With the start of the peak tourism season approaching, Anika Kimble-Huntley is eyeing the billions of dollars that potential visitors to Rhode Island could pump into the local economy in the coming months.
Kimble-Huntley has been R.I. Commerce Corp.’s chief marketing officer since September 2021, the person in charge of overseeing the strategies and campaigns to attract more visitors to
the Ocean State and open their wallets while they’re here.
Those dollars are vital. The tourism industry comprises 14% of the state’s total private sector employment. The year before the COVID-19 pandemic hit in 2019, traveler spending reached $4.7 billion, generating $843 million in state and local taxes.
Tourists searching for the New England summer experience have plenty to choose from. How can Rhode Island stand apart, market itself successfully and ensure long-term growth?
Kimble-Huntley’s department, which now has a staff of five and is seeking to add three more, works with two private companies to get the message out. The Florida-based Zimmerman Agency secured a $2.2 million contract for fiscal 2023 to assist with public relations, advertising, event execution and creative work. The Providence-based RDW Group has a $4 million deal to execute media buys.
Online engagement through multiple media channels has become paramount in destination marketing, leading to a “multiplier effect,” Kimble-Huntley said. “People don’t want to just see images or hear somebody talking. They want to hear a story.”
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BUSY SCHEDULE: Anika Kimble-Huntley, chief marketing officer at R.I. Commerce Corp., says a full events calendar – including a weeklong stopover of the Ocean Race in Newport in May – bodes well for the Rhode Island tourism industry this year.
PBN PHOTO/MICHAEL SALERNO[/caption]
People might question why the state needs to spend millions to hire outside agencies rather than do the marketing work in-house. Is this the most efficient way for R.I. Commerce to achieve its mission? We have a very small but mighty staff. But it is faster to have an agency partner to assist with the execution and the pushing out of messages because they have staffing that we don’t. But they have been worth every penny.
What about oversight? Do you vet these marketing campaigns before they’re released? There are specific marketing objectives that we share with [the private agencies]. We are very heavily involved in every marketing piece before it goes out. And we will also reach out to the tourism regions [there are six local tourism bureaus] to ask for their thoughts and if there is anything specific they want us to focus on. So, it’s a collaborative effort. A very methodical and thought-out process.
What are some new tourism opportunities that are being pursued heading into the 2023 tourism season? Where we have a big opportunity is heritage tourism. We haven’t gotten into that much, but that will be [a] focus moving forward. Rhode Island has had so many firsts in history. We have to talk about those firsts. A lot of people think that Boston started the Revolutionary War. They didn’t. They’ll say they did. So we have an opportunity there.
You’ve said you’d like to find more ways to involve the public in testing and formulating a new marketing campaign for the state. Where does that process stand? The idea is in progress [and will be] tested [through] an online survey. Our campaigns have had to be pretty fluid and change based on travel trends and what is happening [in the industry] in general. But I think that we are now at a point where we can go out with a tagline that everybody can rally behind. [Kimble-Huntley declined to share details of the campaign because a final decision has not been made on it.]
You’ve also spoken about wanting to create more user-generated content. How is this being carried out? One of the ways we’ve done that is through our social media marketing campaigns to get potential visitors who are on social media to engage with Rhode Island in a way that’s unique and different.
One campaign is our social media giveaways. We began by looking at how to get people excited to learn more about the state and participate. People always love a chance to win something. So we partnered with Discover Newport, the R.I. Film & Television Office, and the Preservation Society of Newport County to create a campaign based around the “Gilded Age” HBO [series].
We tried to figure out a way to continue that amplification in the marketplace and put together “Get Gilded.” Participants had a chance to win swag from the Newport mansions. As you entered the contest, we gave you different ways to multiply those entries [such as] sharing the giveaway with friends and family. And once that was done, we immediately went viral and eventually had representation from all 50 states, Canada and the U.K. There were over 40,000 unique entries.
You’ve highlighted a desire to create ethnic-specific marketing campaigns. Can you explain why you see opportunity there and which groups you are focused on?I don’t want to get too specific about which groups we are targeting because I don’t want to share too much of our proprietary marketing plans. But I will tell you we have already started targeting specific ethnicities through special publications, as well as ensuring our ads are diverse and inclusive. We are collaborating with [state tourism] bureaus and our agencies on a massive photo and video shoot of all of our assets in the state. We are really starving for new content. There is going to be a ton of lifestyle photoshoots where you see people with diverse backgrounds engaging on the beach, riding on horseback or walking through the Newport mansions, eating at restaurants or partaking in art at [the Rhode Island School of Design].
There are some groups out there where if you just show a little bit of love and show that you understand their culture and understand what they are about, they will be loyal. So, we are heading down that road in a very strategic way to introduce different people to the state.
Our goal is to drive incremental visitation. Any way we can identify additional revenue opportunities for the state, that is our job.
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Anika Kimble-Huntley/PBN PHOTO/MICHAEL SALERNO[/caption]
Sustainability has become an important buzzword in the tourism business. Is this a priority for you? We have dedicated $800,000 to a statewide strategic marketing program and included in that will be a sustainability plan and transportation study. We will be putting out requests for proposals this summer.
We are looking to bring together a statewide sustainability plan utilizing some of the best practices that some of our regional tourism bureaus have put in place. A great example is Block Island. Their maps are biodegradable. You can plant them, and they will become part of the soil.
Before taking the role at R.I. Commerce, you were a marketing executive at a hotel and casino in California. What is the biggest shift in strategy you’ve brought here from your experience in the private sector? Times have changed. Today it’s about [highlighting] what kind of experience you can provide for the person you are targeting. I’ve asked our agencies not to approach it strictly as tourism marketing, but as entertainment. Because that’s really what it is. One person’s entertainment experience could be art. Another could be history. For another person, that could be a relaxing day on the beach. That’s how you begin to build excitement. When you approach it as entertainment, it’s a completely different message. That’s one of the biggest strategic changes I’ve shared with the agencies. Showing the state in a different way.
How do you measure success against Rhode Island’s tourism competitors? On a quarterly basis, we have our agencies compile a competitive media report. This tells us who is spending what and where. It’s interesting because our New England counterparts are our partners and competitors at the same time. The states and cities spending the most in our regional drive market are actually New York and Orlando, Fla. They are spending millions on advertising. So those are our primary competitors.
We measure what our competitors are doing. And we are definitely looking at how they are spending their media [budgets] and who they are targeting.
The state seemingly has been flush with cash lately because of more than $1 billion in federal aid that was allocated at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. How much of that money has been set aside for tourism marketing and how is it being used? We were allocated $2 million as a part of [American Rescue Plan Act] funding for tourism and hospitality. With those funds, we were able to take $1 million and support air service to [Rhode Island T.F. Green International Airport] in [targeted] markets to get people to fly to Providence. We also used a portion of that money to provide $750,000 in grants to regional tourism leaders for advertising campaigns to help stimulate their regions locally.
The remaining funds went to a marketing campaign that encouraged Massachusetts and Rhode Island residents to “stay and play” in Rhode Island. Another portion was utilized in our regional drive market from Connecticut to Baltimore.
In addition, the General Assembly gave us $1.5 million as a destination tourism marketing match. These funds are allocated for FY23 and FY24, and the sole purpose is to continue to support air service marketing for [R.I. Airport Corp.].
And $10.6 million we received at the end of FY21 [from the U.S. Department of Commerce’s Economic Development Administration] doesn’t have to be expended until 2027. Three million of that will be dedicated to paid advertising. There will be grants to tourism regions. And another piece that we will utilize to keep our marketing message going.
We have a plan in place that will carry us through 2026 to use it strategically so that we don’t run out of money too quickly. I think it’s important for us to be able to sustain the marketing messages and this will help us do that.
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THEY’LL BE BACK: Crowds gather to support the teams competing in the Newport leg of the Ocean Race in May 2015. Organizers say more than 137,000 people visited the race village at Fort Adams that year and more than 100,000 visited when the race returned in 2018. The Ocean Race is coming back for a week in May, and tourism officials are expecting big crowds again.
COURTESY OCEAN RACE/MARC BOW[/caption]
What is your forecast for the coming tourism season? The past two years we were just trying to get back to 2019 levels. So, it has been a progression of growth. I do believe that people’s expectations that this would happen quickly were not backed [by the data], because it is such a big unknown.
But we’ve made a concerted effort to work with businesses on how they can create more events during our shoulder and off-seasons. We went to municipalities, nonprofits and the tourism regions and said if you come up with events, you can get a grant of up to $100,000.
Hotel occupancy is a big indicator of what visitation looks like in the state. In 2019, it was at 65% and then it just dropped 40% [during the pandemic] because no one was staying in hotels. In 2022, occupancy was 62%. So, we are getting there. And we have a strong events calendar statewide that will bring more people here.
All the WaterFire events, PVD Fest and the Gaspee Days celebrations. The Ocean Race is back [in May]. There is a ton of excitement around the Army-Navy game [in December]. We think it’s going to sell out Providence.
Our event calendar changes daily. So we find ourselves changing our marketing message based on some of these events. And that helps us stay fresh and new to the folks we are marketing to.
