For DMOs and CVBs promoting their own corner of the world to travelers, it may sometimes seem like the budget you’re granted just isn’t enough to accomplish all of your goals. Enter…co-op marketing! By creating a program that allows local tourism and hospitality partners to buy into a campaign to co-promote their offerings with travel to your destination, you increase your marketing funds and reap the five surefire benefits detailed below.
Pumped Up Purchasing
It’s simple math, really. More money = more media. So—whether your strategy involves going deep and wide (think: increased impressions), big and bold (think: formerly unaffordable vehicles) or a combination of the two—awareness for your destination will enjoy a noticeable boost. When Dana designed the custom co-op marketing program for The Hawaiian Islands, the CVB enjoyed a colossal 800% increase in media buying power. And the individual businesses that participated in the program (samples shown below) were able to gain exposure to over 485,000 professional travel agents—a previously unattainable reach.
Never-Ending Stories
Destinations have to walk a fine line between delivering the content travelers are seeking and the fair and equitable promotion of individual tourism and hospitality partners. The former screams for granular “what specific things can I do to fulfill my personal interests” while the latter leans into content painted with broader brushstrokes, à la “these are all the things that can be seen/done/stayed in within a destination.” With co-op marketing campaigns, destinations are free to take a deeper dive into stories that focus on and pique segmented traveler interests. Website content promoting seasonal and limited-time events here and here are examples of what we created for the New Jersey Division of Travel and Tourism and two of their co-op marketing partners.
Asset Amassment
When your image and video libraries are feeling tired and you don’t have the budget for new shoots, your co-op marketing efforts can breathe new life into campaign visuals with high-quality assets right from the source—and with built-in rights of use (including credits where credits are due, of course)!
Brand Cohesion and Amplification
Destinations invest a great deal of time and effort into building their brands—and should strive to get as much mileage out of them as possible. By developing a template for your campaign creative to mesh seamlessly with promotion of a co-op partner, you achieve brand cohesion and gain more-and-more impressions through increased media placements. The digital assets for the New Jersey Division of Travel and Tourism’s regular and co-op efforts below illustrate this concept.
More Visitation (and Visitor Spending!)
Among the benefits of co-op marketing programs for destinations, one is increased visitation. Let’s address that by recapping the benefits listed above. With pumped-up purchasing power, you gain more media impressions. Thanks to never-ending stories, you’re able to craft fresh and ever-more compelling reasons to travel to your destination. Through asset amassment, you can grow your image and video libraries to deliver more varied and attention-grabbing visuals. And, finally, by achieving brand cohesion and amplification, you have the opportunity to gain greater top-of-mind awareness. By hitting travelers this way at the dreaming, planning and booking stages, you should see more visitation—and the resulting increase in visitor spending—at the consuming stage.
With great benefits come…a great deal of work. A co-op marketing program requires unsurpassed expertise and dedication to detail. That’s where Dana comes in—we have created, managed and executed exceedingly successful co-op programs for multiple destinations, all from the ground up. Contact Lynn Kaniper today at 609.466.9187 ext. 117 or lkaniper@danacommunications.com to learn how our team can help you reap the benefits of co-op marketing programs for destinations.
