Tourism Advertising and Product Development - YTD 2025
Paid Advertising
Through paid digital advertising, the Chamber has reached over 4.5 million people for the first half of this year. These ads targeted markets all over the Southeast, including Savannah, Nashville, Tallahassee, and more. There were tens of thousands of actions (clicks, likes, engagements) with these ads with high engagement across the board. Display advertisements (ads on websites) alone brought in over 3.1 million impressions.
Through print ads places in various magazines and publications primarily in the southeast, we reached over 250,000 people per month.
Digital Advertising
Overall, VisitBlueRidge digital ads seem to be doing very well compared to industry averages. Display ads are the smallest CTR (click-through rate), but still are doing better than average industry. Engagement can mean anything from liking, sharing, or commenting on the ad/where the ad is. The industry metrics were pulled from Google Ads Benchmarks for travel (Display and Search CTR rates), Wordstream Digital Advertising Benchmark Report for travel (Social Ads CTR), HubSpot & Sprout Social Reports (social media ad performance trends to support Wordstream numbers), and Wyzowl Video Marketing Statistics (paid video ads on Youtube and OTT).
The Weeds (Hard Numbers)
- Overall Engagement Rate: ~3.3%
- Above average compared to display benchmarks (0.35%) and social benchmarks (1.5%)
- Display Ads: 24,237 actions on 3.13M impressions = 0.77% CTR
- More than double industry display average (0.35%)
- Social Ads (Local IQ + Social Actions): (17,992 + 8,459) actions on 665K impressions = 3.98% CTR
- Higher than industry social average (1.5-2%)
- Search Ads: 12,103 actions on 137K impressions = 8.8% CTR
- Much Higher than industry search average (4-5%)
- Video Ads: 86,760 actions on 514K impressions = 16.9% engagements
- Very high compared to industry video benchmark (1.2%)
Industry information pulled from ChatGPT, Statista, and Google.
Definitions
CTR (Click-Through Rate): percentage of people who clicked on ad after seeing it. Formula: Clicks / Impressions x 100
Impressions: Number of times ad was displayed on a screen, regardless if it was clicked
Actions: Engagements resulting from an ad, such as clicks, form submissions, social interactions, or video views
Engagement Rate: Percentage of people who interacted with ad in some way (like, click, share, view)
Video: Video ads are paid ads shown on platforms like Youtube, OTT (Over-The-Top)/CTV (streaming TV), or social media platforms.
OTT: Over-The-Top, streaming content delivered over internet without cable (think Roku, Amazon Firestick, etc.)
Supporting the Community
A few of years ago, we embarked on a wonderful partnership with our school program, advertising on various trailers that travel across Georgia and beyond! It is a way for us to support the community while staying within the limitations of restricted advertising funding.
Helping Improve Our Community
In addition to restricted advertising funds the Chamber & CVB manages, there is a portion that is allowed for physical attractions open to the public and used by visitors and locals alike. We call these funds Tourism Product Development (TPD) funds. Over the past few years, several small and large projects have been completed and paid for by TPD funds.
Check out all the 2025 projects here.