We worked with Tifton Tourism to launch a new campaign to focus on one niche target—Agritourism. In Tifton, it’s active year-round, offering something new to do seasonally. The Marketing Action Plan pointed to Agritourism when defining that Tifton is ideally suited for SMERF events, agritourism excursions and stop-overs.
Background
Tifton is located in south central Georgia along I-75 and ideally situated at the halfway point between Atlanta and Orlando. The small city is benefiting from a renaissance of their downtown area and also features unique agritourism attractions that would appeal to an important multi-gen target. We worked with their CVB team to develop a new campaign that would work to increase overnight stays from travelers looking for interesting attractions to visit as they drive I-75.
Challenges
Our target audiences (specifically leisure travelers in south Georgia and transient travelers on I-75 and Highway 82) are not aware of Tifton’s charm and/or their interesting agritourism offerings. So presenting Tifton as an interesting and affordable destination ideally suited for regional events and agritourism excursions was key to our success.
Solution
To illustrate that Tifton is more than just an interstate exit gas station stop, we wanted the campaign to express the range of things there are to do in Tifton — whether it’s local dining, shopping or playing, everyone will discover something they enjoy to create lasting memories to bring home.
The Marketing Action Plan pointed to Agritourism when defining that Tifton is ideally suited for SMERF events, agritourism excursions and stop-overs.
Our campaign strategy included several seeds:
- a landing page with a unique URL to allow us to measure the effectiveness of the campaign from July to December
- outdoor focused on the I-75 corridor
- interactive ads across multiple digital platforms
- print ads in regional publications
- social media boosted posts and paid ads
After developing our concept, we tailored a custom two-day photoshoot with local talent, DMO staff, and Stamp family. Planning an efficient but jam-packed photoshoot provided a ton of photos for Tifton’s image database. While only a handful of images are used in the campaign, Tifton has over 65 new images to utilize in social media and other marketing channels. The actual cost per image for art directed, customized local photos was less expensive than some popular stock photography websites.
What makes us proud?
We love working with the good people at Tifton Tourism as their full service outsourced marketing partner. Our excellent relationship has built trust that has led to our long-standing partnership and award-winning work. Our custom, on-location photography lends authenticity to the friendliness and down-to-earth personality of Tifton. Interpreting the research lead us to promoting the niche of Agritourism, and the results help prove that small towns can be a big deal.
The RESULTS!
A 6-month comparison of website traffic proves that we reached our target audience:
- Overall users increased 836% and page views grew 807%
- User engagement grew 765% and clicks increased 867%
- The top two pages increased views 2,792%!
- Our top city focus, Atlanta, grew 593%
Attribution Model to tie digital advertising to client KPIs for Tifton Tourism
We worked with a digital partner to reach a custom audience of visitor (non-resident) devices seen in Tifton between October to December of 2021 and to supplement this campaign to geographically attributable lookalike audiences (located in areas where previous Tifton visitors had traveled from) AND that were considered: Travel Intenders consuming content related to: Drive Market Trips + Have visited sites like AirBnB, VRBO, Expedia, etc.
We targeted 20 cities where the previous visitors to Tifton traveled from.
During the campaign, Tifton’s KPI of growing weekend getaways from the Atlanta, Georgia metro area (6 million+ residents within a 2 to 3 hour drive north on I-75) was achieved by increasing measured in-market visitor attribution from Atlanta, Georgia by +593% and the Things To Do in Tifton website page visited by Atlanta, Georgia attributable IP addresses increasing by +287%. Atlanta went from the #2 “traveled from” Tifton market to #1.
The campaign can be seen throughout the Southeast via social media, lifestyle magazines, and billboards. All campaign elements point to a landing page developed to track website visits.
The Ag-venture Awaits Campaign was awarded a Gold ADDY® Award in the Consumer Regional/National Integrated Campaigns Category of the American Advertising Awards.
Services Delivered
- Marketing Action Plan
- Analytics
- Brand Awareness
- Campaign Development & Management
- Content Development
- Copywriting
- Digital Marketing
- Art Direction & Graphic Design
- Landing Pages
- Marketing Strategy
- Media Planning & Management
- Photography
- Social Media Management
- Website Design & Development
- Destination Marketing
- Niche Marketing