Montana Promotion Division
Travel Montana aggressively promotes Montana as a destination to the international travel trade, with emphasis on the United Kingdom, Germany, France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Italy, Japan and Taiwan. The program involves working with key tour operators, wholesalers, travel agencies and the media to establish new Montana itineraries for groups and Foreign Independent Travelers (FITs), while assisting Montana businesses in their marketing efforts overseas.
This is accomplished by representation at key international travel trade shows, familiarization tours, cooperative advertising ventures with other states in the region, brochure and video distribution and ongoing personal contact with targeted tour operators, wholesalers, travel agents and media.
The program's goals are to increase awareness of Montana as a year-round vacation destination for international visitors, and to generate and distribute leads to the CVBs, regions and Montana suppliers for their follow-up purposes.
The European marketing program includes use of the services of specialized travel representatives on a contractual basis in cooperation with the states of Wyoming, South Dakota and Idaho. Primary markets are the United Kingdom, Germany, France, Belgium, the Netherlands and Italy, and we’ve recently begun efforts in Denmark and Sweden as well.
Under the Rocky Mountain International (RMI) banner of "The Real America", Montana continues to see tremendous success from collective marketing efforts. In FY06, the four states participated jointly in a Scandinavian Mission (Sweden and Denmark), International Tourism Bourse (ITB) in Berlin and World Travel Market in London. RMI overseas offices exhibited at several "Visit USA" and consumer shows on behalf of the RMI region.
Travel Montana will also participate in TIA’s International Pow Wow in Orlando, FL on May 6-11, 2006. And that’s not all for this fiscal year – in June 2006 the four RMI states will do a sales mission to the Netherlands and Belgium to meet with tour operators and train their staff. Then it’s off to Paris for participation in the Paris Country Festival on June 23-25, where the four states are the featured destination for this large, 3-day consumer event.
For recent trade show leads, please refer to the following links:
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MT Dept. of Commerce trade representatives in Kumamoto, Japan, and Taipei, Taiwan, market Montana’s travel-related products and services to the travel trade in their respective countries under close direction from Travel Montana. Their responsibilities include contact with wholesalers, tour operators, travel agents and media to create demand for Montana’s travel-related products and services. This objective is achieved through distribution of travel materials, organization of familiarization trips, translation of Montana literature and websites in Japanese and Chinese, travel trade show participation and sales calls.
Plans for FY07 for the four RMI states of Montana, South Dakota, Wyoming and Idaho include attending World Travel Market Trade Show in London, November 6-9, 2006; BIT in Milan, Italy, February 22-25, 2007; Scandinavian Mission in early March 2007; ITB in Berlin, March 7-11, 2007.
The 2007 Rocky Mountain International RoundUp will be held in South Dakota (location TBD) on January 25-28, following an extremely successful RoundUp in Butte, MT in April 2006. As always, two business sessions will be offered at the Round-Up, giving Montana and regional suppliers the opportunity to meet on an appointment basis with tour operators from our target European markets.
A trip to Japan and Taiwan is planned for mid-October 2006 to work with our trade representatives there. Sales calls and travel agency trainings are planned. In addition, Travel Montana will once again sponsor and attend the Go West Summit in Portland, OR on Feb. 11-15, 2007 and the North American Journeys Receptive Tour Operator Summit in Los Angeles, to be held in January, 2007.
Visibility at the key international travel trade shows allows Montana to make contact with wholesalers, operators and media, and provides the opportunity to follow up on new and existing projects and ideas. Travel Montana delegates are sometimes joined by private-sector participants; for information on attending these shows please contact Pam Gosink, Marketing and Overseas Program Manager at pgosink@mt.gov.
International marketing seminars are generally held annually at the Governor’s Conference on Tourism. Watch for updates for the 2007 conference program on our intranet sight later this year.
Familiarization ("fam") tours for trade and media representatives, as well as training and sales missions, are also important components of the Rocky Mountain International program as well as in our Pacific Rim markets. With the assistance of Montana travel industry members, "fam" tours will be conducted to provide firsthand knowledge for prospective tour operators. By experiencing Montana, operators can better understand the mechanics of designing new itineraries in the state. "Fam" tours will also be held for carefully selected travel journalists, with the intended result of generating positive travel articles in foreign publications.
The RMI Mega-fam in October 2006 will include the states of Wyoming and Idaho, and then it will be Montana’s turn to host the European participants with Idaho (Oct. 2007) and South Dakota (Oct. 2008).
Promotional activities will include the distribution of promotional publications and videos, in foreign languages when possible; and the development of other innovative promotional projects.
This specialized direct mail program will provide current tour planning material to tour operators, as well as follow-up to contacts initiated during trade shows. This program also establishes and maintains a professional rapport with overseas groups and FIT travel planners. In addition, selected international tour operators will receive "Montana Magazine" as a direct mail piece to entice them to consider new or expanded itineraries in Montana. They will also receive a Montana calendar to keep Big Sky Country on their minds every day of the year.
Montana’s visibility in overseas markets is measured by tracking the number of Montana tourism products that have been added or expanded by international tour operators through tour extracts provided by RMI and numbers provided by the trade offices in Japan and Taiwan, the figures provided in the ITRR Non-resident survey, and the interest level of consumers and trade representatives in overseas target markets.
