The series of 3 workshops on gamification, organised in the last months by Aries, Municipality of Salzano and the consortium of municipalities “Comunità Collinare del Friuli”, has introduced project partners to new possibilities of using a tourism promotion tool which is very popular among stakeholders. To conclude this series of successful meetings, we would like to invite Fabio Viola, who is one of Europe’s best gamification experts, to share his experience with our project.
- Can you please explain in short what it is all about and how can it be used as a tool for tourism promotion and an innovative region development tool?
Gamification is a wide range of physical and digital activities designed to engage various target groups and make them participate actively by using video games, game principles and gaming logics. In recent years, gamification in the tourism sector has managed to gain strategic positions for various regions and to captivate a flow of 2.5 billion gamers around the globe (15 million in Italy alone) and build new tourist and cultural imagery. The digital exposure of a region and its accessibility through online channels should nowadays be as important as the politics of attracting physical visits.
- What are your impressions about the various regions you have worked with, about their potentials and the most effective and engaging ways of promoting them?
These are very different regions with different requirements; therefore, each project partner used the potentials of gamification in a specific manner. Appealing to new target groups or engaging the existing ones by customer loyalty schemes are some of the levers identified in the process. I believe that Friuli Venezia Giulia has ample potential for networking in both senses: creating a network of tourist products and services and, at the same time, building a solid digital identity, which is essential at times like this when digital consumption is on the rise. The recovery should play the phygital card (physical and digital experiences will merge even more in the future).
The activities of MerlinCV project continue: what we have learned in these workshops (and in the workshop on the same subject a few months back in Slovenia) has enabled us to use the gamification concept to think (and experience) our regions in a new and very immersive way.
GAMIFICATION: TOOLS AND IDEAS TO INCREASE THE ATTRACTIVENESS OF THE STORY OF EXTRA VIRGIN OLIVE OIL
The pilot activity of the MerlinCV project, dedicated to the spreading of knowledge about gamification and its uses, has led to a workshop (organised in Trieste on 17 November 2020) with a very concrete subject theme and objective. After 13 editions of the exhibition “Olio Capitale”, organised by Aries, Trieste can rightly claim to host the most important Italian exhibition of the olive oil sector. Thus, a national network of extra virgin olive oil producers and stakeholders has come into existence. Besides, olive growing in the Venezia Giulia region boasts high quality results, rooted in local traditions and values. How to use an innovative tool to stimulate general interest in the fascinating world of EVO oil and lure the public to explore the production and the region?
Fabio Viola has given us important suggestions during the workshop attended by (besides Aries and other MerlinCV project partners) important stakeholders such as Promoturismo FVG, National Association Città dell’Olio, some producers of EVO oil in Trieste area, representatives of the hoteliers’ associations and regional tourist guides. Fabio first introduced the participants into gamification and showed practical examples of its potentials and afterwards engaged participants by using two practical instruments: Canvas for Cultural Innovation, which helps to define the steps of the project, and Gamification Deck, a deck of 100 cards containing as many gamification logics.
The event has spurred very concrete ideas on how to produce tools able to validate the entire EVO oil production chain and to establish important connections to the sector of tourism and culture in general. Thanks to such connections it will become possible to build a community of stakeholders who, in turn, will attract new target groups and improve the perception and experience linked with EVO oil and create new economic opportunities for the regions involved.
GAMIFICATION AND CULTURAL HERITAGE
Among the planned activities of MerlinCV project was an online workshop, organized by the consortium „Comunità Collinare del Friuli“, in cooperation with ARIES VENEZIA GIULIA, which took place on 26 November 2020: “Gamification: Workshop on partici-patory planning in the field of tourism and culture”.
Gamification was the main topic of three consecutive workshops; one of these was organised by the consortium „Comunità Collinare del Friuli“, which decided to dedicate it to the promotion of tourism and cultural heritage in the region.
Invitation to participate in the workshop has been extended to all museums in the region, to Info Points, municipal institutions in representatives of the cultural institutions.
In the first part of the meeting, Fabio Viola presented the notion of gamification, highlighting practical examples and potentials of this type of user engagement which is still little known and practised in our region.
In the second part of the workshop, all the participants were involved in the practical task of discovering and pointing out peculiar characteristics of the region. With the help of playing cards, they were then asked to propose innovative methods of engaging the potential tourist.
The workshop revealed an alternative approach in which every proposed activity can be structured dynamically to enable the visitors to engage actively instead of just being passive user. Involvement, the element of surprise, dynamic action and entertainment are not to be neglected even in cultural tourism which is usually associated with boredom and passivity. By choosing this approach we gain visitors and increase their loyalty. Customers will want to return several times and will suggest a visit to other persons they are in contact with, thus creating a word-of-mouth effect.
The workshop provided all the participants with the possibility to find a different way of spreading knowledge of their region and think of new ways to present local museums that are often difficult to manage. Gamification is also an opportunity for institutions and various tourism operators to cooperate and build a constructive dialogue.
“GAMIFICATION”: A WORKSHOP DEDICATED TO INNOVATION AND PARTICIPATION
The Municipality of Salzano, in cooperation with Aries Venezia Giulia, organised a workshop with the title Gamification | Workshop on cultural tourism and participatory planning, which took place on 15 January 2021.
This was a rather ambitious and high-level proposal; the topic was little known to most of the participants but it quickly caught their attention and stirred their active involvement.
The proposed challenges included: How to create new experiences that will appeal to new potential visitors, engage them actively and turn them into the leading characters of the experience? How to structure an event to increase the attractiveness of a setting / a region / an excellent product?
Introducing first the usual Gamification tools, Fabio Viola led an online meeting that required active cooperation of the participants. With his professional attitude and empathy, he guided participants to define the objectives and the working hypothesis, opening up new and innovative scenarios assisting them with a precise and strict methodological approach. In this way the game or a playful set-up of a museum visit turns mere visitors into active players who discover a certain region as true protagonists. The game revealed its amazing potential of attracting both “physical” and “virtual” visits. The Municipality of Salzano deliberately chose a very heterogeneous group of stakeholders who are involved in tourism in various capacities: tourism associations, representatives of the cultural, scientific and museum institutions, hoteliers, environmental associations, single citizens, focusing attention on the complex of Villa-Filanda-Park as a historical, environmental and cultural unicum. Curiosity might have been the reason for joining this workshop, but the audience was active and engaged, their feedback was extremely positive and foundations have been laid for future cooperation and possible synergies.
Operation co-funded by the European Regional Development Fund
