An upgrade in technology has enabled the Bermuda Tourism Authority to obtain up-to-the-minute data on industry trends and visitor views, helping the organisation develop strategies for the future.

In its latest quarterly report, the authority says that a raft of technological changes introduced earlier this year were already “making a difference” to the way the BTA, set up earlier this year, was able to get information to its decision makers.

“In our first quarter of operation we immediately made tech improvements to our business intelligence strategies and it is making a significant difference,” BTA chief executive officer Bill Hanbury said.

“Fast and reliable data is crucial to the country’s success as a visitor destination and right now we’re doing that better than we ever have.”

In the past Tourism officials waited weeks to receive vitally important data from visitor landing cards after Government departments manually processed the cards for the information they needed. Now the BTA manages the processing itself and by the end of the third quarter data will be available on a daily basis.

The visitor landing cards also provide visitors’ e-mail addresses and return dates, which can be used to make contact with visitors immediately upon their return home.

Visitor exit surveys for cruise and air passengers are now conducted on iPads instead of on paper, saving time and money.

And according to Research and Business Intelligence Director Erin Smith, electronic surveys on tablets allow the research and intelligence division to easily change questions as business needs arise. Paper surveys are difficult to adapt because they must be reprinted — a time consuming and cost ineffective process.

“For example, if this weekend we are going to have a hurricane or a tropical storm and we wanted to see how that affected our visitors we’d be able to change the questionnaire and get that into the field within a day — without having to retrain everyone and reprint all the questionnaires,” Ms Smith said.

Ms Smith also managed the implementation of nSight, an intelligence tool that tracks when and where travellers search for and book hotels on the internet. It also reveals how much time a consumer takes between conducting a search and actually making a reservation.

The BTA can also use the service to immediately determine if its online marketing campaigns are effectively increasing demand for online searches and conversions.

“This is critical because we can increase the strategies that are working and change course on the ones that aren’t working well,” Ms Smith said.

“We’re not only measuring data anymore but we’re gathering data to develop informed strategies. And the faster we have the data, the more quickly we can react.”

Research and business intelligence details are part of the Tourism Authority’s 2014 second quarter report made public this week on the organisation’s website at http://www.gotobermuda.com/bermudatourism/

In addition, the report details the activities of the sales and marketing division, the operations division and a release of the Authority’s financials for the quarter.

Similar reports will be released each quarter as part of the BTA’s commitment to keeping the public informed.

Mr Hanbury said: “We’ve asked all of Bermuda to buy into the National Tourism Plan.

“If we’re going to request that kind of commitment from the country we must show our industry stakeholders — and Bermuda as a whole — what we’re doing and why we’re doing it.”