Creative Innisfail and area tourism initiatives will be unveiled starting this summer based on an enthusiastic response to a recent Travel Alberta seminar.
The Innisfail Tourism Region group held a one-day Explore Quotient seminar hosted by Lisa Lima, Travel Alberta industry relations consultant, on Feb. 26 at the Library/Learning Centre that was attended by more than 20 citizens.
Representatives of local businesses such as the Innisfail Golf Club, Discovery Wildlife Park, the Danish Canadian National Museum & Gardens, Medicine River Wildlife Centre, Innisfail Econo Lodge, Edgar Farms, Innisfail and District Historical Village, Rock 104.5, the Town of Innisfail, and the Innisfail and District Chamber of Commerce listened as co-hosts Helen Dietz, Innisfail chief administrative officer, and Surina Carloni, marketing and social media coordinator for the town, introduced Lima and Part 1 of the three-part series.
“Explore Quotient was developed especially for the Government of Canada,” said Lima. “Our market share in terms of tourism dropped from No. 2 in the world in the 1950s to No. 15 this last year. The Canadian Tourism Commission is now on the cutting edge of tourism research and this tool is a powerful way to design marketing strategies.”
Lima went on to present a series of concepts and exercises designed to take businesses through a customer profile, and what they look for when making travel decisions.
“Knowing what travellers and tourists look for will help any business or attraction fine-tune their marketing efforts,” said Lima. “The 80/20 rule will still apply, with 80 per cent of any sales coming from 20 per cent of your visitors but if you know more accurately what your visitors are looking for, that is powerful.”
Kari Morck, business and visitor service lead for the Danish Canadian National Museum & Gardens, was excited at the presentation.
“I am new to my position and as we are a small site we need to attract visitors to our attraction and we want to use Travel Alberta resources to optimize our business,” said Morck.
She added this seminar comes at a good time for them as they are just working on their marketing campaign for this next season.
Judy Boyd of the Medicine River Wildlife Centre came on a fact-finding mission as the centre is shut down until renovations to the facility are finished, but she was intrigued at the information presented.
“This was very interesting (for me) as we will be working on marketing next year when we reopen but the ideas and concepts presented will help us plan for 2015,” said Boyd. “Any new ideas will help us in our efforts.”
Dietz said the implementation of marketing efforts would draw tourists and visitors to the central hub of Innisfail and points west. “The whole region can be accessed through Innisfail and we want to try to capitalize on travel through the area for accommodations, food and tourism,” said Dietz.
She added the new Innisfail tourism brochure will soon be available and that it is only the first step in a larger strategy.
