Thursday, January 08, 2009
Tourist and property interest in Galicia in Jan 2009
There is nothing positive about this post, so do not read on if you have a commercial interest connected with holidaying, travel or property sales in Galicia.
We are now a week into January 2009 and this allows me to compare visitor statistics for my Galicia related websites with the equivalent period in 2008.
I can not only make a comparison between overall visitor numbers and page views, but also the specific pages and page topics that gained or lost visitor attention.
The overall picture is a bad one with total visitor numbers being only two thirds of the same time last year. This becomes even more concerning when the “like for like” figures of last month and the month before were only slightly down on their equivalents of the previous year. It suggests that 2009 is not seeing a fresh and positive start, but rather a significant down turn.
More concerning still is the fact that, in addition to total visitor numbers being down, the number of hits on pages related to holiday resources like hotels and villas sees an even bigger drop. This is also echoed by clicks on ads which again show an overall drop of almost 75% on this time last year. Nothing short of catastrophic.
Looking at the area of ads, this again shows signs of the recession and, for the first time, I have themed ads that are clearly not themed at all. The most obvious explanation for this is that there are not a sufficient number of appropriate advertisers to fill the ad slots. The result - un-themed and, in some cases, inappropriate ads.
To what extent all of the above is down to the recession I am unsure. It has clearly had a major impact, but some other “local” factors have also had a serious negative effect too.
Other “critical to Galician overseas tourism” factors
I have already lamented about the loss of the Ryanair Liverpool-to-Santiago flights and the reduced schedule of their Stansted route. But I have also spotted that the Aer Lingus route from Dublin to Santiago has been discontinued in 2009.
To make matters worse, Holiday Autos, the UK’s most used car rental company, has terminated car rental from both Santiago and la Coruna airports. They were operating from these airports before the recent Ryanair flights (Santiago airport from at least 2000), but there operation is now terminated. This suggests that they see a diminished future for Galicia as an overseas tourist destination, at least over the coming couple of years.
Clearly all of these factors are combining to make getting to Galicia more difficult (as it was prior to 2007) and this in turn is removing holiday and property buying interest in the area. Interest in my property pages is down by around 90% from the same time last year. This is nothing short of unbelievable.
As the weeks and month of 2009 pass by will update on any changes, good or bad, and hope that this rapid downward trend sees some kind of reversal.
We are now a week into January 2009 and this allows me to compare visitor statistics for my Galicia related websites with the equivalent period in 2008.
I can not only make a comparison between overall visitor numbers and page views, but also the specific pages and page topics that gained or lost visitor attention.
The overall picture is a bad one with total visitor numbers being only two thirds of the same time last year. This becomes even more concerning when the “like for like” figures of last month and the month before were only slightly down on their equivalents of the previous year. It suggests that 2009 is not seeing a fresh and positive start, but rather a significant down turn.
More concerning still is the fact that, in addition to total visitor numbers being down, the number of hits on pages related to holiday resources like hotels and villas sees an even bigger drop. This is also echoed by clicks on ads which again show an overall drop of almost 75% on this time last year. Nothing short of catastrophic.
Looking at the area of ads, this again shows signs of the recession and, for the first time, I have themed ads that are clearly not themed at all. The most obvious explanation for this is that there are not a sufficient number of appropriate advertisers to fill the ad slots. The result - un-themed and, in some cases, inappropriate ads.
To what extent all of the above is down to the recession I am unsure. It has clearly had a major impact, but some other “local” factors have also had a serious negative effect too.
Other “critical to Galician overseas tourism” factors
I have already lamented about the loss of the Ryanair Liverpool-to-Santiago flights and the reduced schedule of their Stansted route. But I have also spotted that the Aer Lingus route from Dublin to Santiago has been discontinued in 2009.
To make matters worse, Holiday Autos, the UK’s most used car rental company, has terminated car rental from both Santiago and la Coruna airports. They were operating from these airports before the recent Ryanair flights (Santiago airport from at least 2000), but there operation is now terminated. This suggests that they see a diminished future for Galicia as an overseas tourist destination, at least over the coming couple of years.
Clearly all of these factors are combining to make getting to Galicia more difficult (as it was prior to 2007) and this in turn is removing holiday and property buying interest in the area. Interest in my property pages is down by around 90% from the same time last year. This is nothing short of unbelievable.
As the weeks and month of 2009 pass by will update on any changes, good or bad, and hope that this rapid downward trend sees some kind of reversal.
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No airlines fly direct to Galicia from the USA. Flights do go to Madrid and Barcelona from which there are connections to Santiago, la Coruna and Vigo (in Galicia). Hertz, Alamo etc are all in Galicia as are some national car rental companies like Record.
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