Last year we told the story of a CVB in transition as our organization had little historical data on who our visitors were and where they were coming from. Our focus was heavily rooted in obtaining more knowledge of who our target market should be through the analytics of our digital campaign.
This year, while we are still gathering data, more emphasis was placed on increasing brand awareness from a design aspect. This year’s “Re” campaign was designed to tell the story of “why” Lake County can check all travel and tourism boxes for potential visitors and their families. The “Re” prefix means back, or again, and with the desire for so many people to get “back” to traveling after a rough two-years due to Covid, we loved the idea of tying this concept together with our Remarkable name and brand. We wanted to create a mental association between verbs, such as
(Re)connecting, (Re)laxing, and (Re)imagining their vacations to our (Re)markable brand.
People visiting our website and requesting a guide is still our primary way of gathering data about our target market, so we included a call to action on our display ads, encouraging them to “plan their trip.” The button links to a newly created Trip Ideas page where potential visitors can quickly request a guide and find the trip that best fits their interests. Advertisements specific to the Grand River Valley wine region are linked to the “wine lovers” page, where they can see our recommendations. They can also download the 2022 winery guide we put together in conjunction with the Ashtabula County Visitors Bureau. Last year we introduced ourselves to new specific regions (Pittsburgh, West Virginia, Buffalo), and this year we are fortifying our branding in those markets through targeted digital marketing potential visitors will
(Re)member!
Our digital marketing campaign, while still ongoing, has shown us strong results. Since April, we have had 10,244 clicks generated from our digital display campaign. Also, since April, we have seen a dramatic increase in our website traffic with 35,000 unique visitors, 17,000 of them generated from direct clicks due to this digital campaign. Additionally, in PA, we have seen a 513% increase in website visits over last year’s numbers. We will continue to monitor our success yearly by reviewing our bed tax numbers and economic impact reports.
