Despite 2013 being a record year for UK inbound tourism, breaking new ground in terms of nominal spend and visitor numbers, the sector has a slight concern: London alone accounted for more than half of it.

Tourism body VisitBritain is on a mission to encourage overseas visitors to venture beyond London and explore what else the UK has to offer.

Its new report The beyond London challenge looks at a variety of strategies to entice visitors from both mature and emerging markets to all parts of the country.

Previous findings have demonstrated that Britain’s biggest lures vary vastly by markets and the new report spotlights the need to increase visitor awareness of what the rest of Britain has to offer, “beyond some vague constructs of castles and countrysides.”

This has been augmented by a series of marketing campaigns this year, including the sounds of Great Britain adverts and a tie-up with Welsh songstress Katherine Jenkins.

The report also finds that modern UK intellectual properties (such as Harry Potter and James Bond) prove particularly popular in some emerging markets such as Brazil, noting these could be harnessed regionally, alongside the UK’s musical heritage to good effect.

“We need to encourage people to come back time after time, which in turn will mean our visitors venture out across Britain,” said VisitBritain director of strategy Patricia Yates.

“London is the global superstar of tourism destinations, a city that all around the world people want to visit. Because of this, we need to make sure we are inspiring them on the Britain-wide offering and informing on how easy it is to travel across the country in such a short space of time.”

Scotland has been identified as a key area for boosting regional tourism, with this year’s Commonwealth Games and Ryder Cup expected to provide strong impetus.

“Edinburgh and Glasgow are now in second and third place behind London for the total number of overseas holiday visitors they welcome,” added Yates. “Encouragingly, we are starting to see results.”