Our convention and visitor industry changes with the seasons. In winter we feature the many visitor offerings from our indoor venues. These include the arts, educational, entertainment and sports sectors. In the summer, these venues change their showcases or exhibits and add outdoor performances too. The sports change over from indoor to outdoor, from basketball and hockey to baseball, soccer and golf.

There is always something new. Like the Wild Minds exhibit at Science Central

In the summer our top attractions, the Fort Wayne Children’s Zoo and TinCaps Baseball, open. Headwaters Park has a new and different festival every weekend from late May through September. Other venues open their doors as well, such as IPFW’s RiverFest, Jefferson Pointe’s Friday Nites Live, and DID’s many downtown events.

The Botanical Conservatory changes their showcase seasonally, as does the Museum of Art. The Embassy Theatre and Memorial Coliseum offer something new every week!

Visit Fort Wayne invests a considerable amount of time, talent and treasure to keep up with all these changes. We promote “What’s New” to potential visitors through our Calendar of Events at www.visitfortwayne.com/events. It gets updated every day. Our Visitor Center has two, sometimes three, staff who answer hundreds of questions, emails and phone calls each day. Our Marketing Manager does a dozen phone calls a week with radio stations in the region to tell their listeners  “What’s new and going on this weekend in Fort Wayne.” Finally, we send an e-newsletter monthly to over 20,000 subscribers, populate social media outlets like Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and Instagram daily, and communicate with our visitors constantly – always sharing “what’s new!”

So, what’s new? Check our website. There is something new every day. Or just call me if you have an hour.

How does your CVB know if its advertising is working? Through detailed performance measurements - the process of collecting, analyzing and/or reporting information regarding the actions of our staff, organization and systems. I like to say that we know how we’re doing, because we can measure our performance “six ways to Sunday!”  We definitely have plenty of methods in place to determine how our advertising, sales, and promotions are working to attract visitors.

Let me first expand the term ‘advertising” to include sales, marketing, communications, and personal service, because all of these bureau activities advertise Fort Wayne as a destination.

A CVB’s performance measurements can be put into two categories – the measuring of our activities (inputs) and the measuring of the results of those activities (the outcomes or results).  Here are some of the inputs we track:

• Conventions – # accounts contacted; # leads sent; # groups booked; # rooms sold; economic impact
• Sports Groups – same as above, plus # teams; # spectators; prestige of event too
• Marketing – # website hits; # unique visitors; # ad responses; # travel articles; # e-news subscribers
• Social Media – # blogs read; # Facebook friends; # Tweets; # blogs written; amount of ‘buzz’
• Communications – # news releases; # stories about Fort Wayne; # e-newsletters read by partners
• Visitors Center – # inquiries; # walk-ins served; # groups served; # brochures distributed
• Special Projects – # ads sold in Visitors Guide; # front line staff trained; # members we help
• Administration – These performance measurements are more qualitative than quantitative.  Are we promoting more but better?  Is our CVB fiscally sound?  What can we do to make Fort Wayne a better destination?  Are we serving our members and community?  What’s working, what’s not?

Some of our performance measurements are reported each month to our Board of Directors through staff reports. They are also compared annually with the prior year’s results. We set new goals each year, usually to be even more effective marketers and advertisers. We know which half is working (for you), because we can measure it “six ways to Sunday.”

If you would like to learn more on how your CVB does what it does, read our “Report to the Community” -
http://www.fortwaynecvb.com/documents/CommunityReport10vfnl.pdf

You might ask how or why, but  if you are one of the thousands of meeting planners who book some 37.5 million room nights associated with conventions, meetings and trade shows every year, you already know how valuable a CVB can be.

CVBs offer a lot of value to meeting planners choosing a destination

Here are a few basics to know about any CVB when it comes to meetings and conventions (and sports tournaments too.)

C.V.B. is an acronym for convention & visitors bureau.  Now days, the term DMO is substituted for CVB which means ‘destination marketing organization’.  Over 2,500 DMOs exist world wide. Most are not-for-profit organizations, and most of their missions are the same – to promote their destination for convention and tourism development through marketing and sales. They also must provide services to both group and leisure visitors.  They re experts on their destination in every way.

New names, same great purpose. Every CVB is a DMO, but not every DMO is a convention & visitors bureau. Some destinations have no meeting facilities and consequently market to attract leisure travelers only.  Many CVBs are also changing their names to Visit…”this or that”.  We changed our name to Visit Fort Wayne to coincide with our mission, and to clearly state our purpose and differentiate us from the convention center or the FBI for that matter!

CVBs are the marketing arm and sales force for their destination.  They are responsible for increasing awareness and image in the mind of meeting planners that makes their destination desirable.  CVBs also organize local businesses into a destination sales force, by coordinating sales missions, trade shows, campaigns, site tours, e-newsletters and other promotional material.

Effective CVBs also have a dedicated sales team. They work with the convention center or exhibition hall staffs, not for them, because CVBs don’t ‘book’ business, but find new business. Finally, CVBs often, but not exclusively, focus on multi-hotel, larger sized groups. Why?  To garner the greatest economic impact for sure.  But more often its because nobody else is or can.  Hotel staff don’t book 10,000 person conventions because the meeting planner has a myriad of questions and needs that go beyond the rooms.  That is why the CVB is best first contact.

CVBs  have comprehensive destination knowledge. CVBs are uniquely qualified to be the best first contact for any meeting or event planner because the CVBs’ staff’s comprehensive knowledge of their destination saves planners time. The CVBs past planning expertise is extremely helpful to the planner making decisions for their group. And the many complimentary services of the CVB save them money too.

Visit Fort Wayne is the best first contact to learn about Fort Wayne/Allen County.  If you don’t believe me, just ask the meeting planners for Gold Wing Road Riders, or National Fishing Lure Collectors, or Indiana Music Educators.  They will tell you, “We had no idea what a great city Fort Wayne was, until we met the CVB.  They made us look good for picking Fort Wayne!”

We are excited about 2013. Forecasters like the U.S. Travel Association and Destination Marketing Association International, who monitor travel trends for the meetings and tourism industries, say that the hospitality industry has shown strength through the recession years, and predict that 2013 will be a good year. Other industry research firms like Smith Travel Research and Price Waterhouse are also optimistic. Their research shows travel will increase by 4-6% in 2013.

Based on this outlook, and the success of our efforts in 2012, we asked our Board of Directors to allocate more funding to market and promote Fort Wayne next year, and they agreed.

We added a Marketing Manager for the Group Sales Department, John Felts, who will be focused solely on the meetings & conventions market. He is currently developing an extensive marketing strategy for this important industry for Fort Wayne. He plans to re-design the meetings section of our website and produce a bi-monthly e-newsletter to our database of meeting planners. He will also utilize the industry research tool Empowermint, a nationaldatabase of over 100,000 meetings, to help to find new prospects.  We will also be attending an additional trade show in Chicago just for convention planners in the Midwest.

Other new programs include producing a helpful Meeting Planner Tool Kit, which will assist potential planners with any event.  In addition, we are working with Mayor Henry, who is encouraging local clubs and chapters to bring their conventions to Fort Wayne through our Presidents’ Day reception.

In addition, we will be working with the City to complete a comprehensive study of sports to determine: “What more can we do to attract youth sports?  What might build to make us a better destination for sports?  What’s the next Parkview Field or Spiece Fieldhouse?”

We are also expanding our leisure marketing.  We are increasing our summer marketing budget to include more ads in Indy. We are adding more videos and deals to our website.  We are attending the Heartland Showcase, a trade show just for bus tour planners and motorcoach tour companies.  And we are starting new promotions for golf, biking and glass tours as well.

Finally, we spent a lot of time studying and advising the City last year on things like youth sports, how to improve our gateways, and the need for better directional signs. In 2013, watch for major improvements to our city’s gateways and entrances and downtown railroad overpasses, plus new welcome and directional signs to greet city’s visitors and guests.

Learn more about our 2013 marketing plan by linking and reading our Report to the Community: http://issuu.com/visitfortwayne/docs/communityreport12?mode=window&backgroundColor=%23222222

We’re very excited about 2013, and I hope you are too.  It’s going to be fun!

We use a variety of methods to do this, including advertising in print, radio and television, web marketing, public relations, journalism, front-line information services (through our Visitors Center), and more. But one of our most significant efforts is through direct sales.

Our Group Sales staff does direct sales through their sales calls by phone, email, and in person. They also organize site visits and familiarization (FAM) tours of Fort Wayne to personally show planners around our city in hopes that their group will chose our destination for their convention or sporting event.

But where do we find these convention and tournament planners?

One of the best sales marketing strategies we employ is attending trade shows to promote Fort Wayne. These are the “marketplaces” where convention planners and sporting event organizers gather.

We set up our trade show booth (along with hundreds of other cities) to promote our assets, including the Grand Wayne Convention
Center, Memorial Coliseum Expo Center and Arena, our many sports venues, and our hotels.

We travel to a dozen different cities to attend these industry trade shows. In 2013 we will travel to and exhibit at:

• Religious Conference Managers Association, (RCMA) in Minneapolis, MN in January

• Heartland Bus Tour Operators Trade Show in Columbus, OH in February

• National Association of Sports Commissions (NASC) in Louisville, KY in April

• Destination Showcase by DMAI in Chicago, IL in May

• The Travel Media Marketplace by Indiana Tourism office in Indianapolis, IN in May

• Indiana Society of Association Executives in Bloomington, IN in July

• Connect by Sports Travel Magazine in Milwaukee, WI in August

• Media Marketplace in Chicago in September

Today’s trade show is not a bunch of people standing around handing out novelties and brochures. No way.

Today’s trade shows still have booth displays, but they also have prearranged appointments matching vendors with clients for interviews. Sort of like speed dating. You get 8 minutes to impress them, garner their interest and establish a relationship. A sales manager has to do their homework before the appointment. They need to research the association, know their culture and know their client’s needs all before the appointment. Only then can they be prepared to work at the trade show.

We also produce coordinated marketing at trade shows. Visit Fort Wayne often conducts a pre-show mailings to attendees, and organizes the booth’s door prize like DeBrand chocolates or Vera Bradley merchandise. We also involve our local industry partners like the Grand Wayne Center, Memorial Coliseum and area hotels. They share costs, help underwrite receptions, and assist in marketing efforts. The more sales people working appointments, the more face time Fort Wayne gets, and the more chances we all have to attract new business and new visitors – ultimately accomplishing our mission.

Promoting Fort Wayne and attracting visitors so their spending sustains jobs and grows our economy is sometimes accomplished one person at a time. We find that one person (who then brings hundreds more with them) at trade shows.

I actually like this time of year. I like the comparison process: analyzing what worked and what didn’t. By going through the whole process, we accomplish one of our organization’s primary goals – to operate an effective and efficient convention and visitors bureau – for you, our industry partners.

Here’s how we do it. We first look at this year’s results. How many conventions have we booked? What trade shows worked well for us? Which didn’t? Is our advertising working? We try to look backward before we look forward, to be our own harshest critic.

We then conduct more research. We conduct a conversion study by taking a sample size from each inquiry source – emails, ad responses, walk-ins and website contacts. We ask our customers “Did you visit Fort Wayne?”  “Did our ads or brochures motivate you to make that decision?” We also ask some spending and “likes” questions too. This market research helps us make better choices next year.

We then have each department conduct a program-by-program analysis.  They compile this year’s results, look at their costs, and ask again, “What’s working?”  Their final step is to choose what changes are needed in their programs and gather expense forecasts to match the programs to put in the budget.

The Administrative staff spends time analyzing industry trends and revenues. We look at what Smith Travel Research is saying about hotel sales next year and what PriceWaterhouse and US Travel are saying about meetings and leisure travel. What is the local economy doing? What is already on the books for conventions, tournaments and trade shows? Where do our opportunities lie? Where are our challenges?  All this data enables us to make good, solid forecasts about how the local market will perform, and how we will perform, so we can accurately forecast of what budget we should have next year for our bureau.

At this point, we’re about half done. Another step in the process is to conduct staff performance reviews. These take several weeks. It’s an important step in the whole process. The staff needs feedback and input on their performance over the past year. It not only helps measure productivity, but motivates staff and matches their efforts with our goals.

After all the comparisons and analysis, we pull it all together. We match programs and numbers and set new goals and new budget numbers to next year’s marketing plan and corresponding budget.

We’re not done yet. We then present our 2013 Marketing Plan and Budget to the Board of Directors’ Executive Committee in late October. They review our rational for revenues. They look over every expense line item. They ask a lot of questions to insure that we are performing for you, our community and industry partners that support us. They make changes and then the final marketing plan and budget go public.

The final step is for the Board Chair, Treasurer and I to present the marketing plan and budget for our full Board of Directors to approve in November. In December, we present it again to the Capital Improvement Board (CIB). Later in December we appear with the CIB to present both our budgets to both the City and County Councils for their review and approval. Whew!

All in all, it takes about four months to compile, analyze, compare, prepare, present and approve next year’s marketing plan and budget. But it’s all worth it. By taking the time to evaluate our organization’s effectiveness, by reevaluating the rational and reasons why we do the things, and watching all our costs, it insures you our industry partners that we are being good stewards of funds entrusted to us by both our public and private industry partners.

Let’s start at the beginning. When a guest visits Fort Wayne and stays in a hotel, motel or bed and breakfast, they pay the hotel for the use of their guest room. In addition to the room rate, they pay 7% Indiana State Sales Tax, and another 7% for the Allen County Innkeeper’s Tax. (Which is kind of a misnomer. The innkeeper doesn’t actually pay the tax, his guest does, and the innkeeper collects it on behalf of the State and County).

The hotel remits both the State Sales Tax and Innkeeper’s Tax to the State Treasurer each month, who then returns the Innkeeper’s portion to the Allen County Treasurer, who then forwards it to the Allen County Capital Improvement Board (formerly the Convention & Tourism Authority), which is the Grand Wayne Center’s governing board. It takes about 60-90 days for whole process to go from the guest, to the hotel, to the State, and back to Allen County.

By State law, the Allen County Innkeeper’s Tax is restricted “for the promotion and development of convention and tourism activities.” Our civic leaders in the 1960’s, along with several other cities in Indiana (Indy, South Bend, Evansville), used the Innkeeper’s Tax to build and operate their convention centers.  In Fort Wayne, the tax fund was used to build and operate the Grand Wayne Center. This has proven to be a very successful, effective economic development strategy to attract conventions, anchor downtowns, generate visitors and serve the community as both a business and civic gathering space.

Are you still with me?  I’m about to answer the question, “How are you funded?”

With conventions and tourism growing in importance in Fort Wayne, (at more than just the Grand Wayne Center), civic leaders saw the opportunity to attract even more visitors by promoting other strengths in our community – like the Memorial Coliseum, our great family attractions and museums, festivals, arts offerings, and more.

So in the 1990’s, the Innkeeper’s Tax was increased from 5% to 7% with the new tax funds being directed to our CVB. Our CVB budget grew from the 12th in Indiana to 3rd (behind Indy & Elkhart.) As of 2012, our budget ranks 8th in the state as other communities have increased their own innkeepers taxes. (Carmel/Fishers area, Hendrix County, some casino counties>)

The Innkeeper’s Tax comprises about 85% of our funding. Another 15% of revenues come from advertising, project income, merchandise sales and sometimes state or local grants.  Our annual budget is $1.3 million.  It’s distributed with 48% for Personnel (10 staff), 36% for Advertising and Promotions, and 16% for Admin/Operations, which is right within industry norms of CVBs our size.

We do a lot of good with the funds we are given annually by both public entities and our industry partners.  Rest assured, every dollar we get is put to accomplishing our primary mission – to attract more visitors either in groups or as indivituals.  And if visitors stay in a hotel, we get our 2 cents worth in the end, and our tourism industry partners, city, county and community get the lion’s share.  And that’s how it should be.

Over the past two months we’ve hosted three large conventions that brought over 10,000 visitors to our city. The Indiana Democratic Convention (First time out of Indy in 50 years), the Gold Wing Road Riders’ Wing Ding 34 (Their third trip to Fort Wayne) and the National Fishing Lure Collectors Show (First time in our community) all gave our city high praise and high marks for hosting their groups.

“Best run, most fun convention we’ve had in years” said one of the 2,000 delegates to the State Democratic convention.

“We love coming to Fort Wayne. The people are so friendly and the city really rolls out the red carpet for us everyone time!” said one of 7,500 visitors attending GWRRA’s Wing Ding.

“Wow! We had no idea how nice downtown Fort Wayne was for our show. We’ll be back!” said a fishing lure collector.

I’ve got a hundred or so of these to share. And only one or two suggestions for improvement. It’s encouraging!

Getting a group to choose Fort Wayne for their convention is our primary mission. It’s not easy. It takes a team of individuals from facilities, hotels and citizens – usually led or coordinated by our Visit Fort Wayne staff to submit competitive, enticing bids. However, being chosen is only half the assignment. It’s also our job to help the convention planner(s) produce their event so it is 1) efficient; 2) financially successful; 3) memorable; and 4) beneficial to the city too.

At Visit Fort Wayne, we know that if we treat visitors with the respect, attention and the over-the-top hospitality they deserve, we will not only get the convention to return, but our citizens will enjoy hosting them. It’s a win-win situation if a community embraces hosting conventions with zeal….and we do.

So congratulations Fort Wayne! In the final analysis, ‘you’ sold the convention on Fort Wayne. We just tee it up for you.

They will also be staying at virtually every hotel in the NE Indiana region, every campground and in hundreds of our city’s restaurants.  Bike rides and tours to DeBrand’s, A-C-D Museum, downtown museums and Shipshewana are also slated.

It takes a huge, collaborative effort by your staff at Visit Fort Wayne to bid, organize and host Wing Ding.  It takes a collaboration between the County, City, Memorial Coliseum and Visit Fort Wayne to put up the financial package to beat out competitors like Madison, WI and Louisville, KY to land this big convention.  And if we as a bureau, a building and a community plan and perform well, like we’ve done in 2002 and 2005, we should get them to return again.

This is a great convention to get for other than economic impact reasons.  It’s good for the Coliseum, that normally is empty in July.  It’s good for our restaurants whose sales are low in July due to people preferring backyard barbeques and festivals.  Its good for our residents to enjoy the beautiful bikes and to take pride in that our city is popular with these guests.  I want to thank our hard working staff, the Local Organizing Committee  and the Board for supporting us to host Wing Ding.

So let’s put on a good show next week.  Let’s show them our famous Hoosier Hospitality.  Let’s demonstrate once again that Fort Wayne is a great destination.  And earn the privilege and praise of Wing Ding returning yet again to Fort Wayne in the future.

Sincerely,

Dan O’Connell, President/CEO

I invite you to explore this website to learn more about Visit Fort Wayne.  As your official convention and visitors bureau, it conveys all that we do to attract visitors and promote our destination so we can grow our economy through tourism.

Explore the site.  See how our professional staff is using the latest techniques and technologies to attract visitors  These include our Board of Directors working on our strategic plan for destination development.  Our staff using direct sales, mass marketing, advertising campaigns, group services, multiple websites, plus lots of social media to promote our city/county.  It contains research studies, examples, resources and specifics to help you too in your business or organization.

Visit Fort Wayne’s goal is grow our economy through convention & tourism.  Having our members, elected officials and both the business and not-for-profit communities more informed and engaged with us will enable all of us to achieve our common goal -  to make Fort Wayne & Allen County a better destination – to live, work and visit.

Sincerely,

Dan O’Connell, President/CEO