Rural programming fuels regional tourism marketing successes

Visit California’s rural marketing program continues to elevate the eight designated rural tourism regions through strategic grant funding, a communications strategy and industry collaboration. The program allows rural regions to amplify their tourism dollars by aligning with Visit California’s efforts to promote California’s unique experiences in domestic and international markets.

The regions are: 

• Central Coast
• Central Valley
• Inland Empire
• Deserts
• Gold Country
• High Sierra
• North Coast (dba North of Ordinary)
• Shasta Cascade (dba UpstateCA)

Tourism Marketing Grants

The regions received $474,000 in one-to-one matching Tourism Marketing Grants from Visit California. The funding was strategically invested in key areas such as the “California Visitor’s Guide: The Best of California” and the “California Road Trips” guide, social media marketing, press trips, website development, IPW attendance, and a range of other marketing activities.

Regional Marketing Program: California Now Media Network Activation

With a $146,000 budget allocated, Visit California’s Rural Committee voted to execute California Now Media Network Activations. Each region received one dedicated e-newsletter deployed to Visit California’s more than 240,000 active U.S. subscribers and one custom social video that was shared across Visit California’s social media channels. Regions will receive rights to the custom social video to repurpose on their owned channels.

As a bonus, Visit California also deployed an all-region e-newsletter providing each region a custom content block that promoted unique outdoor adventures. These efforts significantly enhanced the visibility of the rural regions by leveraging Visit California’s extensive audience in direct partner hand-offs.

Social campaign performance:

• Instagram average reach: 49,639
• Instagram engagement rate: 10.03%
• TikTok xverage views: 6,955
• TikTok engagement rate: 4.45%
• Facebook average reach: 16,940
• Facebook engagement rate: 4.30%

Newsletter campaign performance:

• Average email open rate: 54%
• Average click-through rate: 4%

IPW 2024 California Plaza Beyond the Gateways Custom Lounge

Visit California proudly hosted the U.S. Travel Association’s IPW, the largest international travel trade and media show held on American soil. To provide attendees with opportunities to forge connections and build synergy beyond the trade show hours, Visit California created the California Plaza. This vibrant space brought the state’s Ultimate Playground to life with a range of food, drink offerings, and immersive destination-specific experiences.

With $200,000 allocated from the Special Programming budget, Visit California developed the Beyond the Gateways lounge. This large-scale, custom-designed space highlighted individual rural regions daily with unique regional branding. Over the course of the three-day event, attendees enjoyed various rotating activations, such as a rock-climbing wall from the High Sierra and refreshing prickly pear lemonade from the Inland Empire, each showcasing the distinct qualities of the participating regions.

FY 23/24 Rural Marketing Program by the Numbers:

• 21 Rural Committee members
• 3 Rural Committee meetings held
• 3 quarterly rural newsletters deployed
• 9 Visit California speaking engagements in rural destinations

For more information on Visit California’s Rural Marketing program, please contact Partnerships Coordinator, Yulianna Cisneros.