Businesses have until Monday to sign up to a free promotional initiative being run by government.

The scheme is being organised by Visit Isle of Man, an agency within the Department for Enterprise (DFE).

Visit Isle of Man is inviting the tourism industry and activity and attraction partners to register their interest in the return of the ‘On Your Doorstep’ scheme.

Running for the first time since before Covid, the ‘Extraordinary Is… On Your Doorstep’ initiative will expand over eight weeks through October and November and aims to encourage attraction and activity businesses in the sector to offer promotional packages during the back end of the traditional tourism season.

Islanders and visitors alike can enjoy the diverse range of experiences on offer throughout autumn and winter at a discount rate.

In previous years the campaign has ran for just a weekend, however, Visit Isle of Man is hoping extending the scheme over a period of two months will mean more locals and tourists are aware of the places open for trade across the entirety of the island.

The extension has also allowed the agency to extend the offer to food and drink establishments and accommodation providers.

Some of the promotional and value-added offerings that local businesses chose to promote as part of this campaign in 2019 and 2022 included complimentary tea and coffee, group discounts, fifth person goes free, free tours for groups over 10, buy one get one half price and 30% off if you make two bookings.

While it’s unclear how many businesses have signed up yet, the agency is expecting many to take it up after a good uptake in the years they ran the initiative before the pandemic.

Deborah Heather, chief executive of Visit Isle of Man, said: ‘Our “Extraordinary Is… On Your Doorstep” initiative is a fantastic opportunity for our industry partners to showcase their offerings to a warm audience, widening leisure opportunities throughout the shoulder season.

‘As an industry it is essential we work together to create an exceptional visitor experience and I would encourage our attraction and activity businesses to get involved and utilise the marketing and operational benefits this initiative will bring.’

Stuart Clague, business development executive of Visit Isle of Man, said: ‘There’s a bit of an illusion that there’s not much happening on the island, but when I was speaking to a lot of the activities and attractions, there’s a lot of businesses open and people just don’t realise that they are there. Some of them are weather dependent, but a lot of them are ready and open.’

‘Businesses will be listed on a special “On Your Doorstep” page that we will create, and all the marketing strategy and marketing budget behind it will be going into driving traffic towards that page.

‘We’ve got quite an exciting little campaign here and it’s ready to go.’