Situation

As the official destination marketing organization (DMO) for the Eau Claire area in Wisconsin, Visit Eau Claire developed a vision for a website that would better promote the unique offerings of its destination. The DMO sought to convey a fresh, fun and edgy personality to engage locals and visitors alike through social media, as well as the opportunity to create an ongoing conversation about experiences in and around the area.

Solution

Site planning began with an inventory of what makes Eau Claire unique- from quirky coffee shops to being the world capital of the chess-like lawn game, Kubb. The inventory laid the groundwork for content around experience clusters: Sporting Getaway, Romantic Escape, Bikers Paradise, Nature Tour, Family Adventure, Music & Arts, History & Heritage, and Girls Getaway.

Other features implemented are directly correlated to goals established by Visit Eau Claire:

  • A blog by DMO staff, local experts, and visitors- creating a community of authentic voices sharing their Eau Claire experiences
  • Invite community members to submit their events- giving the site the most complete calendar for the region
  • Offer multiple resources to help travelers maximize their visits, including a "Plan Your Trip" content section, an interactive "Trip Builder" tool for personalized itineraries and "Live Chat" with DMO staff and volunteers
Results

The site's content marketing, SEO and fresh design create a true success story, revealed by metrics tracked before and after the new site launched. Organic traffic to the previous site was stagnant, as page views had dropped 24% year-over-year and pages-per-session were down 31% year-over-year.

Just one month after launch, organic traffic to VisitEauClaire.com increased 104%, unique visits went up 81% year-over-year, and overall visits increased 77%. Additionally, page views increased 36% and time spent on the site is steadily increasing.

In line with one of the DMO's top goals, the most popular page on VisitEauClaire.com is the Event Calendar. Visitors to this resource stay up to 1.5 minutes on average and tend to stay on the site even after leaving this page. The calendar also has an outstanding bounce rate average of 37%- considerably below the industry average of 50%.

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