SITUATION

With Walt Disney World® Resort nearby, plus eco tours, air excursions, golf courses, and water parks ... it's no wonder Kissimmee, Florida is dubbed "The Gateway to Fun." With so much to do, travel planners can use all the help they can get coordinating a smooth vacation filled with unforgettable experiences or a memorable meeting. Yet to best serve visitors and planners, it helps to start with a highly organized, efficiently run destination marketing organization (DMO).

Guided by a new CEO, Experience Kissimmee, the official DMO for Kissimmee, Florida, was ready to streamline in-house processes to help better serve their visitors and partners, and eventually achieve accreditation from the Destination Marketing Association International (DMAI). It soon became clear that the data in the organization's Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system could use some improvement, and the team needed to ensure the platform would be consistently used correctly.

SOLUTION

Experience Kissimmee took full advantage of Simpleview training resources, including regional training, on-site training for staff and extranet training for partners, and the knowledge base. They utilized on-site training to get specific questions answered and learn best practices. In addition, several staff also attended the Simpleview Summit to expand their knowledge in multiple technical and marketing areas, and to network with industry peers.

Experience Kissimmee was fortunate enough to hire a new staff member dedicated to CRM management, Gabrielle Matthews. Gabby ensures everyone on staff benefits from the information learned through Simpleview training and education. Following regional and on-site training, Gabby and the Kissimmee team gathered staff, addressed goals, and performed extensive database clean-up. Simpleview helped mass-close dated leads, merge related information, further organize accounts by region, and import partner listings.

When it came to launching their new version of the extranet, where partners can update member records and view leads, the Experience Kissimmee team got creative to build partner engagement and ensure success. They launched a campaign branded "LOL," Learn Over Lunch. Using Simpleview's RSVP module to track these events, the team gathered about 60 partners over a three-day period at the DMO' offices. They made the Simpleview-led training forum personalized and fun, bridging the gap between the new DMO team and destination partners while illustrating the extranet's benefits.

RESULTS

Consistent with their goals, the Experience Kissimmee database is much cleaner, more organized, and more intuitive to the DMO’s needs. Extranet engagement was already higher in the first five months of 2016 than the level achieved in all of 2015. Experience Kissimmee continues to follow best practices and leverages ongoing training and education from Simpleview to ensure they get the most value out of their new Simpleview CRM. In addition, through all of the DMO’s hard work with their CRM and then some, they earned DMAI accreditation!