Eureka Springs City Advertising and Promotion Commission held a regular monthly meeting Wednesday night with special presentations by contracted agencies, Paradise Advertising & Marketing, and Right Mind. Both companies presented from onstage in the Auditorium with large visual signage featuring Eureka’s new logo on a variety of banners.
The logo simply says, “Eureka Springs, Arkansas” inside a square. Paradise is running two campaigns for the city in 2020; the spring/summer from Feb. 24 to June 28, and the fall from Sept. 14 to Nov. 8.
Target markets are Dallas/Fort Worth, Kansas City, Oklahoma City, Tulsa, St. Louis and Little Rock. Cities which compete with Eureka Springs for in-state tourism were identified as Hot Springs primarily, with Bentonville/Rogers and Fayetteville also a factor. Out-of-state cities are Memphis, Tulsa and Springfield.
The primary target demographic is adults ages 25 – 64 with a household income of $75,000 or more. Specialty targets are millennials, seniors, and weddings. Interest Targeting includes food/culinary, shopping, nature/outdoor, and soft adventure.
The marketing plan includes utilizing Google ads, Facebook and Instagram in-feed ads, Adara, TripAdvisor, Spotify and Hulu to target the millennial constituency, television commercials, radio advertising, E-newsletters, the website experience, digital billboard ads on major interstates and high profile roadways, Weddingwire.com, Pinterest, with magazine advertising in Southern Living, RoadRunner and Bike.
KSHB-TV (NBC) will be running a television ad during Jeopardy, the Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon, and the Today Show for periods during the campaigns which are expected to make over 1.3 million impressions. These collective efforts are timed in a way that the viewer will see the ads in their everyday lives to elicit plans for a getaway to Eureka Springs.
Paradise described that each element of the marketing plan is designed to work together synergistically to grow tourism for Eureka Springs.
Paradise primarily serves tourism destinations in Florida but serves two organizations in Arkansas; Little Rock and Eureka Springs. After the presentations there was a positive response from commissioners noting Terry McClung’s statement, “I’m tickled to death-I think it’s going to be a good relationship – I’m looking forward to it. It’s a way we haven’t gone in a long time, but I think they [Paradise] are fresh and new and committed, and I think it’s going to be ok… it’s going to be a great year all the way around.”
Tourism Director Lacey Ekberg procured the services of Paradise to create and enact much of her 40-page 2020 Marketing Plan while she had an office in Eureka Springs from August 2019 to February 2020.
Collections are also up
Finance Director Rick Bright provided the January financial report showing a strong cash position with $673,209 in checking/savings, the tourism taxes remitted from restaurants was up by 16.2 percent, hotels were up 57.5 percent, motels up 90.4 percent, and the B&B up .2 percent.
Overall January tax collections totaled $86,341 which is a 28.3 percent or $19,036 gain compared to the same month in 2019. Following a profitable January, commissioner James DeVito said that from his experience at his downtown restaurant the month of February will prove to show growth compared to last year as the Valentine’s weekend showed favorable tourist turnouts.
The next meeting is a workshop scheduled for Wednesday, March 11 at 4 p.m. and a regular meeting is scheduled for Wednesday, March 25 at 6 p.m. in the Auditorium