USING IN-HOUSE RESEARCH TO DEVELOP MARKETING STRATEGIES Nick Breedlove, Executive Director Jackson County Tourism Development Authority
HISTORY Jackson County began collecting occupancy tax in 1986 and was marketed by two Travel and Tourism Authorities acting as DMO s. When Jackson County sought to raise occupancy tax from 3 to 4-percent in 2013, both TTA s were dissolved and the Jackson County Tourism Development Authority was formed. A singular entity presented the opportunity to market the entire county with cohesive, synchronized advertising strategy across print and digital platforms. After three years of steady growth and increasing occupancy tax collections, the JCTDA hired its first Director.
CHALLENGE Very little, if any, research data existed when Director position came online. We anecdotally knew who our visitors were through VisitNC studies on the mountain region. However, we wanted to refine our market efforts even more and have them pay greater dividends (more Visitors and Overnight stays!) The only data that existed on our tourists was from a branding study completed in February, 2013. The Visitor Intercept was done in an effort to better understand why people visited Jackson County so the branding firm could develop ideas around our branding. While it was useful in the branding process and provided generalities they could utilize to create our brand, the data was less useful for later in-depth analysis on which to base marketing decisions.
CHALLENGE - CONTINUED Budget allocation in FY 15-16 did not exist for Research, Visitor Intercepts or any Third party studies. No segmentation data existed for our tourists from big-data firms. The challenge and opportunity arose to find a way to better understand our visitors on a limited budget.
1 ST DATA SOURCE GOOGLE ANALYTICS Google Analytics had been collecting data from website visitors since our official tourism site launched in March 2014. We ran a data collection report in January, 2016 showing top geographic areas visiting our website. In addition, Google Analytics revealed age, gender, affinity categories and more through its ability to capture additional demographics. Our top three geographic markets since the website s creation are: Charlotte, Atlanta and Nashville.
2 ND DATA SOURCE SPROUT SOCIAL We have several social media platforms and they all had free, yet varied analytic offerings. They were helpful to view independently but offered no overall view of all our social media traffic. There were many platforms available, some ranging from free to $3,000 per month. Ultimately we selected reasonably-priced Sprout Social for $99 a month. This platform provides combined analytics from Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Google +, and Instagram into one platform. We re able to track not only our data but also how well a competitor s social pages are performing.
3 RD DATA SOURCE - STR Smith Travel Research www.str.com Reports require you to have at least four properties online to aggregate data for confidentiality. From STR data, destinations are able to see ADR, Occupancy, REVPar, seasonality and more. Fees are very reasonable given the high-quality of data STR provides. One of the most valuable reports to understand your destination and averages year over year is their trend report: Standard (Data for the last 6 years) or Extended (Data starting in 2000).
Used with permission from STR, Inc. www.str.com
Used with permission from STR, Inc. www.str.com
4 TH DATA SOURCE ZIP CODE COLLECTION AT FESTIVALS The JCTDA provides grant funding to local festivals for advertising. As part of that program we trialed zip code collection last year with great success. We were able to validate that our festivals were drawing people whose primary residences were mostly out of state. Volunteers and Chamber Staff collected these manually on sheets and they were entered in to Google Forms and then translated to a Google Fusion Table.
FIFTH DATA SOURCE VISITOR LOGS AT CHAMBER OF COMMERCE While Google Analytics, Sprout Social and other analytic suites show who visits your digital properties, there is still a disconnect between visitors to your digital properties and your actual destination. We instituted old fashioned paper logs at our county s two Visitor Centers and the staff encouraged those visiting to fill them out. We asked: Zip Code # of people in travel group Nights in town Is this your first visit? What is the most important reason for your visit to this area? How did you find out about Jackson County?
FIFTH DATA SOURCE VISITOR LOGS AT CHAMBER OF COMMERCE Participation was great. Paper is the easiest for people of all ages to fill out and people were willing to part with it because we weren t requesting any personal information (age, e-mail address, income level, etc.) We collected data over a six month period to better understand our visitors. There are caveats/disclaimers I d add to any analysis: Not every visitor to a destination stops in a Visitor Center, so this only represents a subset of visitors. The paper logs, while useful, led to duplication of answers by people seeing what others entered above their entries. There was no way to follow up with a visitor about their trip/experience.
ANALYSIS OF CHAMBER VISITOR LOGS Challenge: Time intensive process to input entries. Challenge: Reading handwriting, ambiguous entries. Example: How d you hear about Jackson County? Answer: Susan Benefit: We now recognize from where our visitors come and why, which is an improvement over data we had from the February 2013 Visitor Intercept branding study.
How did you find out about Jackson County?
What is the most important reason for your visit to this area?
FEB. 2017: IPAD KIOSKS TO AUTOMATE VISITOR DATA CAPTURE Automates data capture We changed the data we solicit from several fields to four: name, zip code, e-mail address and now offer an incentive of a monthly $50 Visa Gift card drawing. As a result of agreeing to provide that information they ll receive a 14-question survey a week later asking them detailed questions about their visit. So far we ve had excellent participation; less than paper forms, but higher quality actionable data. Software Platform: KioskPro / MailChimp
RESULTS More strategic marketing buys in better defined geographic areas based on research and not anecdotal evidence Better social media targeting via ad buys Greater ROI on ad dollars spent Combined with all other efforts including PR, Social Media, a relaunched website, new creative campaign, Staff Director, along with a healthy tourism market we recognized double digit increases in our occupancy tax collections in FY 16-17.