Colorado is known for its majestic landscapes and all-year-round outdoor activities. Alamosa, rooted in the heart of the Majestic San Luis Valley, is a perfect getaway to The Great Sand Dunes National Park.
Since working with Visit Alamosa back in 2008, the Agency has led four rebranding projects for its website.
On our latest rebrand, we wanted to keep in mind Alamosa’s effort to promote all there is to offer at The Great Sand Dunes National Park – Dark Skies at the park.
Durango & Silverton Narrow Gauge Road and Museum is known for its history preservation work through scenic steam train rides operating on a National Historic Landmark, concluding the journey with a stop at the museum.
Setting the Scene
The Durango Train and its authentic 1882 railroading adventure captured many hearts through the decades, creating a dedicated fan base. But why stop there?
We knew that with the limitless potential social media holds today, we could reach new streams of audiences and widen brand awareness.
Our Approach
Building awareness is critical for brands. But what sets long-term results apart is making sure the digital content and experiences are engaging, making audiences want “more.”
In 2023, the team implemented structural strategies for the @dsngrr Facebook and Instagram pages. Focusing on content intractability and consistency, the positive changes were clear.
Based on the success, later in 2023, our team branched out to TikTok, which shows promising and healthy growth.
Results Earned
Increase in page likes and follow*
+9100 Page Likes
545.8%↑ Since 2022
+25,800 Followers
52.6%↑ Since 2022
Followers and total organic reach:
44.7k Total Followers
+5900 Gained
+280k , Reached
Three months since the launch:
+53.1k Engagement by reach,
7.3% (↑3.14% benchmark**)
*Duration is from January 1, 2023, to November 30, 2023, comparing traceable data from February 1, 2022, to December 30, 2022 **Based on a study by RivallQ
For those who have visited Durango, you likely have been or heard of the Durango Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad really. As one of the town’s most popular attractions, it’s responsible for a sizable amount of regional tourism spend annually. Having worked closely with American Heritage Railways and their respective railways on numerous projects over the last few years, our team has a passion for marketing these unique and historic attractions.
2018 was a challenging year for DSNGRR. Due to nearby forest fires, they were forced to limit operations during the peak of their summer season, the attraction’s busiest time. After reviewing their marketing efforts in Q4, we made a handful of suggestions which included a revised plan for paid search efforts utilizing Google Search (formerly AdWords). We recommended a modest budget increase and were handed the reigns. By the end of 2019, we increased average ROAS by 48% to 69x, conversions increased by 223%, and we saw a 45% increase in conversion rate to 5.06%.
Since then, we’ve continued to optimize and strengthen these efforts and are still yielding a desirable return today in 2020.
An image makes a story more compelling; it shows a scene better than words ever could, which is why using images in any marketing campaign is always a good idea. Their downfall? File size.
Even optimized JPGs and PNGs can grow the file size of a webpage or email exponentially, so it’s important to make sure the images you use are sized correctly for their use.
GIFs have great versatility for digital marketing. They are eye-catching, loop automatically, usually have a small file size, and they look great in an email or on a webpage.
We already talked about how to make a GIF sideshow, but maybe you’ve got a video that you want to make into a GIF. We recently launched an itinerary planner on Alamosa.org and we used a GIF to demonstrate how to use the planner, and also to show it off a bit. Here’s how we did it:
Since COVID-19 reared its ugly head and flipped the script for travel and tourism destinations across the globe, industry leaders have been quick to adopt revised marketing strategies to address the shift in consumer behavior. For many, this plan incorporates a phased approach towards reopening and welcoming back travelers with new safety precautions in place. The Colorado Tourism Office, for example, adopted a route called “Wait, Ready, Set, Go”, which spans the initial travel hiatus to the inevitable rebound of tourism and business as usual. The good news is that most believe we’re past the first phase and onto the next where we can expect to see early adopters of travel making their way to nearby, familiar and less risky destinations.
The truth about the road to recovery is that no destination’s situation is the same. For that reason, we’re here to offer some guidance.
It’s no secret that the ski resort business is hypercompetitive. When resorts aren’t concerned about weather forecasts, they’re focusing on reaching new audience segments and growing their skier base; a challenging task when ski resort conglomerates like Alterra Mountain Co. and Vail Resorts are absorbing market share. Loveland Ski Area, located 53 miles west of Denver Colorado, sought out our team to help plan and execute a paid social media campaign to drive their season pass sales. The “season pass” product is launched annually in a highly competitive landscape as most ski resorts execute their own campaigns around the same timeframe. Responsible for the majority of annual product revenue, the success of this campaign is crucial in helping the resort reach its annual goals.
When this campaign was said and done, we earned over 8x the return on ad spend. This success was made possible by combining our agency’s deep understanding for the snowsports industry and prowess in serving highly detailed, precise ads through Facebook and Instagram. Our paid social campaign leveraged key audience segments, lookalike audiences, and retargeting strategies while communicating Loveland’s highest value points through a tone that was on brand.
Are you creating an email for an event, a sale, or a holiday? This countdown timer is the perfect add-on to create some urgency to your customers. We’ve recently implemented this new feature for Tourism Engine and want to show you how it works!
It can be styled to your liking and branding using the following parameters (in pixels, unless otherwise noted):
For the first time ever, our country has a “be back soon” sign up in the window and there’s no telling when service will resume. Our ski resorts have suspended lift service, surf breaks off the coast are going untouched, and national parks across the country are no longer being explored. Virtually all of our favorite destinations (you can tell which mine are) have in some way been altered by the presence of COVID-19 and its accompanying economic downturn.
I’m sure you’ve seen it countlessly: “We’re navigating through unprecedented times”…if that’s the case, then shouldn’t we think of an unprecedented response in return?
What Does a Leads Program and Ice Cream Have in Common?
The answer is… this blog post!
Here’s the deal: We want to share how implementing a leads program can be a total game changer for any tourism-based business, big or small. If you listen to our spiel and decide it wasn’t worth it, you’ll get a free ice cream dessert on us. Sounds good? Here we go.
First things first. All of your marketing efforts, including a marketing calendar, work better with a marketing strategy and plan. Marketing strategies and plans need not take weeks of research or investment but if you are running your tourism business without a strategy or plan, please let us know. Agency can help you start one today. Now on to building your marketing calendar.
There are many recommendations online which you are encouraged to explore. Why? Because one method may spark an idea or perhaps multiple methods will best align with what you need to do for your tourism based business. The method below is simple and will provide you with pragmatic marketing ideas that you can implement throughout the year.
This video shows how to create a new email newsletter, load the HTML from a prebuilt sample template, insert a content section using HTML snippets, and insert a standard button using an HTML snippet.
In the world of marketing, there are two primary schools of thought: Inbound and Outbound. Traditional, outbound marketing ruled the scene for, like, literally forever, but has recently taken a backseat to the newcomer in marketing strategy: Inbound.
First, we’ll take a look at inbound and outbound marketing and how they differ, then we’ll discuss how to apply it to your own marketing strategy.
This will show how to create content that shows for specific conditions. You can show content based on the data in Tourism Engine™. That includes all the data imported into Tourism Engine™ as well.
Why You’d Use It
Being able to control what content shows based on conditions allows you to understand what engages your audience. Are they more invested in deals or video content? How early in the season and they planning?
Remember this movie? And the excitement of hearing that “You’ve got mail!” jingle? Those were the days…
It’s 1998. You’ve Got Mail is in theaters. Tom Hanks in his hey-day.
The internet is now available to the masses (with dial-up connection!) and email is EXCITING. You got 1, maybe 2 emails a week and it was almost always your mom or grandma writing you.
Email marketing has come a long way since then. Pretty much every business organization has, at the very least, an email subscriber list and a basic newsletter they send on a regular basis.
We’ve been using animated GIFs in email marketing for over a decade. It’s still an easy way to stand out a little and provide some movement in the otherwise static medium of email. There are virtually no drawbacks to using GIFs, other than the short amount of time it takes to create them. They’re compatible with just about every email client out there, and for users of Outlook 2005, they fail gracefully and simply show the first frame of animation.
Here, we’ll show you how to create a simple slideshow of four header images using Photoshop.
The new year symbolizes opportunity, renewal, and a fresh start for many. This time of year, that means we’re assessing the digital landscape and helping clients seize the opportunities that arise from shifts in technology and consumer behavior. Below are a few things to know.
How local businesses can tap into the tourism economy.
Here’s to your success in reaching tourists!
Not a DMO or typical tourist attraction? You can still position your business in front of tourists! A few tactics are below.
Strong presence on social
Tourists are using social media more and more to find dining options on their vacations. Instagram allows users to save posts now, so that process begins at the time of booking. Help them get stoked on your brand and anticipate their arrival by:
Curating strong brand imagery
Cultivate a following and get them to save your posts!
It’s a brand-building effort that requires more time than, say, a promotion or ad campaign. You won’t see the ROI immediately, but any good investment in brand will pay off immensely over time. I gathered some stats to support this argument for our clients (partners) who need to bring hard data to their board or decision makers.
