Council was recently presented with a report on last year's marketing campaign called Explore Sundre.
During the March 7 meeting, administrator Dave Dubauskas said he was impressed with economic development officer Jonathan Allan's efforts to promote the community.
"He took what money he had and he doubled it. He worked with stakeholders, he did a very good marketing campaign, and he's collected data to see how it went," said Dubauskas, opening the floor to Allan.
Starting his presentation with some background on the 2015 marketing campaign, Allan told council about $22,000 that had been budgeted specifically to promote Sundre was combined with contributions from several local businesses that added several thousand dollars to the total amount available for advertising.
"The 2015 Explore Sundre marketing campaign pulled the resources of at least four private partners to help be eligible for a large cooperative grant from Travel Alberta," he said.
That grant more than doubled the total pool of money by adding shy of $29,000 for a campaign total of less than $60,000, "one of the largest campaigns in Sundre's history," he said, adding the focus was to get one message across.
"And that was, ëGo to our destination website and get all the information you need there.'"
There was a certain element of solidarity on the part of the businesses that got involved in the campaign, as they knew their names would not be featured on all the promotional material. However, they could see the value in directing as many people as possible to the campaign's website, www.exploresundre.com, which highlights the municipality's many amenities and businesses, he said.
The campaign lasted from about May until August last year. Ads featuring the Explore Sundre website ran in magazines, TV, radio, online as well as large posters on seven pillars at the Calgary International Airport. The printed material featured photos of the region with either the words "Visit", "Live", "Explore" or "Invest."
Although the advertising campaign was not the sole factor affecting results, Allan said, "it surely contributed."
Among the campaign's objectives was to attract a minimum of 4,000 unique views to the website. The web page had never before been marketed, and so as a brand new presence on the Internet, staff felt reaching as many as 4,000 individual hits would be lucky, he said.
"What we used was Google Analytics, and the actual end-of-campaign results were 7,261 unique users ó 81.5 per cent above the goal."
Additionally, there was a goal to reach 3,500 visitors at the Sundre and District Chamber of Commerce's Visitor Information Centre, which was an increase of about 500 over the 2014 total. The actual number of visitors in 2015 turned out to be a little more than 4,000, he said.
"Again, not all increases in these areas are going to be directly attributed to the campaign, but it helps."
The Snake Hill Slam and Sundre Pro Rodeo also saw their numbers increase in 2015 over 2014, he said.
Additionally, although Tall Timber RV Leisure Park more or less matched its goal in terms of number of campers, it was able to sell 17 lots ó almost double its goal of 10. While that might not necessarily be a direct result of the ad campaign, Allan said it was noteworthy and demonstrates that "Sundre is becoming more front of mind for people looking to invest."
Throughout the 2015 campaign, a survey was embedded into the website to conduct research on the interests and demographics of interested visitors to get additional value out of the campaign. Roughly two-thirds of respondents were female aged about 35-40 on average, and of all the activities mentioned, their biggest interests were camping and hiking, he said.
"So we found out that the number 1 thing that people are really most interested in when they think about Sundre is the camping and the hiking. It was an interesting bit of information when we think about advertising."
Looking ahead to this year's promotional campaign, Allan told council the grant had again been applied for and that staff would be pursuing a new sponsored online content marketing strategy with various travel blogs.
"We got to create a greater presence online."
The number of local business partners was also expanded, he said, adding this year's campaign would begin sooner starting with online advertising in April.
Coun. Chris Vardas said the campaign had provided great advertising for the town.
"I don't think Sundre's ever been so promoted as it is now, and I appreciate that. Especially with the economic times that we have, now's the time to really push it because people from the city are coming out to this area instead of going to the Bahamas or wherever," he said.
Coun. Myron Thompson recollected a time when the Red Deer River had more users and even a boat race decades ago, but that slowly over a period of time, the river had deteriorated to the point that hosting such events was no longer feasible.
"You don't see the kayakers and the canoers in the river like you used to see them," he said.
Parts of other rivers like the Bow have been cleaned out by the province and reopened, and the councillor wondered whether a proposal to improve the Red Deer River could be presented to the government.
"I'd love to see more utilization of the river, as long as, of course, we don't start polluting it," said Allan, adding that lobbying the government would be a good place to start.
"I'd put my name behind that, 100 per cent."
Since the meeting, the grant for this year's campaign has been approved, again bringing the total funding up to about $60,000, Allan told the Round Up.
