The Connecticut Office of Tourism is embarking on an ambitious, multi ”” level plan to keep up the momentum it says it achieved last year.
And, as one of the few public agencies whose funds are being increased in Gov. Dannel Malloy”™s proposed budget, the organization is feeling pretty confident about where things are headed, according to Connecticut Office of Tourism Director Randy Fiveash.
The budget increase, from 2016”™s $6.4 million to a proposed $8.3 million this year, “shows the governor”™s commitment to tourism and his recognition of the fact that the tourism industry is a revenue producer,” Fiveash said. “We put money in the checkbook.”
It”™s certainly a far cry from the money tourism received in former Gov. Jodi Rell”™s last budget in 2011 ”” $0 ”” though still considerably less than the $15 million Malloy allocated in his first year in office and the $12 million the department received in 2014. Still, Fiveash pointed out, any increase is welcome, “especially in the current economic environment.”
According to the bureau”™s latest economic impact study, tourism contributed $14.7 billion to the state”™s bottom line in 2015, a 4.6 percent increase since the last study in 2013. In addition, tourism generated $1.7 billion in tax revenues, including $910 million in state and local taxes, in 2015.
Hotel tax revenues have grown 3.2 percent on a compound annual growth rate basis over the past four years to total $117.8 million in 2016. Although hotel occupancy last year was up 4 percent from 2013, it was flat when compared to 2015.
Fiveash said that 82,688 people are employed in jobs directly related to tourism. Fairfield County accounts for about 24 percent of them, edging out Hartford and New London counties each by a few hundred. Counting linen companies servicing hotels, food companies working events and other service providers, the total employment number related to tourism grows to 121,527 people.
The tourism director”™s remarks were made during an interview in the midst of the COT”™s annual series of tourism marketing outreach meetings, held April 3 through 6 in Hartford, Branford, Groton, Willington, Litchfield and wrapping up at the Westport Inn. Such meetings have become even more important in the wake of the state”™s defunding of its three regional tourism districts last summer. Fiveash said his department is increasingly looking to partner with city chambers of commerce and government councils to help drive business.
The outreach meetings are designed not just to tout what the COT has going on, he said, but to also alert municipalities, hotels and the like about partnership opportunities available to them. “We want to make sure none of our partners or businesses miss out on what we have in our arsenal,” he said.
Central to that effort is CTvisit.com, which was relaunched a year ago to allow those partners to manage their own free features page where they can post information about upcoming events, special deals and the like on a regularly updated basis.
As a result, visits to the site rose 64 percent from 2015”™s 2.6 million to 4.2 million last year; 49 percent of last year”™s traffic was driven by people clicking on a promotion they saw elsewhere for one of its web articles.
CTvisit.com added 1,966 tourism partners last year and recorded nearly 1.6 million partner page listing views. Views of partner page listings were up 168 percent last year.
The COT has also rebalanced its media mix to optimize its resources. For fiscal 2015, 31 percent of its media budget was allocated to television, 15 percent to outdoor advertising, 9 percent to print and 45 percent to digital. This fiscal year, the entire media budget is being devoted to digital.
Part of the reasoning behind that move is the office”™s social media activity: Facebook engagement, including likes, shares, comments and links, was up 130 percent last year, while Instagram engagement (likes and comments) was up 1,893 percent. Clicks to CTvisit.com from social channels increased by 1,010 percent.
The agency has also announced a $75,000 spring/summer co-op advertising program designed to help smaller tourism-related attractions, restaurants and hotels expand their marketing reach. The turnkey program, offered on a first ”” come, first ”” served basis, matches participants”™ media investment of a minimum of $5,000 for online advertising or outdoor billboards and up to $10,000 if they choose both. The COT will prepare the creative and place the media.
Asked whether those regional tourism bureau jobs might be coming back any time soon, Fiveash replied, “They”™re not in the governor”™s budget. It depends on whether or not legislators want to revisit that.”
Janet L. Serra, executive director of Western CT Convention and Visitors Bureau, said the three regional bureaus have had “very productive, ongoing talks” about their future with a number of legislators, though she declined to specify which lawmakers were sending those positive signals. “I don”™t think any of them would be willing to go out on that limb at this point,” she said.
Serra further noted that both visitfairfieldcountyct.com and litchfieldhills.com are still vibrant websites ”” together they receive about 40,000 hits per day, she said — as are the Central Regional Tourism District”™s centerofct.com and the Eastern District”™s mystic.org.
“The decision was made when we agreed to lay ourselves off that we would continue to service the small businesses that make up the majority of Connecticut”™s tourism industry,” Serra said. “They have come to depend upon the bureaus for a lot of their support.”
While applauding the state COT for all of its efforts ”” which include the annual Connecticut Governor”™s Conference on Tourism on May 4 at the Connecticut Convention Center in Hartford ”” Serra said, “There are many things the regional bureaus can do that the state can”™t, and in some ways shouldn”™t, do. They can do the big picture stuff, but we”™re the ones with our fingers on the pulse of what”™s happening on a regional and local basis.”
