The tourist season in Branson is coming to a close. A large percentage of the population will be unemployed. This town vibrant and busy with tourists will become somewhat of a ghost town. Those lucky enough to find year round employment - or at least a great majority will be planning for the 2006 season.
As an interactive media buyer I spend a lot of time monitoring the media buys of competitors in the Branson Market.
Unlike the standard cost per impression charges in traditional media, most interactive media is purchased on a "cost per action" basis. Generally, business's in the area try to ride the interest of travelers seeking information about the area. This segment - those actively searching for travel information about Branson represents a small group of people. Through their behavior we can tell that they already have an interest in Branson.
National and local companies bid for the attention span of this small group of consumers. National and local competition can become fierce at peak times as they fight for the attention of consumers to the Branson market.
The Chamber of Commerce and Tourism Board in Branson are the same entity. Their goal is to increase tourism. They are supported by both our tax dollars and private membership fees. Though some see this as a conflict of interest - having a unified entity is important as our city's budget is relatively small compared to the spending capacity of competing cities.
The problem - last year the Chamber started some aggressive advertising online. Some of the budget was put into online bidding systems. Though this is an easy method of gaining traffic is does very little to bring in new customers. In fact, these customers are already coming. When the Branson Chamber of Commerce bids on the attention of people already coming to Branson they bid against the entrepreneurial efforts of active online advertisers.
This type of marketing drives the costs of Branson business's up and fails to bring in new visitors. I hope this year the Chamber has the courage and fortitude to aggressively seek new visitors to Branson instead of making local entities pay more for the advertising they're already buying.
There are a lot of ways to increase tourism to our city online. A lot of research has been conducted to understand the geodemographics of our customer base. Gaining new visitors means focusing on lucrative regions and keeping the frequency of contact with these markets in a timely manner - as we do with our traditional marketing.
Funds used to bid against Branson companies that are trying to gain sales through visitors already expressing interest in Branson comes at a cost of aquiring new ones.
