HomeMy WebLinkAboutVLMD March 2013 FINALVail Local Marketing District Advisory Council
Thursday, March 21, 2013
The Antlers
Caribou/Pronghorn Room
8:30-10:30 AM
VLMDAC Members Present: Laurie Mullen (West Vail Liquor Mart); Susie Tjossem (Vail
Town Council); Mia Vlaar (East West Resorts); Jamie Gunion (Vail Recreation District);
Skip Thurnauer; Beth Slifer, Chair (Slifer Designs); John Dawsey, Treasurer (CME); Davy
Ratchford(Vail Resorts)
Also Present: Kelli McDonald (Town of Vail); Sybill Navas (CSE); Clare Hefferen (Town of
Vail); Jill Lammers (Vail Valley Partnership); Chris Romer (Vail Valley Partnership); Sandra
Perrig-Holst (Vail Valley Partnership); Meggen Kirkham (SITE Marketing); Kristin Yantis
(MYPR); Adam Sutner (MKT Vail); Bobby Bank (CSE); Jenn Bruno (CSE); Derek Schmidt
(Wren); Steve Wodlinger (TV8); Satchele Burns (Videographer); Rob LeVine (Antlers);
Lianna Moore (Antlers); Garrett Smith(Booyah!); Alex Rawall(Booyah!); Josh Culver
(Booyah!)
I. February 2013 Monthly Financial Report- Kathleen Halloran
a) $100,000 supplemental request to VLMD on April 16.
b) This will leave a 35% fund balance for 2013.
II. Approval of February 21, 2013 Meeting Minutes
a) Motion to approve/Skip Thurnauer. Seconded/John Dawsey. Passed
unanimously.
III. Brand Positioning/Framework/Rollout Strategy- MKT Vail
a) Current Vail Brand Positioning- See slide.
b) Adam- It’s important to rally the community around this message. We should
run ads on TV8 to get the message in front of the community. It could be a
poster, an ad in the Vail Daily or a TV campaign.
c) Davy- Is the hope that the Mountain adopt this positioning in a similar way?
d) Adam- No, not necessarily. Our hope is that the town, mountain and
everything in between have a sense of a shared identity. For 2014, it’s the
same statement, but we’ve added the word ‘discovery’ in order to integrate
the whole sense of where Epic Discovery is going to go.
e) Beth- I think the first paragraph Adam stated is the reason that we live here.
That is the message.
f) Kelli- There were visitors here from Truckee and their comment on Vail was
that everyone here was so happy.
g) Mia- Our competitors are envious of our vision, our leadership and passion.
h) Adam-We could easily do an internal campaign, to go back to John’s point.
i) New Vail Brand Framework- ‘Life at Its Best.’ See slide.
j) New Positioning Analysis- See slide.
1. These are notions we can put back in the Burke brand research to see
how it is doing.
k) Recommendation- See slide. We are using 2015 as a sort of milestone.
l) How to bring it to life- See slide.
1. The 2013 Sustaining Plan remains unchanged.
2. We are looking to gently infuse the health and well-being message into
this.
3. Principally, we want to support it with video. Our goal is to create a brand
video that supports the brand positioning statement. We would support
it with companion videos and tie them to a wider video distribution
strategy.
m) Brand Funnel Strategy- See slide.
1. New positioning communicates against this objective. The goal is to
increase Vail’s Awareness from 89% to 96%.
n) 2013 Plan Summary of Goals- See slide.
o) Roll-out strategy – See slide.
2. We have creative development in progress. We will look at in print,
digital, and a variety of different ideas.
p) Adam- Here is an example of an early execution of the messaging. We will
run this ad in the programs for the Vail Film Festival and Taste of Vail.
1. Davy- Being new here, I am not sure where the separation comes from
between the mountain and town. I look at this ad and it says the
mountain.
2. Beth- This is a very aspirational ad. However, we are trying to require
partners to get everything in front of us before it goes to print. We need
to see everything before it goes to print. Even when there are tight
deadlines, it still needs to be approved. It’s not the content or quality of
this ad, it’s about following the appropriate process, which was not done
this time.
q) Brand Territory Exploration Map- See slide.
r) Red Bull brand video example.
1. Satchele- You are watching an ad, but it’s an ad with very moving content.
It demonstrates a blurred line between content and commerciality, which
is why the Red Bull model works.
s) Next steps and deliverables- See slide.
1. Number 6 is important because we are trying to understand the target
audience.
IV. Front Range Media Update- SITE.
a) As far as expectations, it is very similar to last year. It is all included in our
budget. See slide.
b) Kelli- Since we have the new Memorial Day event, could we start earlier in
the Denver Post?
c) TV Media Overview- See slide.
1. For the TV8 campaign, it’s the whole notion of targeting our local
stakeholders.
2. Davy- Is this the ad- ‘Life at its best?’ Do we need to give you our
support? We owe you overall concept approval.
d) Adam- To Meggen’s point, sometimes the deadlines fall outside of our
meeting schedule.
e) Susie- Going forward for next year, do we need to push these developments
earlier so they are ready to go around March?
f) Laurie- There are partners who need to know things earlier. So, maybe
starting this whole process earlier is a good idea.
g) Beth- It seems as if the Red Bull video and the print ad are the two things
that need to be talked about right now.
h) Adam- Our goal is to depict this new mission statement with compelling
images and music.
i) Beth- I don’t know if it’s possible or desirable to highlight some of the
leadership aspects of Vail also.
j) Skip- The Red Bull video really changed my vision of the brand.
k) Beth- We want to change people’s vision of Vail.
l) Satchele- I am very encouraged about what you all have just said. It is in line
with what Meggen, Adam and I have been talking about.
m) Davy- In the print ad, I would take the top line out.
n) John- I would let the consumer fill in the top line and figure it out for
themselves.
o) Davy- Look at the Discover Ireland campaign. It looks very similar to this.
p) Adam- We are not claiming to be the first to look at this territory, we are
claiming to be the best.
q) Adam will try various options and bring them back to the group. He agrees
there is not a need for a headline in the print ad.
r) Laurie- The Red Bull videos show experiences and aspirations that everyone
can relate to.
V. Mexico Update-All.
a) Meggen- We have evolved our thinking since the last meeting. We’ve had
several meetings since then. We are making a commitment this year to vastly
improve the website.
b) Mexico marketing and Events- See slide.
c) Golf tournament-
1. We are probably going to have more than the 50 people we originally
thought.
d) For the Mexico website, the url will stay the same www.destinovail.com. It
will still be housed in vail.com. MYPR’s partner (VOX PR) will be taking over
the managing of the content to hopefully make it much more dynamic.
VI. Digital Update-Booyah.
a) SEO- See slide. The biggest thing to work on is leveraging Twitter, You Tube
and Facebook.
b) Davy- The active engagement on Facebook for Vail mountain is great. The
biggest challenge is the engagement of the international clientele with social
media.
c) Garrett- There are Bing RAIS available (rich ads in search).
d) Alex- Media Target Strategy- See slide.
2. We want to look at the people in-state and out-of-state a little differently,
especially in regards to when people book their trip.
3. Digital Paid Media Strategy- We try to focus on site retargeting.
e) Paid Media Flowchart- See slide.
f) Yelp is one of the highest recommendation engines for travel options.
g) Davy- It’s hard to have a call to action on Yelp.
h) Alex- If those partners aren’t performing during those testing periods, then
we will look at changing something and possibly using new partners.
i) Incremental video plan- See slide.
VII. PR Update- MYPR.
a) Last month we talked about LA. As we researched, we realized the cost was
going to be about $15,000-20,000. So, we decided to scale it down a bit. Liz
Biebl, from Vail Resorts, is going to partner with us.
VIII. Air Program Update-MYPR.
a) For the Air Alliance, there are very few travel media in the Houston market.
b) Kristin is doing some pro-bono work for the alliance.
c) Mia- What are we doing to be sure the Houston market is aware of this
flight?
d) Kristin- We have not had a meeting with the integrative partners. We need to
have a strategic meeting to figure out what we are going to do in the
Houston market.
e) Adam- The best approach is to work with United because they know their
market. A highly targeted approach is the way to go.
f) Beth- So, how much money should we spend on PR for this?
g) Kristin- We might have it in our budget to partner with the VVP and host a
media luncheon.
h) Susie- Does CME have a database for all the Houston clients that come here?
i) John- We are reaching out to them.
IX. Incremental Budget Recommendations.
a) Branding- We are asking for more money to get this new brand positioning
up and running.
b) Alex- With additional funds, we would be able to do more things like take
over home pages, etc. The plan we have proposed will do a lot with little
money.
c) Meggen- The $40,000 will just be for the main video.
d) Adam- We will make the $40,000 go as far as we can.
e) Kelli- The council will need metrics for these numbers and will want to know
the ROI.
f) Skip- We need to be opportunistic and get this out there now.
g) Davy- The video is going to have to evolve. Are we going to have to do this all
over next year?
h) Satchele- The framework is sustainable, but the images will evolve.
Motion to approve $100,000 budget allocation as proposed/Mia Vlaar. Seconded/
Davy Ratchford. Passed unanimously.
X. Other Business
a) Discussion of moving next VLMD meeting.
b) Adam- We can have a pre-meeting with a sub-committee getting together to
look at everything before the next VLMD meeting.
c) The next VLMD meeting changed to Friday April 19th. But we will wait to hear
from Beth about finalizing that day.
d) The sub-committee meeting will take place on April 12th from 2:30 to 4:30pm
(place TBD).
XI. Adjournment
a) Motion to adjourn/Laurie Mullen. Seconded John Dawsey.
XII. Upcoming meetings
a) Town Council, April 2, Time TBD, Council Chambers
b) VEAC, April 9, 8:00-10:00am, The Antlers
c) VLMDAC, April 19, 8:30-11:00am, The Antlers