Influencer Outreach and Media FAMs Stimulate Drive Market Visitation for Open Air Museum
How this Case Study may be relevant to you: This example of work illustrates Break the Ice Media’s strengths in leveraging PR to create interest in expanded offerings and shoulder season experiences to create demand for visitation from drive markets.
In 2019, our campaign resulted in 79 placements and over 8.5 Million media impressions. Eight hosted writers and influencers from target geographies posted about The Wild Center 71 times on social media.
Situational Analysis
Although they had an engaged audience across social media, email marketing and their website, without a proactive PR program in place, news about The Wild Center and its unique offerings were not reaching new audiences. In addition, their current visitors were not booking available add-on experiences such as guided canoe and paddleboard excursions, which could mean added revenue to The Wild Center’s bottom line. Lastly, The Wild Center saw an opportunity to grow their shoulder season (September and October) as prime leaf peeping among an older demographic.
The Challenge
As part of an integrated marketing plan, The Wild Center engaged in a media relations campaign to drive awareness of the museum and its available experiences to help meet their visitation goals.
Objectives
- Increase brand awareness of The Wild Center and its experiences / add-on offerings
- Seek third party endorsements of The Wild Center through proactive PR, media and influencer relations
- Drive traffic to the tickets page on The Wild Center’s website
- Influence conversions on The Wild Center’s website
- Increase the number of visitors during shoulder season (September and October)
Strategic Insight
The Wild Center can refresh interest in visitation by bringing attention to add-on experiences and extend the season by leaning into the natural beauty of the Adirondacks during autumn.
Photo Credit: The Wild Center
Strategies
- Develop key messages designed to resonate with target audiences and motivate them to take action – consistent messages used across distribution channels (paid, earned, shared & owned).
- Build on past interest of Wild Walk and create new angles to continue exposure for The Wild Center.
- Focus on building interest from regional, national and Canadian media outlets.
- Leverage influencers and bloggers to help extend digital reach.
- Highlight available special experiences, such as behind the scenes tours, SUP and canoe excursions.
- Position The Wild Center as a top destination for leaf peeping and fall foliage experiences.
Tactics
- Public Relations Strategy
- Proactive Public Relations
- Reactive Public Relations
- Ongoing Pitching & Outreach
- Blogger & Influencer Relations
- Media FAM Coordination
- Measurement & Tracking
Results
Break the Ice Media’s 2019 public relations campaign resulted in:
- 79 placements and over 8.5 million media impressions as a result of our public relations efforts (pitching, press release distribution, media alerts, etc.).
- 32 coordinated stories or coverage based around event announcements.
- 8 writers and influencers hosted from target geographies including Buffalo, Rochester, Syracuse and Saratoga Springs, NY and Ottawa, Ontario.
- 71 social posts from hosted writers, providing third-party endorsements of The Wild Center.
- Placements that included links to The Wild Center website, mentioned the add-on experiences (behind the scenes tours, canoe excursions) and highlighted The Wild Center as a great place for leaf peeping.
Photo Credit: The Wild Center
Result Highlights
