Sunshine Matters

The Florida tourism industry is in the unique position of having attained so much success in recent years that we now face the challenge of determining how best to continue to build on our momentum.  To that end, nearly 200 Florida tourism industry leaders met this week at the annual VISIT FLORIDA Marketing Retreat to review research and hear from experts in order to provide input on the development of a strategic marketing plan for the years to come.

The two-day event included participation from members of VISIT FLORIDA’s Board of Directors and Marketing Committees, as well as key staff, expert presenters and agency partners.  The two keynote speakers brought in to share their expertise with attendees were Peter Kim, Chief Solutions Architect at Dachis Group, who offered tactics on formulating a winning “social business” and Joel Book, principal at ExactTarget, who talked about what it takes to create a successful digital marketing strategy.  Both speakers are highly sought after innovators in the social and digital realm who have learned to succeed in today’s aggressively changing marketing landscape.

As part of this year’s Marketing Retreat, VISIT FLORIDA outlined several marketing options the tourism industry must weigh when developing both short- and long-term strategies going forward. Developing a platform that will take VISIT FLORIDA through to the year 2020 must strike a balance between solving for issues related to both scale and divergent destinations across the state.

During brainstorming sessions, attendees provided feedback on how best VISIT FLORIDA might create a 2020 planning process and a new vision for Partner programs that will offer valuable solutions for tourism businesses throughout the state.   From these discussions, the industry expressed it is looking to VISIT FLORIDA to develop strategies that will allow them to more effectively target international travelers, especially those from Brazil, with messages that resonate from various cultural perspectives; advocate for easier access into Florida by international visitors, including visa waivers, expanded airlift and expedited customs technology; programs to better reach the Millenial and Luxury Traveler; and cutting-edge digital and email applications for destination marketing.

While we were able to gather a tremendous amount of information from the industry, we all know the Marketing Retreat is just the beginning of VISIT FLORIDA’s planning process.  Staff will continue to work with the Marketing Committee members and other industry leaders over the next year on this major effort to develop a marketing platform that will create and add value to our industry Partners and to travelers from around the world.

VISIT FLORIDA’s unique public-private partnership model has proven successful because of the industry’s active involvement in the development and implementation of all our marketing efforts and this year’s Marketing Retreat was no exception.  I would like to thank all of the Partners who were able to attend the retreat for their commitment to VISIT FLORIDA and for the thought-provoking contributions that were made over the two days of meetings.  Their leadership is very much appreciated and will have a significant impact on our ability to make Florida the No. 1 travel destination in the world.

I welcome any feedback on the retreat and would appreciate any additional thoughts, ideas or suggestions on how VISIT FLORIDA can work with the industry to build more innovative and impactful marketing programs that will add value to your existing efforts.  Thanks again to everyone who attended – and to our event sponsors at the PGA National Resort & Spa, Schneider Publishing, Collinson Media & Events, Madden Media and Adara Media – for their contributions to a very successful Marketing Retreat.