Department of Tourism
For Immediate Release: March 23, 2001
Contact: Mary Stadick Smith, (605) 773-3301

SPRING ADS TARGET SUMMER TRAVELERS

The Department of Tourism’s $2.4 million peak-season ad campaign is in full swing. Using media such as television, the Web, newspapers and magazines, ads tout South Dakota as a summer vacation destination.

"It’s that time of year when people start making their summer travel plans," said Patricia Van Gerpen, secretary of the South Dakota Department of Tourism. "We want to make sure they hear our message while the timing is right."

Promotions target potential travelers in Minnesota, Iowa, Wisconsin, Illinois, Missouri, Nebraska, Montana, Wyoming, Colorado and North Dakota as well as Manitoba, Canada.

For the first time, Dallas, Texas, has been added as a target market. "Based on its large population base, our research, and what seems to be a growing level of interest among travelers in that area, we decided to add Texas to our target audience," Van Gerpen said.

Fast-paced television commercials and eye-catching newspaper inserts are being used in these markets. In addition, magazine ads and Internet banner ads are running in publications and on Web sites in these markets and beyond. The department’s magazine ads focus on vacation packages that are available via its Web site, travelsd.com. So do the Internet banner ads.

"More and more of our visitors rely on the Web to do their travel planning," Van Gerpen said. "So we’ve loaded our Web site with the information they’re seeking as well as fun elements like our send-a-postcard feature and live Web cams, which keep users coming back to the site."

This year, the department’s spring newspaper inserts feature an interactive game piece that requires readers to visit the Web site, to learn if they’ve won a South Dakota vacation giveaway.

"It’s one more way to drive traffic to our Web site," Van Gerpen said, adding that visits to travelsd.com grew by 183 percent last fiscal year. "This promotion should bump those numbers up even more," she said.

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