Making a Smarter Splash
Visit St. Pete/Clearwater is maximizing the impact of its marketing strategy.
Introduction
Some of America’s best beaches are found along the sun-soaked coast of Florida in St. Petersburg and Clearwater. Surrounded by dazzling scenery and a vibrant community, the area has quickly captured the attention of travelers around the world. We partnered with Visit St. Pete/Clearwater to evolve their strategy in pursuit of a bigger splash.
Approach
As Pinellas County’s DMO, Visit St. Pete/Clearwater strives to uplift the area’s array of attractions and capture the attention of a diverse audience. We worked together to investigate the existing impact of the organization’s targeted focus and identify opportunities to improve their approach. To do this, we have been conducting annual comprehensive research on the destination’s visitors, potential visitors and advertising campaigns to profile who visits, key markets and traveler segments to prioritize in the marketing strategy and estimate the economic impact of tourism to the destination.
“Visit St. Pete/Clearwater relies on studying our visitor population and their decisions to measure the impact of our marketing. We need the surveying and economic modeling Future Partners provides our organization through various studies such as our visitor profile, ad effectiveness study, and event impact studies to secure more resources to promote America’s Best Beaches.
Moreover, we benefit greatly from the work Future Partners does in support of the tourism industry. We regularly utilize The State of the American Traveler study to help us get a broader picture of the American Traveler to understand general traveler sentiments. Appropriately named, we look forward to partnering with Future Partners, in the future.”
Impact
Visit St. Pete/Clearwater has used this research to determine how their efforts translate into outcomes—and, with the help of our Destination Economic Impact Model, the DMO can estimate visitor spending and volume with ease. Our partnership made waves when USA Today called Clearwater the best beach in the South and Forbes named St. Peter/Clearwater one of the best places to travel in the United States.