View all posts: Destination Marketing
Overtourism Tool Kit
Tourism around the world has been growing fast with total visitor spending now in excess of $7 trillion USD and 11% of global GDP. More than $1.3 trillion of this spending is from 1.2 billion international travelers. This growth is being driven by several long-term trends including rapidly expanding middle classes in developing countries, rebounding economies after the Great Financial Crisis and a shift from goods to services in consumer preferences – including those seeking travel experiences.
This growth is creating an increasing range of problems that Skift has coined “Overtourism”. These problems include crowding and congestion, impact of historic sites, increased waste and environmental degradation. In an increasing number of cities, regions and nations, local residents are expressing their frustration with these impacts and the tourism industry is...
The Unrivalled Quality of a DMO’s Audience
Official Destination Websites and Visitor Guides reach and engage with a highly engaged audience. Research shows these readers and online users are among the most qualified audience in the travel industry. They have a high likelihood of traveling to the destination and use these resources to make booking decisions. This audience is one of the most valuable assets of a DMO and of tremendous appeal to industry partners. Creating opportunities to reach this highly qualified audience is a win-win opportunity: generating revenue and additional content for the DMO, offering a high-quality advertising opportunity for the industry and creating engaged leads and new visitors and guests.
Reoccurring and independent third-party research studies have highlighted the unrivalled quality of the audience offered by destination visitor guides,...
Gold Rushes & Exhibitions – The History of DMO Partnership Models
Destination Marketing Organizations (DMOs) date back to the 19th century with the establishment of the Detroit Convention and Businessmen’s League in 1896 – an organization that later evolved into the Detroit Metro CVB.
The United States has been the pioneer and innovator in destination marketing, including creative private – public funding models and partnerships. Early destination marketers were often larger than life personalities who used a savvy combination of evocative storytelling, boosterism and specific events to put their city, territory or state on the map.
The 6 Building Blocks of Successful Industry Participation Programs & Coops
At US Travel’s ESTO Learning Labs this year, our team at Miles had the opportunity to present best practices and essential skills on “How Industry Co-Ops Can Empower Your DMO.” My colleagues, Chris Adams and Laura Libby, and I shared insights into planning, setting up and managing cooperative programs. Industry coop programs no only drive revenue, but enrich and expand marketing for your destination and build closer, more valuable connections with industry partners.
As we prepared for the presentation, we reviewed case studies, studied results and found that these six consistent ideas that are essential to the success of a coop program.
Dealing with Disasters
The last few years have seen an accelerating number of both natural and man-made disasters impacting destinations around the world.
In the U.S., increasing wild fires across the west and flooding events in the east and south have increased and become more severe. Recent fires in California and Colorado follow the pattern of earlier and more damaging fires as well as the continual “fire season”. In storms and other wet weather occurences, the trend is the same. For example in late May, Ellicott City in Maryland just outside Baltimore suffered its second “1,000 year flood” in the last two years.
