The Forest And The Trees

When Zartico updated our Website Attribution product by removing the 90-day conversion window between website visits and destination arrivals, we uncovered something remarkable. Contrary to conventional wisdom, travelers researching destinations often conduct their research many months—sometimes even more than a year—before their actual visits. Conversions within 90 days proved to be the exception rather than the rule.

This revelation highlights that traveler journeys involving Destination Marketing Organizations (DMOs) are far more extended, complex, and deliberate than previously understood.

In subsequent months, I've analyzed this data repeatedly, considering its implications for destinations facing increasing pressure to demonstrate advertising ROI.

Fortunately, we're not alone in tackling this challenge. Les Binet and Peter Field have extensively studied hundreds of campaigns in the UK, concluding that the most successful marketing programs balance long-term brand-building with short-term performance activities. Their research suggests an optimal ratio of approximately 60:40 awareness to activation.

For destination marketers, this means effectively measuring both the forest and the trees.

The foundation begins with destination-level metrics: Average Daily Rate (ADR), occupancy, visitor spend per day, visitor-to-resident ratio, and other KPIs that illuminate both volume and quality of visits. Tracking these over extended time periods provides visibility into comprehensive destination marketing efforts and measures growth in long-term awareness and brand equity.

For digital activities where performance can be measured against actual destination visits, there are significant opportunities for optimization, experimentation, and refinement based on meaningful outcomes rather than proxy metrics like website sessions, clicks, or impressions.

I firmly believe that integrated campaigns require integrated measurement tools. This is why we've developed our marketing performance suite with three measurement elevations:

1. Destination-level metrics through ZDOS
2. Digital Campaign Optimization for impression-based measurement of digital ads
3. Website Attribution for evaluating paid social, paid search, content, and website performance

As destination marketers navigate an increasingly complex landscape, success hinges on balancing short-term wins with long-term brand development. Our integrated approach to measurement empowers DMOs to make data-driven decisions across all marketing activities, revealing the complete traveler journey from initial inspiration to final destination. By understanding both immediate impacts and extended conversion patterns, destinations can optimize their marketing investments, demonstrate true ROI, and create sustainable growth in an evolving travel ecosystem.?

The future belongs to those who recognize that meaningful measurement requires patience, precision, and the right tools to capture the complete story of traveler engagement.