Regional Development Agency supports Leap Local
At the end of the summer 2007, Liles once again put her head down to write a grant application. Leap had been developing well but needed to explore its market and potential in more detail. The Leap team was invited for interview, and shortly afterwards was awarded a grant for the proposed work by the East of England Regional Development Agency (EEDA). This money enabled us to engage with several contractors and clarify Leap's position through market research including focus groups and interviews with locals in Peru.
After reviewing some of this research, it was decided to reorientate Leap's messaging slightly to emphasise the local and unique experience people can have by engaging with local guides and services. It is this authentic experience which initially drives people's interest in what we do, and responsible tourism is the added bonus.
The research also gave us the opportunity to review the website functionality and user experience. As a result we quickly moved to secure David Heath to help us install new features such as google maps, improved website navigation, and several other features. The Design Office, as a result of grant work, proposed several branding ideas, which we later moved to implement.
One of the critical parts of research was surveying local guides and services in Peru. Our worst fear is that we set up an organisation to benefit local guides and services which does not deliver on its mission. Fortunately the people surveyed were enthusiastic about what Leap can offer them, and excited to see their profiles on the web. While many are aware of the web's power to link them to foreigners, they have never seen their profiles in this medium.
Many thanks to all those who helped us conduct this research, especially EEDA for the funding which enabled this to happen in the first place.