westerwood Hotel near Glasgow on 12th November.

The Real Mary King’s Close won for its ‘Real Streets…Real People…Real History’ campaign, which focused on marketing activity carried out following a re-branding of the attraction in 2008. The campaign, which aimed to grow off-peak shoulder month business and consolidate visitor numbers and revenue in the peak season, included printed marketing materials, online marketing, social, broadcast and outdoor media and PR activity. 

 

Speaking about the Real Mary King’s Close campaign, the judges said: “The pre-booking services which the attraction introduced as part of this campaign are clever marketing and data capture techniques in their own right and the campaign plan demonstrated an excellent range and sensible mix of traditional and new media”. 

 

Entries for this award were open to individual attractions, or groups of attractions working together, which could demonstrate good use of marketing channels, disciplines and technology together with effective measurement of results.

 

Presenting the awards, ASVA Chairman Andrew Johnson said: “The standard of entries was higher than ever this year, and demonstrates that successful visitor attractions are those than can use market intelligence to up their game and respond to the challenges presented by an increasingly competitive business environment. Encouraging improved marketing and promotion through awards such as this is just one of the ways ASVA supports visitor attractions throughout the country.”