The New Way for Tourism Bureaus To Measure Their Effectiveness
Photo Credit: Austin, Texas—who knows a thing or two about destination marketing—played host to the 101st DMAI Annual Convention this month. Guero's Taco Bar
Skift Take
DMAI's DestinationNEXT research is important because DMOs and destination stakeholders can now scientifically assess their marketing effectiveness on a collaborative level.
Destination Marketing Association International (DMAI) launched phase two of its DestinationNEXT research project this month during its annual convention in Austin, providing what it hopes will be a roadmap for the future of destination marketing organizations (DMOs).
As we reported last year following the roll-out of phase one, DMAI collected data from 327 tourism bureaus in 36 countries in early 2014 to collate the most significant travel consumer trends and the top DMO strategies designed to exploit those trends.
The trends and strategies were then culled into three “Transformational Opportunities” that DMOs could embrace to elevate their effectiveness, according to DMAI. Those three actions include: A shift toward two-way digital communications and social media execution; better destination-specific branding strategy and product development for both leisure and meetings markets; and more strategic collaboration with economic development organizations to pool intell
