TDC/CVB Feb 8 meeting offered an in-depth look into the 2011 marketing strategies as well as an opportunity to check out the newest TV Commercials.

The Real. Fun. Beach commercials were created to hit specific markets and have two versions in rotation, aimed at targeting Couples and Families.

More Info Below

The 2011 Summer marketing strategy is slated to begin televised promotions in mid-April, and running through July.

The interrupted headline campaign, Real. Fun. Beach. will be resurrected through out this duration with a conscious effort being made to maintain continuity between print, television and online media outlets.

The Real. Fun. Beach. tag line will feature family fun at the beach and a second that features couples and other adults having year-round fun

The Real. Fun. Beach TV commercials will target Atlanta, Baltimore and Birmingham, with some overlap occurring in cities where Southwest Airlines ad campaigns are being televised as well.  Cooperative marketing with Southwest through out April, June and August will focus efforts to promote Panama City Beach in new markets now being serviced by the airline.

Overall goal is to reclaim our title as the “World’s Most Beautiful Beaches” and leave the mayhem from the past year behind us, once and for all.  The focus is on interactive media with an emphasis on driving people to their website, but general marketing strategies include specific media placements aimed to hit a variety of markets, during corresponding peak times.

50% of the media budget has been allocated for Broadcast, TV, Radio, VOD, Check-out  and more, with 20% going towards online (website, online display etc.)

Jan 11th’s TDC meeting offered an eclectic mix of information.

Starting with the Vice-President of the Canadian Snowbirds, Nancy Hopcraft,  who caught my attention with the mention of the ‘Birds working on a potential “Retiree Visa” allowing those who qualify an opportunity to spend more time in Panama City Beach (or anywhere in the Nation).  It’s a wonderful idea, and one that’s sure to bring about an economic boost but we’re looking at least 2 years, before hearing any final words.

Great News from the Bay Point Invitational! Last year, Bay Point Invitational, had been called on to help prove to the nation that our waters were open, and our seafood, edible. So they did. Opening up the event to include Swordfish, they had an industry celebrity chef cook up the fish right there during weigh-in.  You can’t beat that kind of freshness, creativity or ingenious marketing.

Bay Point stole the spotlight  by announcing their Classic Event in September, had 44 Boats involved and a quarter of a million in the purse, which enabled them to present a  $25,000 check to Beach Point Services.

Finally, we come to Spring Break.

The TDC marketing strategy for Spring Break, has been mostly focused on Social Media.

There’s a few other avenues being utilized as well and without further ado, we present The Plan.

An Online Lodging Survey is in the works to gather feedback in a timely fashion, with questions on whether the business is booking above or below last year. The reason behind this is to enable a quick response or changes to the program as needed.

Targeting Associated Press (USA Today, NY Times, National Morning Shows & CNN) to spread the word by content.

In regards to utilization of Social Media, the plan is to narrow social site efforts to maximize impact. How, you ask?

Good question:

Targeting 50 designated schools on the school’s Facebook page

Advertise on school’s Facebook page (creating a dialogue on page with actual posts, as well as advertisements)

Setting up a specific Spring Break Twitter account (only to be used for Spring Break topics, information, etc)

Creating a Re-Tweet gift card program at each targeted school. For example, if you attend school in one of the target markets, and you re-tweet a post from our Spring Break twitter, you will be granted a gift card. Note: not PCB specific gift-card.

Hosting Tweet-Ups.

What’s a Tweet-Up? To be blunt, it’s a real-life get-together, where people tweet about the event, while AT the event.

Tweet-ups are a huge marketing strategy, currently being used in Hollywood, and to great success.  Popular TV shows, new Movie releases, Political events- can all be found in the real-time world of Twitter.

Those in attendance today, raised some concerns over these efforts coming a little too late, mentioning that Maximum Campaign Mode is currently in full swing from Collegiate Marketing and that the TDC’s/CVB PR strategy of polls, surveys and social media, should have been launched in early December, before kids left for Christmas Break.

Personally, I find some validity in those statements and I’m interested in hearing you’re thoughts?

Should the TDC start the Public Relation campaign trail, before January?

Photo credit: tonyocruz.com

At Tuesday’s TDC meeting, the big guns of Thunder Beach approached the board asking to move their Autumn Rally to Columbus Day Weekend.

Currently, the rally is held on the first weekend in October. Reason for wanting to change the date were stated as follows:

1. Ability to confirm more Vendors presence
2. More Vendors = more attendants
3. More Attendants = boost in Panama City Beach’s economy

While the TDC acknowledges the potential boost in revenue, the board did have multiple concerns over allowing the date change to take place:

1. The Seafood Festival currently holds the date for Columbus Day Weekend
2. The festival is scheduled to coincide with the Fall Break schedules of kids
3. Families may not want to visit while Thunder Beach is happening
4. The businesses that don’t prosper from Thunder Beach, would suffer from the loss of families opting not to come

Joe and Rich, both stated clear, concise reasons for wanting to move the Autumn Rally date, with the main point of interest being that with the date change, Thunder Beach would be able to solidify more vendors, which in turn brings more bikers, which of course, heightens revenue for merchants, lodging and as a whole- the majority of businesses in the Panama City Beach area. They cited that by changing the date to Columbus Day weekend, it frees up scheduling conflicts with vendors and events on a national scale.

Currently, the Autumn Rally is scheduled right after the popular West Coast event, Street Vibrations in Reno, NV and right before Daytona’s Biketoberfest. If you consider the national scheduling of these events, it puts the vendors in a position of having to choose which event they can commit to, and since the Autumn event falls smack in the middle of two major rallys, Vendors are opting to by-pass Thunder Beach. Leaving our Panama City Beach event with few vendors, and less appeal for the event’s two-wheeled enthusiast.

The idea behind moving the date to Columbus Day, is an interesting one. Thunder Beach is a solid event for the economy, participants have typically proven to be well-behaved, respectful and money spending. However, as Mayor Gayle Oberst thoughtfully pointed out, Panama City Beach is composed of both Businesses and Families.

The coveted Columbus Day Weekend currently plays host to the family friendly Seafood Festival. It’s a time when parents can capitalize on kid’s schools Fall Break time, and possibly squeeze in one last outing before buckling down for the coming winter.

That’s the type of welcoming environment the TDC is worried about losing, with the question being if they moved the Seafood Festival (to allow Thunder Beach use of Columbus Day Weekend) would the city be potentially setting themselves up to lose its family friendly fall tourism nitch? The two events are typically polar opposites of each other, with families choosing to vacation or visit PCB when it’s not packed with Bikers, essentially making it unlikely the two events could share the same weekend.

Overall, the TDC volleyed back and forth with Thunder Beach, both sides able to see the potential of hosting the rally during the long weekend, yet the TDC Board values the family friendly events the city host through out the Fall.

In the end, the Tourist Development Council didn’t support moving the date of the rally.  Concerns of families being deterred from coming during the “fall-break” week and the prospects of the Seafood Festival becoming a stable stake for the fall tourism season reinforced that decision. For now, the dates will stay the same.

What are your thoughts on this?

Spring Break on Panama City Beach has always, always, been a very tough board to balance. In past years, no matter how brilliant the public relations strategies, no matter how well-targeted the advertising and no matter how many overall arrests, no Spring Break season has ever been considered the smoothest of our four tourist seasons. In fact, although SB is without question PCB’s biggest economic boost, it remains the most polarizing topic throughout our great town; some love it, some hate it, some make money from it, others lose cash by the bucket loads. But what can be said is that 2010 was arguably one of the best years to date. Hotels had record numbers, businesses boomed and the number of major incidents declined considerably. So what was the big difference? How was 2010 more balanced than years past?

To make a successful Spring Break, three things have to be balanced evenly: Spring Break Public Relations, Spring Break Promotions and In-destination Management; you have to get the word out, control the messaging and manage the area to the best of your ability. SB 2010 did this exceptionally well. The biggest difference was that in 2010 the TDC and CVB did not use its budget to promote Spring Break, from an advertising standpoint, and put its efforts toward handling the PR and adding extra bulk to in-destination management of the season; putting a larger police force on the streets, giving business owners Spring Break workshops and changing the rules on when and where big events could be held. This was coupled with (perhaps even motivated into action) the Spring Break Co-op: a collaboration of local business owners with the Collegiate Marketing Group to promote spring break. By getting the local business owners involved, and allocating budgeted money evenly, for the most part, all the spring break bases were covered and the city developed a nice blueprint for handling spring break moving forward. That was, until the Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill.

On Tuesday, December 14, The Collegiate Marketing Group approached the TDC and CVB requesting funds to help with the marketing and advertising efforts. “We want to make sure students know we are open for business, alive and well and free of oil.” Said, Shannon Posavad, representing CMG. After accumulating over $80,0000 from co-op members, CMG requested specifically $50,000 from the board to help marketing and advertising campaigns. His request, even with board members seeing the need to “get the message out”, was declined. Without that contribution, it seems, the balance that was attained last year may tilt at a critical juncture in the future of Spring Break.

Whether you believe it or not, most the country still regards our area to be covered in oil. Spring Break provides an opportunity to change that belief. Every single person, student or family, that comes to Panama City Beach during spring break will become a billboard for the reality of the area; that we are open for business and oil free. Now would be the time to try and encourage as many individuals as possible to come to Panama City Beach. The more people, the more billboards. With the Southwest effect starting to kick in as well as Southwest boosting marketing and advertising efforts, 2011 is the pivotal year where the balance will either shift or find its equilibrium. Now more than ever, Panama City Beach has to get Spring Break right. Even Lou Hammond, president of the TDC’s PR agency agreed, “We have to get this perfect.”

But with “Zero” dollars being allocated to Spring Break advertising and declining the requests of CMG for additional funds to help overcome oil spill misconceptions, 2011 Spring Break, already headed for make or break situation, could be tilting towards break. The efforts and successes of 2010 need to be supported by greater efforts in 2011. Whether you love or hate Spring Break, it cannot be denied that Panama City Beach is a better place than it was last year, with more to do, more to see, cleaner and more beautiful than ever. In 2011, Spring Breakers will become to voice of PCB’s rejuvenation. And right now, we need that voice to be as loud as possible.

In case you’ve been wondering whether the construction of the new airport was in vain, 2010 passenger traffic since the new airport has been open is almost triple what it was in 2009, during the 2010 summer months.  Despite the threat of oil on our beaches, the new Northwest Florida Beaches International Airport and all the marketing horsepower that was brought to the market by Southwest Airlines has been considered a huge success.

A normal July and August usually brings about 30,000 people per month through the old Panama City airport, but this summer there was around 83,000 per month.  This number comes as a huge welcome and leaves immense speculation:  what would it have been like had we NOT had the oil spill scare?

Icing on the cake was October’s numbers, 73,000 passengers came through the new airport – attributed to fall breaks around the country, national holidays and a series of successful fall events on Panama City Beach.

As if increased traffic wasn’t enough, the new Northwest Florida Beaches International Airport seems to be drawing travelers regionally as well.  The parking lot frequently has cars from Tallahassee, Dothan, Ft. Walton, Destin, and even Pensacola.  The July and August numbers were also higher than Tallahassee’s passenger traffic numbers, for the first time ever – who normally come in at around 50,000 per month.

The word seems to be getting out that traveling to Panama City Beach is easier than it has ever been.  Mike Bennet, TDC Chairman and local restaurateur commented at Tuesday’s TDC meeting of a conversation he had with a visitor to one of his restaurants: “They were from Dallas, TX and normally took their beach vacation in Corpus Christi, and were surprised at how accessible and beautiful Panama City Beach was – they said they’d be coming back every year.”  This message was resounded by others recounting similar stories with customers.

Total annual traffic is now expected to be around 600,000 to 700,000 at the new Panama City Airport, which isn’t far off from big-city Pensacola, who passes around a million travelers through its gates every year.

Despite a very dismal looking outlook at the beginning of the summer, the actual numbers for June are showing nearly even bed tax collections this year, compared to last year.  In June, a total of $1,88,269.21 was collected.  This compares to $1,946,037.92 in tax revenue that was collected in June of 2009.  The actual variance is just over $61,000, or -3.17%.

This was an interesting summer, we had tons of things lined up to all but guarantee the best summer tourist season we’ve had in years.  Ironically, right before the season began, there was what some may call a monstrous accident just a few short hundred miles away.  After a summer of weekly and even daily threats, the damaged perception left our local industry practically starving for business and pleading with their customers to keep their reservations.  The rental climate changed from one of knowing how the numbers were going to be all summer before Memorial Day, to guessing what the next week would hold for rental revenue.  Shops and restaurants had no idea what to expect, but were bracing for the worst.  Talking to retailers and resorts, numbers were way off this year.  Obviously some fared better than others, but overall most suffered to some degree.

But lets get back to the bed tax numbers.  The numbers were only down 3.17% this year.  That doesn’t seem all bad, right?  Well, you have to consider that a deficit of any amount is going to spread hurt across the board.  You have to consider that with any new additions to the rental or retail inventory, plus some businesses ability to reach their customers over other businesses, that 3.17% can mean quite a different story for different people.

All in all, I think we are blessed to have done as well as we did, in Panama City Beach, despite the looming threat that impaled the perception of our beach this summer.  Hopefully next year no outside forces will impede all the work that has been put into increasing our local tourism business.

July’s numbers should be out within the week, which will be the real test to see how the summer really fared.  Stay tuned!

The oil spill threat this summer took it’s toll on the opportunity for us to have a slammin’, jammin’ summer, but it wasn’t all bad.  Our image was certainly tarnished, our tourism numbers were down a bit, but on the plus side, the Panama City Beach Convention and Visitor’s Bureau received $2 million from BP to be used for marketing the beaches of Panama City Beach.  This influx of marketing money has saved our CVB $750,000 from their regular marketing budget this year so far and has freed up some cash to use in other arenas.

At the TDC meeting this week, there was one slide in PCB CVB Marketing Director Susan Estler’s presentation that kept its place longer than the others, and it’s pictured above.  Note the extra dollars that are proposed to be allocated to the various events.  If you can’t see through the grain of the low-light photo, it reads:

Recommendation of Enhancement for Existing Events

• Lobsterfest – $50,000
• Thunder Beach – $50,000
• Seafood, Wine and Music Festival – $150,000

This is huge news for these events as this could enable them to step up their value for this year.  Currently and in the past, the CVB has not supported monetarily Lobsterfest, so this would be totally new for them.  Last I checked, the CVB was contributing $25,000 to Thunder Beach and currently they have committed $60,000 to the Panama City Beach Seafood Wine and Music Festival.  This new influx of cash would up the support for the Seafood Festival to $210,000 total.

Event Stakeholder, Jack Bishop was in attendance at the TDC meeting this week and was asked what this money would mean for the event.  He was clear in that using this money to make it a free event was not a good idea as it would “take it down a level, rather than take it up a level.”  It was discussed making it free for visitors to our area and paid for locals, which Mayor Oberst was staunchly opposed to, with due cause. Bishop said the influx in money would allow them to add tremendous value to the existing ticketed event, possibly allowing them to bring in a huge headliner.

He reported that they have flexibility in their contracts to move some schedules around and said they had already been in discussions on how to move forward should this become a reality.

Convention and Visitor’s Bureau CEO, Dan Rowe said they would sit down with the event stake holders and discuss how this money would best suit each individual event.  He stressed that the CVB wouldn’t just start cutting checks.  The whole idea is to boost Panama City Beach tourism by boosting existing events that are happening anyway.

Other ideas to use the savings from the regular budget include creating a totally new event that has a huge Jimmy Buffet-sized event that would be ticketed.  The goal of an event of this magnitude would be to bring in 35,000 people (like they did for the Jimmy Buffet concert in south Alabama) that could have an influx of up to $7 million to the local economy.  This would be at the end of the fall season this year or at the beginning of the tourism season next year.

One of the cool things about bringing in Southwest Airlines to the new Northwest Florida Beaches International Airport was that we get to take advantage of SWA’s amazing marketing success. This proven track record of creating an immense brand awareness so far has proven invaluable so far in marketing Panama City Beach, and it couldn’t come at a better time.

When it was proposed to increase the bed tax from 3 to 5 cents early last year, the whole idea was to pump our tourism board full of marketing ammunition. The bed tax was increased in time to allow plenty of reserves to be built up so when the time came, the TDC could flood the country with an enormous awareness campaign. That awareness campaign came at the compliments of Southwest Airlines genius.

Tourism officials this week at a regular TDC meeting reported that many industry leaders have commented on their guests having seen the television commercials that Southwest Airlines has been airing. “Southwest is well known for their edginess in their TV commercials,” said one of the board members.

One commercial was actually shot at Gulf World Marine Park using their acrobatic dolphins, then super-imposed into an emerald green gulf shot. Thud showcases our amazing water, beautiful beaches and fun opportunities to spot dolphins in the gulf.

The TDC unanimously approved to pay a $2 million bill from Southwest Airlines this week. The bill was for the agreed upon ad placements that Southwest Airlines has been running since spring of this year. All board members seem to agree that this was money well spent.

This year, we are paying for 75% of all the ad placements with the Walton County Convention and Visitor’s Bureau paying the other 25%.  Next year, the Panama City Beach Convention and Visitor’s Bureau will pay two-thirds with the Walton County CVB picking up the remaining one-third.

With the looming threat of oil hitting our pristine beaches in one form or another, the Bay County Tourism Development Council (TDC) met this week to discuss how they can fight the negativity and display why Panama City Beach is still an ideal summer vacation spot for guests, new and old alike.  The solution was to come up with a whole summer full of fun with festivals, live concerts and events that will show our visitors that in Panama City Beach, it’s not just the beach anymore.

Officials beleive that it’s realistic to expect oil in the shape of tar balls, light sheen, or a foamy mouse, but nothing more.  Additionally reported, the product that may make it to our shores will be so weathered, that it’s toxicity levels will be little more than grease.

So what’s in store for this summer, you ask?  Here are some of the ideas discussed:

• Fireworks every week
• Random parades along the beach in different areas
  • It was discussed the the TDC buy floats (like Disney) or local groups enter their floats for free
• Concerts at various locations
  • Having varying tiers with different levels of performers
  • Some of the locations discussed were Aaron Bessant Park, Frank Brown Park, the new County Pier (with great parking close by)
• Various contests including a huge sand castle competition, some contest for the kids like hacky sack contests, frisby throwing contests and frisby catching competitions for dogs.
• Random “beachy” elements around town, such as steel drums playing at super markets

BP has given the state of Florida $25 million to be portioned out to county tourism officials across the effected areas to be used for marketing expenses related to the oil spill.  Bay County’s portion was $1.1 million.  In addition, the TDC has set aside $500,000 to be used to help fund events or any other costs associated with boosting our summer.  The $1.1 million from the state can only be used for marketing expenses.

The whole idea was stemmed from tourism officials wanting to be sure that tourists understood that this summer was going to be the most fun-filled summer we’ve ever had and that they don’t want to miss it.

This brings an interesting point, and leads to a question that I’ve always pondered.  The conventional thought in Panama City Beach has always been, “Why spend money and put on events in the summer when visitors are coming to our beaches anyway?”  Yet, interestingly, the question I’ve seen so much on PCBDaily is, “There is nothing to do in Panama City Beach.  I love going to the beach, but I don’t want to do that every day.”  So, here is my question:  Do you think tourism traffic would be substantially greater in the summer than it normally is if we have festivals or events on or around the beach EVERY summer?  Answer in comments.

Tuesday’s combined TDC/CVB meeting at City Hall covered topics such as the impact of extra sporting events and sports marketing on Panama City Beach, (numbers are up and new events keep coming!) approval and discussion of various financial items, an update on the Panama City Beach vegetation project (very well executed so far, almost 60% complete with lots of new sea oats and vegetation planted), and, most importantly, the Seafood Wine & Music Festival for 2010.

Jack Bishop, local restaurant owner and former member of the Bay County Tourist Development Council is one of the festival organizers, and took to the microphone at the meeting to put his thoughts and ideas to the board. Mr Bishop talked about how far the festival has come since it’s roots and how he sees further growth and improvement in the future. “The Seafood, Wine & Music Festival has gone a long way towards restoring the image of Panama City Beach.” Bishop stated. “We need something like this, something for people to do in addition to 4th July, especially now we are appealing to an upper level demographic with the arrival of the new airport.”
Mr Bishop continued to say; “We need to make some short term decisions, and some long term decisions. In the short term, let’s think about 2010. We need to address the issues of security, garbage and sanitation, and production, all of which we need to step up, and will need extra resources for. We need extra promotion and sponsorship, extra marketing, and extra financing.” Mr Bishop then asked for an additional $50,000 on top of the current $60,000 the board has already committed in order to execute these changes. “We know exactly where we are now with the Seafood, Wine & Music Festival, and I have learned many lessons along the way. If I am to take on this extra responsibility, then I am going to need more help.”