Without much effort and resources, unique story-telling tours for tourists!
Within the H2020 AURORAL project and the collaboration with the Norwegian pilot region Hålogaland, the web app oHA and its digital platform were used to integrate a regional digital storytelling and outdoor guiding system. This touristic service and system is part of the tourism use case of our project partners, the Narvik Municipality and Smart Innovation Norway. In the Hålogaland region, tourists can
- Live navigate storytelling tours with oHA
- Discover hidden or public stories during a tour
- Learn more about the destination
- Voluntarily donate to the maintenance of local attractions
This use case ensures smart destination management, attracts tourists and also collects statistics on tourists' activities and user behavior while using the web app oHA.
How oHA works in Hålogaland?
The Narvik Municipality uses the digital platform oHA as a touristic web app & destination management system for
- Creating/presenting touristic activities
- An overview and for navigation of tours
- Digitalizing local stories
- Promoting the Hålogaland region as touristic destination
- Publishing news & events
- Communicating with tourists
- Using a branded web app in individual design
- Collecting user behavior statistics
- Payments of voluntary donations
The five main local attractions can also be found and discovered by tourists while using live GPS navigation. oHA also provides information about the attractions with descriptions, historical videos, images, and interactive content for users.
Ideal for rural regions, like Hålogaland...
GPS tours are defined by the municipality and mapped in the oHA management tool. Tourists can reach defined points in navigation mode and discover local sights and attractions offered by the rural region which are mostly related to the historical events during the World War Two. In oHA Base, the management tool of oHA, the municipality can create as many GPS tours as like and along a tour and so-called >>Story-Pins<<. Story-Pins then pop up for tourists in the navigation mode in oHA as soon as the device with oHA is physically near to a Story-Pin. This is used to digitally tell stories that include interactive content to tourists on the spot. For example, stories are told by using text, images, audio files or even videos.
The Story-Pins can also be hidden completely in oHA so that tourists cannot view them in advance but only when they are in the nearby vicinity of the pin or spot. This motivates tourists to go on a tour, surprises them at the same time with great unique information about the sights that they can discover live which makes tours with oHA being a special experience.
Advantages of Digital Story-Telling and Outdoor Guiding System
- Digital story-telling on tours as innovative approach
- Unique hidden activities on the map that are attractive to tourists and to enhance local tourism
- Realization without much effort or required resources
- Revival of existing tourist trails & tours
- Coverage of areas with poor internet connection (see next)
Scan, pre-download and discover!
For a maximum user experience, tourists can scan the QR codes on the tours that connect them to oHA where they can find the entry point of a tour or the related attraction on the spot.
While the Hålogaland region faces poor internet connection in some locations, the problematic areas were mapped and the automatic pre-download function was integrated into oHA.
Once the web app oHA is opened by the user the first time, all the content from the attractions located in areas with a poor internet connection will be pre-downloaded, ensuring the interactive content is available for the tourist when a story-pin is reached during the tour.
Smart destination management and maintenance of attractions with the help of oHA
With the direct online payment funcionality in oHA, tourists can make voluntary donations to support the maintenance of attractions and tours, offered and managed by the Narvik Municipality.
The municipality can collected data on user behaviour and therefore statistics are provided to identify the most popular attractions or interesting information about users preferences that helps in decision-making.
Thus, oHA will be used as well as a regional and local tourism marketing tool!
