Destination Sydney Surrounds South

Search Visibility in the AI Era
2026-02-17 10:00 - 11:00 UTC | Online
Destination NSW, in partnership with Tourism Tribe, is hosting a second series of practical, industry-focused webinars to help tourism businesses navigate marketing and digital trends in the AI era. Each session runs for one hour and will cover a key topic to help you stay visible, competitive, and efficient.
Find out how AI is changing search and what you need to optimise now across your website and Google Business Profile.

Email Marketing for Repeat Bookings
2026-02-19 10:00 - 11:00 | NSW
Destination NSW, in partnership with Tourism Tribe, is hosting a second series of practical, industry-focused webinars to help tourism businesses navigate marketing and digital trends in the AI era. Each session runs for one hour and will cover a key topic to help you stay visible, competitive, and efficient.
Understand why email remains one of the highest converting channels in tourism and how to turn your database into repeat bookings.

Beyond the Ramp: Practical Accessibility for Every Visitor Workshops - Illawarra
2026-03-10 13:00 - 17:00 | Shellharbour – TBC
Inclusive tourism is no longer a “nice to have”, it’s a growth opportunity, a service standard, and an expectation from today’s travellers.

More than 70 million trips in Australia each year are taken by travellers with accessible needs and their companions, around 1 in 5 trips nationwide. In 2024 alone, these travellers contributed $29.2 billion in tourism spend, making accessibility one of the most significant and growing opportunities for tourism and hospitality businesses.
Beyond the Ramp: Practical Accessibility for Every Visitor is a hands-on, interactive workshop designed to help tourism and hospitality businesses understand accessibility in a broader, more practical way. Rather than focusing on compliance or specialised infrastructure, this workshop explores how small, thoughtful changes across the visitor journey can significantly improve comfort, ease, and usability for a wide range of visitors, while also strengthening your business.
Grounded in Universal Design principles, the session demonstrates how accessible practice benefits everyone: older travellers, families with prams, people with temporary injuries, neurodiverse visitors, and those navigating situational limitations… not just people with permanent disability.
This workshop goes well beyond what happens when a visitor arrives at your business. We’ll explore how people with access needs find, assess, choose and experience tourism products, and what that means for your marketing, online presence, storytelling, service delivery and staff confidence.
Designed specifically for real-world tourism and hospitality environments, the session is practical, engaging and supportive. Through examples, group activities, guided reflection, and local case studies, participants will leave with a clear understanding of accessibility as good customer experience and smart business practice, along with a personalised action plan they can start implementing immediately.
What Participants will learn
Participants will gain practical insight into:

How accessibility extends far beyond disability and supports a wide range of visitor needs
The core principles of Universal Design and how they apply in everyday business settings
Where common barriers occur across the full visitor journey- from online discovery and booking through to arrival, movement, facilities, and staff interactions
Practical, low-cost improvements that can be implemented immediately
How to communicate accessibility information clearly, honestly, and confidently across websites, listings, imagery, and language
How to identify opportunities within their own business to create more welcoming, user-friendly experiences
How small changes can significantly improve customer satisfaction, repeat visitation, and word-of-mouth
Why accessibility is not just inclusion…it’s good business

What we’ll cover:
Understanding different types of disability and access needs; the full customer journey from discovery and booking through to arrival and experience; what inclusive travellers look for in your website, listings, imagery and language; how to position and market your business with confidence and clarity; real-life case studies and practical examples; role play and group discussion; and practical exercises to help you refine your story and identify improvements. This is a practical, interactive workshop, not a lecture.
What Participants will recieve

Pre-workshop self-assessment
Accessibility “Quick Wins” checklist
Visitor journey mapping template
Personalised action plan tailored to their business

What’s different about this workshop?
This workshop is strongly focused on real-world application rather than theory and is designed specifically for tourism and hospitality businesses. It combines practical customer journey, marketing and storytelling exercises with honest conversations about what businesses can and can’t offer, and how to communicate this clearly and confidently to visitors. Delivered in a supportive, peer-based environment, the session recognises that businesses are at different stages of their accessibility journey. Participants will leave with clarity on small, achievable changes they can implement immediately, as well as a clear understanding of longer-term opportunities to work towards over time.
Pre-workshop commitment (important)
To get the most out of the session, all participants are required to complete pre-workshop material. This includes short pre-reading content and a simple self-assessment to understand where you currently sit on your inclusion journey. These materials will be emailed to you ahead of the workshop with clear instructions and completion is required prior to attending the workshop.
Post-workshop follow-up
All participants will be invited to a facilitated online follow-up session that will run for 90 minutes in early May, bringing the group back together to share progress and challenges, ask follow-up questions, and continue learning and accountability. Details will be provided after workshop registration and attendance.
Who should attend?
This workshop is ideal for accommodation providers, visitor experiences and attractions, food and beverage businesses and cellar doors, tour operators, event and venue managers, and destination and tourism staff. You don’t need to be “accessibility ready”, but you do need to be open to change.
Presented by Melissa James from Inclusive Tourism, bringing extensive experience in accessible tourism with practical insight, real examples and an engaging facilitation style focused on action and outcomes.
Workshop locations & dates:
This workshop will be delivered in three locations: Illawarra, Shoalhaven and the Southern Highlands . Duration is four (4) hours.

Tuesday 10th March | Shellharbour | 1.00pm – 5.00pm | Registration link
Wednesday 11th March | Nowra | 10.00am – 2.00pm | Registration Link
Thursday 12th March | Bowral | 9.00am – 1.00pm | Registration Link

Workshop registrations will close on Thursday 5 March at 6.00pm to allow sufficient time for all participants to receive and complete the required pre-work prior to the workshop.
In addition to the DSSS pre-work, participants are encouraged to access the Destination NSW Accessibility and Inclusion resources as optional, self-paced learning. These materials sit outside the workshop program but are highly complementary and can be worked through at your own pace, before or after the workshop, and revisited as needed. Recommended Destination NSW resources include The Welcome Framework (Austrade), Quick tips for creating accessible and inclusive experiences and On-demand webinar series, covering:

Disability inclusion in the visitor economy
Inclusive customer service
Creating accessible digital content
Inclusive marketing and communications

These resources provide broader context and ongoing professional development, while the in-person workshop remains focused on practical application, discussion, local case studies and hands-on exercises tailored to your business.
Image credit: Shellharbour City Council

Beyond the Ramp: Practical Accessibility for Every Visitor - Nowra
2026-03-11 10:00 - 14:00 | Shoalhaven Entertainment Centre, 42 Bridge Road, Nowra, NSW, 2541

Business Events Market Insights & Trade Activity
2026-03-11 13:00 - 14:00 | Online
The Business Events sector continues to be a critical driver of high-yield visitation across the DSSS region. In this March edition of the DSSS Visitor Economy Insights Webinar Series, we turn the spotlight on recent national and international trade activity and what it means for our destinations and operators.
This session will unpack key insights, trends and opportunities emerging from AIME 2026 (Asia Pacific Incentives and Meetings Event), the region’s largest and longest-running business events trade exhibition, as well as learnings from PCOA2025, where Australian destinations and suppliers connected with professional conference organisers in New Zealand.
Hosted by DSSS, with guest speakers from Destination NSW, Destination Southern Highlands, Destination Wollongong and operators who actively represented their businesses at these events, this webinar will provide a first-hand view of how our region is being positioned, what buyers are seeking, what are the current trends and where future demand is heading.
This session is designed to help accommodation providers, venues, experience operators and destination stakeholders better understand the business events pipeline, identify realistic opportunities and align their product and marketing to future demand.

Beyond the Ramp: Practical Accessibility for Every Visitor - Bowral
2026-03-12 09:00 - 13:00 | Bowral – TBC

Social Impact in Tourism – Insights, Case Studies & Learnings
2026-04-15 13:00 - 14:00 | Online
The DSSS Visitor Economy Insights Webinar Series is a monthly program designed to share timely insights, data, learnings and best-practice guidance to support tourism operators, destination stakeholders and partners across the Destination Sydney Surrounds South region.
Each session focuses on a different theme relevant to the visitor economy, including industry insights, data and research, market trends, social impact, capability building and emerging opportunities. Topics and speakers vary each month and are tailored to current priorities, seasonal considerations and industry needs.
These webinars are practical and informative, providing attendees with access to current visitor economy insights and data, learnings from industry, government and regional partners, guidance on how to apply insights to business and destination planning and opportunities to stay connected with regional and state-level initiatives.
Webinars are typically scheduled for the second Wednesday of each month from 1.00–2.00pm. Please note that in some months, session dates may be adjusted to accommodate public holidays, peak periods or scheduling conflicts.
Further details, including confirmed topics, speakers and registration information, will be shared closer to each session.
Please note this webinar will be recorded and made available as an on-demand resource via the Destination Sydney Surrounds South website. For further information, please contact us at info@dnsss.com.au or visit https://dnsss.com.au/news-events.

Data in Tourism – Finding, Understanding & Using Insights
2026-05-13 13:00 - 14:00 | Online

Visitor Economy Insights – Topic to be announced
2026-06-10 13:00 - 14:00 | Online
