I just returned home from a two week trip to visit some client destinations in Florida and Tennessee. In both places I was met with happy clients who are seeing great returns on their  online advertising spend. For one of our biggest resort clients we ran some early spring specials and it really paid off. The resort measured results at 8x return on the investment and are extending the promotion to gain more market share.  In Tennessee we have vacation rental companies who are realizing the advantage of using our Top Ten Tips for Marketing in this economy. We use some of the attributes that vacation rentals have over single hotel rooms and target consumers who are most likely to visit the destination and consider vacation home rental. Our key learnings in this market segment are based on the first research just released by PhoCusWright about vacation rental management in the U.S.  We were a partner in the research and gained some key information from custom questions we submitted for the survey.

Vacation rentals are becoming more appealing tas a travel option this year primarily because of the economic slide and consumers needing to budget more than ever before. As I have stated, consumers will travel and have a deservability about their vacations, t they are trying to cut back on restaurant meals and other expenditures on the trip. We market our vacation rental clients in a number of ways online, primarily in very aggressive search marketing and eMail advertising. Douglas Quinby, a friend of mine and leading analyst at PhoCusWright says "It's a whole new ballgame and a $25 billion-plus market".

The biggest return we have seen on the online advertising has been where we finely target the top ten markets for our clients and then offer compelling reasons to buy... not deep discounts, but value. It is working and man, there is nothing better than happy clients : )

till next time...

Leah

Last week I was in beautiful Florida talking to clients and holding strategic planning meetings. I was happy to learn that we are hitting the numbers with our hotel clients in booking for spring travel. In fact, we have increased our booking results over the same months last year. So how do we move the needle in this economy? Strategy of offers, promotional tactics that reach specific target audiences and a well-honed message and creative piece that hits home with consumers in the midst of their shopping and planning for spring travel. Last year's marketing plan is no good anymore. You have to be bold and flexable. You have to have a plan that is more a series of monthly promotions tested, launched, optimized, fine-tuned and measured based on what moves the needle in bookings or visitors. Most hotel clients would like a 3 to 1 return on their advertising this year. We are realizing an 8 to 1 return online... and that is where the budget should go... where it is the most effective and where you can measure the actual return on investment.

This week I am in Pigeon Forge Tennessee. I am looking foreward to great meetings and Totally Tourism, which is Pigeon Forge's annual meeting for all tourism businesses here. Some companies I talk to are doing pretty well... others not so well. And so it is all over the country, and the world, really. As travel marketers try to find the right "magic" to attract business it is becoming very evident that research, test, launch, optimize and measure, relaunch, is the word of the day....

I will predict that many companies will do well during this uncertain economy to spite predictons or surveys. There is less share in the marketplace, but smart marketers don't fear that. We know that we can get our share and that we will take brand share from others to meet our goals. It is a challenging first quarter but man it feels great to have our clients be the winners!

Till next time...

Leah

P.S. thanks for all the emails. I enjoy the sharing of those ideas.