CH-OCVB minutes 021517 - Laserfiche WebLink

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hotels in the near future. The Vistors Bureau is looking at the demand for hotels in the county going forward. The County Manager is doing a five year budget, with the outlying years serving as a look forward. Mark Sherburne shared that the market is presently four thousand room nights behind where it was last year at this time, so he is wondering if we are considering only past numbers when setting our budget. Laurie Paolicelli shared that we are looking at staffing resources and marketing. Commissioner Rich asked if HB2 is to blame for the reduced room nights. Mr. Sherburne responded that while that is part of it, the other part is the lack of demand generators. A very good upcoming football schedule has translated into good sales this coming fall. Ms. Paolicelli reported that since 2012 room supply increased by 51,463 rooms in Orange County. During that same period room demand increased by 52,562 rooms. Occupancy rates were identical between 2014 and 2015 at 72.4 %. Additional supply did not result in a reduction in overall occupancy. Was this an anomaly or did the type of supply generate new business? Nitin Khanna reminded the board that Durham has seen many new hotels and that we have lost some business to those properties. Ms. Paolicelli shared that the Bureau will devote fewer funds to promoting local events and focus more on promoting overnight stays, possibly in the medical market. New supply is going to require a shift in expenditures. Guest /host speakers Laurie Paolicelli shared with the board some of the history that brought us to our present marketing philosophy within Orange County. In listening to the customer the bureau moved toward the Visit Chapel Hill brand with the commitment of the communities to work to bring them in once they are here. Our agency, Clean Design, attended the meeting to speak about how we are moving forward. They shared their current strategy, a media snapshot and talk about what is new. The target audience is the business explorer, smaller groups and meetings, and the leisure traveler. Psychographics are important to keep in mind as well. These travelers are more open minded and progressive and want to try new things. They are focusing on three groups from a paid media perspective: LGBT, Wedding and Local. Brand platform is internal and its focus is "the new progressive south ". This is the lens through which Clean Design sees everything they do on our behalf. Our campaign has moved to more online digital than other platforms. Digital includes video, email, search, social, display and native. We have increased paid social media. Cvent has been especially successful. Video has begun to take more of our advertising dollars. Our campaign is robust, integrated and diverse. They have received a great response from our print ads in targeted publications, as well as with some exposure in some of their media partners such as "Out and About" with WRAL. They are treating TripAdvisor as if it is our own website, populating it with their content. They own their TripAdvisor page. Our campaign will be moving into TV advertising this summer. The task in two -fold: 1) increase overnight leisure travel during summer months, and 2) highlight Chapel Hill, Carrboro and Hillsborough offerings and what there is to do in each one during the summer. Their take on this task is to; position the area as an easy summer getaway; highlight the foodie, microbrewery, live music and art culture; speak to progressive- minded groups of women and couples; target the Charlotte market. The demo audience will be women 25- 64. Charlotte has a large population of UNC alumni and so a high degree of familiarity and is far enough away to encourage an overnight stay. They will focus on one major market. Ms. Paolicelli reminded the board that in the summer of 2014 hotel room nights were up by more than one thousand rooms. This was an anomaly situation, but we find ourselves trying to keep up with that number. She continued by sharing that the ads for AI's and LGBT have been very positively received. That being said, we are all feeling the pain of new supply. We hope to move more into the search engine market. 21 Page CHOCVB BOD Meeting February 15, 2017