Seattle's Convention and Visitors Bureau found 30% ROI with Google AdWords.
| Seattle's Convention
and Visitors Bureau (SCVB) is a nonprofit economic development
agency responsible for competitively marketing Seattle, Washington
and King County as a destination for meeting and convention groups
and leisure travelers. Meetings and conventions in the Seattle
market achieved a record high economic impact of $411 million
in 2003. Leisure visitors spend $3.6 billion in Seattle and King
County annually, benefiting hotels, retailers, restaurants, attractions,
transportation services and other businesses, and supporting
jobs for 60,000 people in the Seattle region. Approach SCVB was the first U.S. convention and visitors bureau to implement its own hotel booking engine, Seattle Super Saver (www.SeattleSuperSaver.com). Following a favorable customer satisfaction survey and endorsement from the Seattle Hotel Association, SCVB expanded the program in spring 2004 as an alternative to private sector hotel booking sites. To generate interest, the nonprofit Super Saver began search advertising as well as online co-marketing with Seattle websites. In addition, the SCVB's search engine marketing consultant encouraged them to add more aggressive search advertising into its integrated marketing campaign. "It's a very competitive market," says Steven C. Morris, SCVB president and CEO. "We needed to focus on search results, driving traffic and generating bookings, and chose Google AdWords to help reach our goals." Morris says that the AdWords™ startup process "was very easy to understand and implement" and took just one day to set up. Results "We immediately began to get more traffic and conversion to hotel bookings," says Morris of the initial AdWords campaign. "And we are reaching a much broader customer base than was previously possible – we are seeing people from all over the world now." He notes that the numbers are impressive: "10 to 15% of our current traffic is generated by Google advertising clickthrough. 5% of that traffic translates into a booking. And our ROI is about 30%." The Bureau has found search marketing with Google so powerful that it has decided to move its entire promotional budget for Seattle Super Saver online. "Pay per click (PPC) has been more cost effective than traditional media advertising ever was," Morris says. "Compared to other channels, it produces the most online sales. That's why we will absolutely continue to work with Google. It's been very effective for us." About Google AdWords Google AdWords is currently used by thousands of businesses worldwide to gain new customers in a cost-effective way. AdWords uses keywords to precisely target ad delivery to web users seeking information about a particular product or service. The program is based on cost-per-click (CPC) pricing, so advertisers only pay when an ad is clicked on. Advertisers can take advantage of an extremely broad distribution network, and choose the level of support and spending appropriate for their business. For more information on launching your own campaign or getting expert help, visit http://adwords.google.com. Would you like to share your Google AdWords success story with us? We'd love to hear from you! Return to Travel overview |
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