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FY15: More Visitors, Spending in Missouri

I’m very pleased to announce that, as a reflection of the combined efforts of our statewide industry, Missouri wel-comed a record number of domestic and international visitors who generated a historically peak amount of reve-nue for the Show-Me State’s economy in Fiscal Year 2015. According to an FY15 analysis by Tourism Economics, the total economic impact of tourism in the state has now reached $15.9 billion. Missouri welcomed 40.4 million visi-tors, putting the state well on the way to the forecast of 43 million visitors by FY2018. Those visitors spent more than $12.4 billion (+7 percent vs. FY14), supported more than 297,000 jobs and generated $1.35 billion in state and local taxes. As we continue to welcome more domestic and international travelers to our diverse state, the tourism industry creates jobs, builds our economy and strengthens the foundation of our communities. In addition to executing a strong, integrated media campaign in 24 regional markets, MDT enhanced its marketing and sales reach by becoming the 12th member of TSUSA, which recently celebrated its 50th year of marketing member states as tourism desti-nations to both national and international audiences.

Continued on Page 2

Director’s Message Coming Events

Jan. 31-Feb. 4, 2016

Travel Exchange

Atlanta, Ga.

Feb. 9, 2016

DMAI Destinations Showcase

Washington, D.C.

Feb. 9-10, 2016

Receptive Services Association of

America (RSAA) Summit

New York, N.Y.

Feb. 22, 2016

Missouri Tourism Commission Meeting

Jefferson City, Mo.

Feb. 24-25, 2016

Capitol Days for Tourism

Jefferson City, Mo.

March 6-9, 2016

Travel South Domestic Showcase

Winston-Salem, N.C.

March 16-17, 2016

Destination Capitol Hill

Washington, D.C.

April 21-23, 2016

African American Travel Conference

Cleveland, Ohio

May 1-7, 2016

National Travel and Tourism Week

Nationwide

May 3-4, 2016

Missouri Bank Travel Exchange

Lake Ozark, Mo.

May 22-25, 2016

PRSA Travel and Tourism Conference

Houston, Texas

June 5-9, 2016

TAP Dance

Duluth, Minn.

June 14-16, 2016

TTRA International Conference Vail, Colo.

June 18-22, 2016

IPW

New Orleans, La.

Save the Date!

Preparations are underway for the 2016 Missouri Governor’s Conference on

Tourism. Make plans to join us Oct. 4-6 for a fantastic educational and networking experience in Independence.

Opening its doors in March 2015 the Stoney Creek Hotel & Conference Center, our conference headquarters, offers an eclectic urban lodge feel and state-of-the-art meeting facilities.

Continued on Page 4

The Quarterly Newsletter of the Missouri Division of Tourism February 2016 Monitor

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The Travel Van H&L Partners

It’s February – which means it is the off-season for many at-tractions and destinations in Missouri. While your foot traffic may be down, tourism marketing never sleeps. Remember, true travelers never stop dreaming about travel!

Here are a few tips on what you can do in the off-season to

improve your marketing.

Cleaning House

Take the downtime you may have to work on administrative tasks. Create or wrap up reports on what happened last season and use the information you learn to plan for the upcoming year.

Take a look at everything from Google Analytics on your site to insights on your social pages, and from public relations meas-urements to marketing research results. Make a list of what worked and what didn’t last year and brainstorm some ideas on how to improve your initiatives in the future.

The Internet is 24/7

With the Internet, potential travelers can research future trips at any time, day or night, on or off-season. Keep the conversation surrounding your destination going with your search engine mar-keting (SEM) and social media marketing.

While you may want to lower your budget and volume, it is

important to never completely stop promoting your attraction or destination through these channels. Consider switching your posts up with an aspirational tone – encourage your audience to start dreaming about travel and get them in the mood to plan a

vacation.

Find Something Unique

If your attraction is open in the off-season, market something that is unique to you during that time – even if that something unique is simply that you are one of the few of your kind actu-ally open for business. Whether it’s a special Valentine’s week-end package, a winter festival or a seasonal menu, promoting your unique opportunity will encourage travelers to take a trip now.

Make Time for Meetings

It happens to all of us – we promise to schedule meetings with everyone from industry professionals to attraction owners to

Continued on Page 3

Director’s Message

Continued

We joined Travel South as partners working toward the goal of bringing more travelers to our region of America and showcasing Missouri’s history, heritage and culture, along with the unique, diverse and ex-citing attractions we have to share with travelers.

As another way to reach international travelers, MDT also continued its active participation in Brand USA, the public-private marketing partnership estab-lished at the federal level by passage of the Travel Promotion Act in 2010. In the last three years, 16 statewide tourism industry partners have joined us in cooperative advertising, promotion and content creation projects focused on the foreign traveler.

These combined efforts enable us to entice visitors from around the world. The foreign visitor wants to experience Missouri’s varied offerings, from inter-generational family fun and diverse entertainment, to our abundant outdoor assets, historic sites and communities along Route 66, the Great River Road, the Way of American Genius (Highway 36) and be-yond.

In calendar year 2014, an estimated 400,000 foreign travelers visited Missouri, an increase of 7.5 percent from the previous year. Although they make up a small percentage of overall visitors, international travelers to Missouri have a tendency to stay longer and spend more ($774 per trip) than domestic trav-elers ($280 per trip).

We truly appreciate the leadership of Governor Nixon and the bipartisan support of both the Mis-souri Legislature and the Missouri Tourism Commis-sion. It’s gratifying to know that, when faced with difficult decisions related to the state’s budget, our leaders continue to see the value and importance of the tourism industry.

The Division of Tourism will continue to use sound, research-based strategies in its marketing efforts as we strive to make Missouri one of the country’s top destinations.

Thank you for your support of our industry.

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The Travel Van Continued

media contacts, but times during the on-season get a little crazy and we forget to make these important meetings happen. Now is the perfect time to catch up on overdue conversations.

Take this time to both learn about new events and opportunities and to inform others about this news. Members of the media often plan their stories well in advance, so you’ll want to get in front of them early, and while you have time to do so.

Competitive Research

This is also a great time to look at what else is happen-ing in the industry. What is a similar destination or

Yelp profile, Google My Business listing and Face-book page.

Fix the Issues You Can Fix

There are some things you just can’t help. For those issues you constantly hear about – rude service, un-dercooked food, dirty rooms, poorly written poli-cies, etc. – make a con-scious effort to correct them in a timely manner. Flag False Reviews

Yelp and other review sites have an obligation to serve facts. Under their guidelines, you cannot remove a review just be-cause you don’t like it. If you receive a blatantly false or defamatory re-view, you can flag it for removal.

Seek out Positive Reviews

The most effective thing

Whether it’s choosing between two hotels or an entire district full of restaurants, the “been there, done that” crowd has walked the walk, and is now talking the talk by leaving online reviews. Here are some ways to manage bad reviews online, helping you protect your business, learn from mistakes and possibly get a second chance. Be Transparent and Accept Responsibility

Take time to respond to nega-tive reviews efficiently and identify yourself as the busi-ness owner. Apologize for your shortcomings and never blame the customer. Along with dis-cussing the matter, refunds or gift certificates can help win back customers. Being trans-parent rubs off on those who read the reviews as well.

In order to respond to reviews, be sure to have claimed your

you can do to combat the

bad is to overwhelm it with good.

It is illegal to falsify reviews, so don’t pay people to write favorable reviews and don’t write them yourself.

Seek out reviews on and offline. Offering deals on Yelp can provide incentive to leave a good review. Have your staff ask custom-ers how their experience went and encourage them to share the same positive thoughts online. Build up your social media presence and leverage your existing fan base for reviews.

Seeking out, addressing and learning from negative re-views can teach businesses a lot about their products or services, and help improve them for many more cus-tomers down the road.

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attraction doing to promote itself? Is there a brand or company performing well on social media? Check them out, take some notes, and see how you can apply it to your destination.

Continuing Education

You can always take this time to learn something new as well. Sign up for an online course, check out a marketing book from the library or attend a seminar. Taking time to improve yourself and your knowledge will only improve how well you can promote your destination. The world of marketing is always changing and staying abreast of these changes is key.

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Save the Date Continued

After hearing such positive feedback about last year’s conference we know we have a tall order to fill, but we’re confident we can offer valuable insights and plentiful opportunities to learn - from knowledge-able, nationally recognized speakers, tourism peers and cultural enrichment activities.

We look forward to a lively session with our opening keynote speaker,Mr. Anirban Basu, chairman and CEO of Sage Policy Group, Inc., an economic and pol-icy consulting firm. The highest rated ESTO speaker in 2013, he returned to ESTO last year, once again earning rave reviews. One attendee noted had he been her economics professor, her career likely would have taken an entirely different direction!

Mr. Basu’s presentation, The Economist Who Loved Me, provides a detailed, data-driven update of the performance of the global, national and regional economy. You won’t want to miss this spir-ited discussion as he shares key aspects of economic life.

Make sure to arrive early and join the tour of historic Independ-ence. We’ll explore the Harry S. Truman

Library & Museum and stop at Clinton’s Soda Fountain for a phosphate or other de-lectable treat.

We’re excited to offer to our industry part-ners and supporters a place to gather and exchange ideas each year. We hope you’ll take this journey with us and attend the 2016 Missouri Governor’s Conference on Tourism in October.