Get the Locals' Perspective

Longwoods' newest program offering, Resident Sentiment Research, allows destinations to discover how the local community at large perceives tourism and its impacts. Increasingly, destination management must be considered a partnership between the industry and residents, to ensure that tourism development benefits both parties and contributes to the community economically while maintaining or enhancing quality of life for its residents. Our Resident Sentiment Research examines both practical and emerging/growing concerns including economic development, perceived environmental impacts, overtourism, quality of life, and many others. 

Understand + Engage

Each Resident Sentiment report provides a comparison between locals' responses and regional and national norms from our annual National Resident Sentiment study to highlight areas where local issues may differ from regional or national concerns.    Each study will include questions asked on the national survey as well as questions tailored to unique local or regional issues. 

This new research allows destinations to develop an engagement strategy to interface with locals. By showcasing the positive aspects of tourism while being aware of potential pitfalls of tourism growth, the destination can work with local partners to increase support for its efforts to develop sustainable tourism growth. With overtourism, the sharing economy, and the environment becoming topics of discussion in many communities, this product is essential for destination marketers who wish to build community support for continued growth of this important segment of the local economy.