A trip to New York to meet with writers and editors from travel publications has pushed a local tourism promotion group to ask area attractions for deals and packages for visits to the area.
Corrina Ferguson of the Williamsburg Area Destination Marketing Committee made the trip to New York last month to meet with the writers and editors in hopes of convincing them to use their national publications to write about the Historic Triangle.
Unlike last year’s trip, when they wanted to know more about the area’s culinary offerings, this year it was all about deals and packages.
“Memorial Day getaways, July 4, planning ahead as far as Christmas getaways,” Ferguson said. “There’s also the split between some want deals, stay two nights and your third night is half off and fourth is free, and some actually want really unique packages — you stay in the room when you check in, you’ll have a bottle of wine open and ready for you. They want something special and unique.”
Ferguson wants to receive deals and packages from area attractions by March 20. They can be submitted via a page on WADMC’s Visit Williamsburg website. A similar approach was used last year to promote Veterans Day Weekend trips to Greater Williamsburg.
They will be displayed on a single page on WADMC’s website so the New York writers and editors can see all that is offered in one place. That page will also be used to try to sell deals and packages to tourists.
She said publications like Sherman Travel, Budget Travel and Parade Magazine pointed to deals and packages because there is “such a desire to consume that content” and that those publications want to be seen as resources for finding cost effective vacations.
Ferguson first made trips to New York and Washington, D.C., last year. So far that effort has yielded seven published articles reaching an estimated 41,310,178 people. Most of the views are from a MapQuest.com article with a general message of “History comes vividly to life in Greater Williamsburg through hands-on fun and interactive experiences,” according to a description of WADMC’s 2014 media placements.
Other placements include National Geographic Traveler, the Washingtonian and Parents magazines. Those articles all stressed the Greater Williamsburg area as a “family travel destination” where fun and meaningful vacations can be had.
A similar trip to Washington, D.C., is scheduled for later this year to try to generate interest among publications based there.
Ferguson said the face-to-face conversations afforded by the trips makes for a much more effective effort with travel writers than email or phone calls.
“When you chat with someone in person, you can see a spark of interest in something when you chat casually so you can follow up with them or you can tell when they’re not interested so you can quickly switch topics,” she said.
It also allows for relationship building, which can lead to further collaboration past one printed article, such as social media placements of new attractions or deals connected to the area.
During the trip, Ferguson also shared details with the publications about other areas of interest, such as the 40th anniversary of Busch Gardens. She also touched on renovations to hotels in the area, as that is an area of interest among publications.
