Destinations spend heavily to be found
Our own estimate is that the destination marketing behind Visit + Destination brands, across states, regions and nations, comes to well over $1.5 billion a year, spanning television, events, partnerships and digital. This is a Costello Global Technology estimate built from adding together the budgets of many destinations, not a published statistic, and we do not attribute it to any third party. Two published data points show the scale at the level of a single destination.
Destination marketing is a serious industry. VISIT FLORIDA, the state's tourism marketing agency, is in line to receive $80 million from the state of Florida for fiscal year 2026-2027, the same as the current year, according to WLRN (May 2026). On a larger scale, Skift reported in 2022 that Saudi Arabia planned to spend $1 trillion over a decade to build a global tourism economy, which is investment in the whole sector rather than marketing alone. Across the world, boards and governments pay for television, events, partnerships and digital campaigns, and nearly all of it points travellers to one address: the destination's official website.
Most of the world's top destinations use Visit + Destination
The pattern is easy to check. The official tourism sites for Florida (VisitFlorida.com), Qatar (VisitQatar.com), Saudi Arabia (VisitSaudi.com), Britain (VisitBritain.com), Scotland (VisitScotland.com), California (VisitCalifornia.com), Jamaica (VisitJamaica.com), Barbados (VisitBarbados.org), Greece (VisitGreece.gr), Portugal (VisitPortugal.com), Finland (VisitFinland.com), Norway (VisitNorway.com), Denmark (VisitDenmark.com), Sweden (VisitSweden.com) and Abu Dhabi (VisitAbuDhabi.ae) all use it. A few take another route, such as Türkiye's goturkiye.com and India's incredibleindia.gov.in, and they show the point from the other side: they spend to build a brand that travellers must learn. A Visit + Destination name needs no learning.
Those official sites belong to their tourism boards. Visit Travel Group is not affiliated with them and does not claim to be. Our portfolio is a different set of names that travellers type in exactly the same way, from VisitMalta to VisitMiami and many more, and each can become a platform in its own right.
Why the name works
A traveller who types "visit" and a place name is already halfway to a decision. The name says what the site is before it loads, which builds trust with people and tells search engines and AI systems what the address is about. We make no promises about rankings or about any particular assistant, because we cannot control them. What a clear, descriptive tourism name does is remove ambiguity, which is exactly what a person or an AI agent is looking for when it chooses where to send a traveller.
Why it matters more now
Travellers are asking AI where to go, where to stay and what to book. In a March to April 2026 survey of 2,001 US adults by Ipsos for Allianz Partners, 37% of US travellers said they use AI to plan their trips, as reported in trade press. The next step is agentic AI: software that is given a goal, such as a four-night trip within a budget, and then researches, compares and acts on the traveller's behalf. We explain it on the future of travel page. An agent favours sources it can identify, verify and act on, and a named, sourced, machine-readable destination platform is exactly that.
What each partner gets
Hotels get described once, accurately, and recommended wherever the destination is discussed, with bookings routed to their own engine so the guest relationship and the rate stay theirs. Intermediary commissions are commonly cited at 15% to 25% of the booking value, but neither of the two largest platforms publishes a rate card, so the real figure depends on each contract. Airlines put routes and holidays in front of travellers while they are still choosing a destination. Tourist boards and governments get a platform on a name travellers already trust, answering from the board's approved material, for leisure visitors and for business events. OTAs and travel partners connect inventory to demand that is already specific.
How we turn a name into a platform
Each name becomes a working platform: sourced destination guides, a concierge that answers only from an approved knowledge base, structured data for AI search and a booking path. The flagship is VisitMalta.co.uk, built with KM Malta Airlines, and the next is VisitMiami.co.uk. Our AI platform page explains how it works, and build, manage or lease sets out how to work with a name. To start a conversation, use the contact page.
Last reviewed 4 October 2026