Best Travel Email Message Campaign

Grand Junction is a popular getaway for Colorado residents as well as a charming discovery for out-of-state travelers. The destination has strong repeat visitation, with 77.4% of visitors having been to Grand Junction one or more times before. The Grand Junction eZine program was created to keep the destination top-of-mind with loyal visitors and encourage new travelers to discover the market. The “eZine” program is a regular email newsletter delivered to a list of recipients who have opted-in to receive more information about Grand Junction. This database consists of an average of 11,500 travelers. Thirteen eZines were deployed in 2007 and 2008 to date and have exceeded our benchmark goals. 98.5% deliverability was obtained. Average open rate was 24.4%, with a high of 32% and a low of 19.9%. - exceeding our benchmark of 15%. The average click through was 5.2%,slightly above the 3 - 5%.goal. Unsubscribes were only 0.1%. The design of the eZine was reconsidered in early 2008 based on the response rates and traffic patterns of the 2007 deployments. A more attractive layout was created that reflected the newly redesigned Grand Junction website. The impact on open rate and click throughs was tremendous. Prior to the redesign, the average open rate was a respectable 4.7%. After redesign it rose to 7.2% Click throughs on opens averaged 17.4% before redesign. The new design delivered an incredible 33.2% average. In addition, the visitor sessions to VisitGrandJunction.com increased an average of 50.3% each time an eZine was deployed.

Contributors:

Creative Director:	Elena Prostova
Art Director:	Marianne Sibille
Developer:	Susan Harper
Editor:	Steven Keith
Publisher:	Karin Mast

MILES MEDIA

Location: USA