VisitRainier Board Minutes: July 2009
10:00-2:00pm
Whittaker Mountaineering, Ashford
Attendance: Jeremy Foust, Adam Angel, Maree Lerchen, Pam Newlun. Mary Kay Nelson and Annalee Tobey. Guests, Pam Painter. Absent: Steven Cadematori, Dee Patterson, PC Dickenson, Andrea Brannon and Rehne Copeland-Vanek.
The meeting was called to order at 10:20 by President Jeremy Foust. No quorum present, so minutes were not approved. The Financial Report was accepted for May - June. The board suggested that only one copy of the entire financial report is needed to be presented at the board meetings in the future. They would only like to receive the Profit and Loss statement and balance sheet.
New Business:
Executive Directors Report (See Below)
2010 Board Retreat Discussion... the following topics were suggested:
Summary of who we are now
3-5 Year Plan of who we want to be and where we are going as an organization
Short term marketing plan - bring ad campaign proposal
Budget for 2010
Overview of current program
Provide job description for VR Team members and organizational chart
Discussion of Community Relations position and Public Relations
Network options for a possible Partners Summit in lieu of inviting partners to board meetings
No facilitator needed at this point.
Adjourn
Next Meeting -
Board Retreat... Maree's in Packwood (Riverhouse) (Maree to provide rooms)
Small fee for meals TBD (Board to provide?)
Wednesday, Oct 14 - 10am to 4pm - networking social and dinner to follow
Thursday, Oct 15 - 9am - 2pm
| Executive Director Report July 2009 | Cost - details - comments | |
| Executive position | ||
| As of June 30, 2009- 100 hours over budget | Increase is covered so far in content development budget. Continue to work to develop content and revisit in October for budget status. | Propose increase in admin consulting costs for 2010 for both Executive Director and Content Manager. |
| IRS | This has been resolved and no payment is necessary. | |
| Public Relations | ||
| Hawaiian Airlines | Carol Zahorsky has lined up Scott Sorenson to do an in-flight video for the airlines. Carol has developed an around the mountain loop for them. The will be here in August (cancelled) | Cost covered by Hawaiian Airlines, we provide comp rooms and meals...VR may purchase the rights to this video. |
| Men's Fitness | Carol looking for comped rooms and transportation July... Discussion was held about putting $$ in the 2010 budget to pay for lodging and dining for media. Discussion was also held about the value of hosting media relative to the high volume of requests for comped rooms. Some requests that businesses receive are not always valid or qualified. It was suggested that Carol might be able to come up with criteria that would help board determine what leads would receive the best ROI. | The board discussed allocating dollars in the 2010 budget to help cover costs of overnights and meals for media stays. It is problematic asking for comps during the high season and not having a choice of where we want to place them. |
| Editorial Photos | Work with a photographer to collect signature shots for the media | Carol's work within contracted amount. Additional dollars are available for photos |
| Initial discussion of retainer fee for 2010 PR work | Board would like to develop a list of what the scope of work should include to give more direction to this program. | Board discussed options for Public Relations for 2010. Board will continue this discussion at the board retreat. MK to bring info from discussion with DSI. |
| Web Content | ||
| Karen Sykes and Mary Janosik | Hikes, photos, GPS tracking | Contracted for hikes and photo with GPS |
| Russ Mohney | Nature, Outdoor Naturalist | |
| John Zilly | Mt. Biking | |
| Linda McAskill | Horseback riding trails (Enumclaw area) | |
| Peter Potterfield | We have lost recent contact with Peter. Sara will use his stories, once she makes contact with him. | Unknown at this time |
| Mt. Rainer Climb | Jeremy and Adam mentioned that they could work to get some trip reports for posting current climbing reports | No cost |
| Insider tip page | For current happenings like crowded conditions | Road less traveled |
| Kelli Clouse / Website videos | Started project June 27..10 signed up so far, inquiries from about 5 more. | $400 per property...$175 pay to play. If properties want additional videos or something beyond what VR is doing, they are welcome to work directly with Kelli to have more videos done. |
| Top five hikes | Hikes for dogs, kids, waterfalls, flowers | MKM |
| Wellness, spa and fitness | Next to be developed.. need more input | MKM |
| Other pages | Historic places, MORA attractions, fall color, photo drives, 50 hikes checklist | MKM; Sandy Altman to do Historic |
| Website | ||
| Dedicated Server | Set up and being tested..will cost $99 per month vs $19.99 per month. Ken determined that there was not a significant difference in loading time.. | Jeremy and Ken agreed that the dedicated server is necessary because of the videos being launched on the site. Following the board meeting, Jeremy discussed the optimization proposal that Ken put forward upon our request for increasing loading speed, search friendly URLs, sorting lodging by city, Google map icons. Note: Ken submitted a proposal to the board for the items noted above. With a email vote from the board in favor of the proposal, this project is moving forward at this time. Timeline is to have it completed by the end of August. |
| Website Review and oversight | No comment from Brainkinetics. Terradon.com contacted for free site review, DSI is reviewing as well | Need someone to evaluate and oversee needed changes to the website in the future. |
| Advertising on the website | Small space ads or sponsors on the pages ie lodging | This is on hold until hours become available and board decides what they want. Look into new license needed for software. ..Ask Ken and Sara if old program for advertising be used on this site for ad placement??? |
| e-newsletter | Consumer 4/21 and 6/9 Stakeholders 4/26 Lodging only 6/22 Advertising potential on newsletter- |
2200+ sent 30% open 219 sent 42% open 84 sent 63% open Hold ads for now |
| Website statistics | Highest days - 912 and 944 on June 29 and 30 from 644 the day before (June 28) after experiencewa.com eblast went out. June 2009 highest month ever, 18,107 unique visitors Direct traffic decreased, Search engines increased..(reflects that google adwords are now being recognized) referring sites stayed the same New adword campaign started on June 25.. What are our goals? We are doing well according to Sara with our length of time on the site, bounce rate and percentage of where traffic is generated. What are the top referring sites? |
ExperienceWa.com eblast 25,390 sent out.. One year from June that new website was launched.. June 2008 had 13,701 unique visitors Report on this data will be provided at future board meetings. Top Referring sites for June are: Google, Direct, CPC, ExperienceWa.com, Yahoo, NPS, Bing, VisitSeattle, Bing, NW Trek |
| Inventory who is linked to VisitRainier.com from their website. | Board suggested a button or link directly to the specific page ie hiking, dining etc.. not to home page---Sara is working on this. | When the HTML code is placed on sites to collect referral data, this will result in a link without a visible link to our website from their site. |
| Tracking referral code traffic from other websites | HTML language.. Summary of how many clicks were sent to each property website.. from VR and other sources | Need to encourage others to apply this info to their websites. |
| Other | ||
| Over 697 followers ..we are tweeting daily.... And getting great response.. good info like road conditions, ideas about shuttles, wildflowers hikes and more. | (in November- 971 followers) | |
| Annalee has begun this process | (in November 224 Fans) | |
| Reverse Itineraries | Show visitors how to beat the crowds and parking issues by going the reverse direction.. info posted on how to overcome crowded conditions and to use the shuttle | |
| McChord AirForce Rodeo | 3500 flyers (maps) distributed by TRCVB | DSI designed the one page map/flyer (inside of brochure) |
| NewLeadsUSA.com | Clone your best customer and send them an email | Not done yet. |
| Contests | ||
| $50 email sign up contest | 437 signed up so far | RainierBucks |
| $100 quarterly contest | Eblast from Experience Wa. to gather email addresses (71 so far for August 1) | Didn't work the first time; Next one August 1 drawing |
| $500 WSTP contest | Annual Dec 31, drawing 50 signed up so far | RainierBucks |
| $25 survey | One winner selected for answering the survey | RainierBucks - winner did not collect |
| Marketing Plan for 2010 | ||
| DSI.. Dodge Schmitgal Inc. | VR to define long- and short-term goals, objective and strategies; how the web and traditional advertising can successfully work together, what VR partners can do to specifically support the goals, how the web can evolve to maintain a strong presence with search engines, become a favorite bookmark and increased traffic; and define what part social marketing plays. Consider whether or not we want to do any competitive research (primary or secondary) and what part public relations will play, if any. DSI can incorporate anything you are currently doing that is working and should continue. Consider new creative design...new brochure design.. for 2010? | No cost estimates yet.. Met with Dodge and Stephanie on July 24 at 10am in Longview. Waiting for proposal from them |
| New Print advertising Done this year but, not in original budget | VIA- Oregon- Idaho Seattle Drive Guide -rental car agencies Seattle Visitor Guide (1.36 ctr average ---ours is 2.91 ctr) AAA Journey Sept-October Sunset - August Ken Burns National Park special |
$737 1/9 page $700 July/August/Sept 2250 plus 3 month internet $3801 $2310 1/6 page $4888 - full run plus Quick weekends free.. 200,000 issues ($7520 value plus $1380 value free) |
| Local Media targeted | Road to Rainier Destination Rainier /Chronicle Seattle Times - Summer Guide in May |
½ page- $260 $278 $600 |
| Community Relations 2010 | ||
| Tradeshows, fairs, local business connection, guide books, local newspaper columns, military and Olympia market | Yet to be determined who or what this position would be in 2010. | Tradeshow booth needed.. who will man the booth at what events? Hand outs, recognizable uniform for attendant, decals, buttons, magnets, maps etc to distribute.. Who is the audience we will reach? |
| Coming up: | Ken Burns special in September National Geographic Geotourism MapGuide in January 2010 |
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