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| Angel Fire, New Mexico - Courtesy of New Mexico Tourism Department |
When
a country or state is best known for its dry climate, desert flora and long,
laid back summers, it’s pretty difficult to imagine it in winter, covered in
snow with skiers and snowboarders merrily zooming down groomed runs, slaloming
in glades and pounding the powder.
But
New Mexico, which has this extreme variation in climate, has managed to change
people’s perception recently and open their eyes to a new winter sports
wonderland, doused in around 300 inches of snow annually. This has been
achieved via the New Mexico True campaign launched by
the New Mexico Tourism Department (NMTD) in November 2013.
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| New Mexico True ad for Outside Magazine |
“Last
year (2013) was the first year we did a designated winter campaign,” says
Rebecca Latham, NMTD Cabinet Secretary. “The perception was that New Mexico is a dry and
arid state and we wanted to dispel those misconceptions.” New Mexico True summer advertising
shows lush greenery and water with mountain backdrops and this has been
extended to winter, with a heavy focus on the ski industry offerings. “We are
showing that New Mexico has snow and also an abundant offering of skiing and
snowboarding as well as snowshoeing, sleigh rides and snowmobiling,” Latham
explains.
The
creative campaign is being disseminated via multi media: “We’re using a little
bit of everything, really targeting print in AFAR, Food Network magazine, Texas Monthly, Southwest, Outside mag. So we have some really targeted messages based on what
the appeal of the publication is. We also do broadcasts, 30-second TV
commercials, and also cinema advertising in our main target markets. In New
York City and Chicago we do transit advertising, on subway trains and taxi
cabs. And we have beautiful, larger than life dioramas in the airports. And
closer to home we have billboards within the state of New Mexico,” Latham
explains. This is backed up with a wide scale social media presence on
Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Pinterest plus 15-second digital ads on
targeted websites.
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| Taos, New Mexico - courtesy of New Mexico Tourism Department |
The
aim is to enhance awareness of New Mexico’s snow and dedicated program of
winter recreation which includes eight Alpine and three Nordic ski resorts.
Probably the most famous alpine area is Taos Ski Valley, but there
are also Apache, Angel Fire, Sipapu, Red River, Ski Santa Fe, Pajarito
Mountain
and Sandia Peak. “It is a general promotion message
rather than pinpointing specific resorts,” says Latham but she says that all
the resorts are very pleased that NMTD is fronting a winter
campaign and they are already seeing the trickledown benefits of it. “As well
as showing our skiing, we are also showcasing our culture - for example, people
having a bowl of green chili stew at the end of their ski run, adventures that
you can’t have anywhere else,” Latham describes.
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| New Mexico True ad |
This
kind of promotion doesn’t come cheaply. “We don’t necessarily have the
breakdown of what our total marketing budget for winter versus summer, but $8.6m
in total is our annual budget,” says Latham. “And that’s what we’ll be spending
in the budget cycle from July up to June 2016.” Is
it worth it? Definitely, says Latham, when you look at the return on investment
(ROI). “Shortly after New Mexico True campaign launched, we
did an ROI study and saw that for every $1 spent, $3 was returned on the tax
base level, so we know we have a 3:1 ROI. We now have a new study with results
coming at the beginning 2016. We look at the money that’s being spent while
people are vacationing here and the taxes that are coming back to us as a
result of the dollars being spent. Let’s say if someone saw a New Mexico True ad and then traveled
here as a result of the advertising and let’s say they spent $200 while here, it’s
the percentage of that that goes back into the state tax level.”
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| New Mexico True ad for Texas Monthly |
Total
visitor spending since 2010 has also increased by 24 percent and the amount of overnight
leisure trips has gone up 37.5 percent – “that is three times the national
average,” says Latham. The change in perception – and resulting leisure travel
increase - has emanated from New Mexico’s target “fly markets”: Dallas,
Houston, Denver, Phoenix, San Diego, Chicago and New York City. “We know that
the past two years we have seen record-breaking tourism growth as a result of
the New Mexico True campaign,” she adds.
So
what does Latham envisage for the future? “We don’t see the idea of New Mexico True changing at all. But I
think there are things that we can do differently and ways we can expand on the
message,” she says. “However, we don’t see it as your traditional ad campaign
but more like a standard within the industry in New Mexico. The whole idea of New Mexico True is promoting everything
that separates us from our neighbors. That adventure culture we don’t see
changing.”
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| Taos, New Mexico - courtesy of New Mexico Tourism Department |
