ROGERS -- City room tax revenue climbed above $800,000 for the first time in 2016, and officials say the city can expect those numbers to continue to climb in coming years. The city collects a 2 percent hotel tax.
Hoteliers, those in the culinary industry, museum executives and other business owners gathered at the Pinnacle Hills Promenade on Friday for "Tourism Talk," an event presented by Visit Rogers. It provided the tourism-focused audience with recently released travel statistics, perspective and tips for how to influence traveler's plans.
"There are a lot of doomsday scenarios for travel, but we're optimistic for domestic travel," said Jay Salyers, senior vice president for digital marketing company Miles Partnerships. Visit Rogers hired the company as the firm's marketing partner at the beginning of the year.
Salyers presented research from Miles' online survey "State of the American Traveler" on the changing technology and platforms that have made the biggest difference in how visitors find and book travel destinations. The study is done quarterly each year by surveying at least 2,000 people who have taken a trip more than 50 miles from their homes.
"Those who expect to spend more on travel is up 5 percent," Salyers said. Personal finances remain the top reason that people find it difficult to travel, but travel budgets were up nearly 10 percent during the final months of 2016, he said.
Knowing budgets are up and watching national trends of gasoline prices and flight costs dropping make a good combination for tourism destinations such as Rogers, he said. "We don't have a strong headwind from our perspective as it pertains to travel."
Rogers attractions and venues have seen some of the benefit of that combination, said J.R. Shaw, executive director for Visit Rogers.
Visitors who live at least 50 miles away made more than 1.5 million trips to Benton County in 2016 and spent $364 million, according to the 2016 Visit Rogers Economic Impact of Tourism. The report used information from the Arkansas Department of Parks and Tourism 2016-2017 annual report.
Benton County's travel economy employs 3,602 people and brought in $32.4 million in state and local taxes.
Shaw said Visit Rogers and other tourism partners bring the traffic by focusing on the meeting and convention markets, sports tournaments, group visits, leisure and shopping markets.
"We create experiences that contribute to the quality of life for our partners and institutions," Shaw said. "We're about building business and growing the community."
Visit Rogers staff booked 61 events in 2016 leading to 71,476 visitors, 23,052 room nights and a room tax revenue of $833,880.
Working in tandem with tourism industries of other Northwest Arkansas cities, attractions and locations is key to continuing that success, Shaw said.
"We're not a bubble in Rogers, but in partnership with our friends in Bentonville and Fayetteville and as a part of the Northwest Arkansas Tourism Association. It's important to represent a larger product," he said.
Creating awareness of the city and region is a crucial first step to increasing tourists, Salyers said. Knowing how to properly leverage the newest and most popular technologies of the year can help foster that awareness and drive traffic.
Salyers said using voice search options, such as iPhone's Siri and Amazon's Alexa; metasearch engines such as Kayak; and search engine optimization were the most common technologies recently changing the way people find and book travel destinations.
Those platforms and others such as Airbnb, an online marketplace allowing people to rent short-term lodging from individuals, have essentially nixed the traditional process of searching, planning and booking travel plans by doing it all in one place, Salyers said. A location's ability to use destination websites, user-generated content, print publications and provide an experience rather than a single product will determine success, he said. Audience members viewed videos of other companies providing creative and interactive experiences as examples for reaching new visitors.
"We're trying to get as many eyeballs as possible on area attractions, hotels and experiences," Salyers said of tactics to drive traffic to Visit Rogers.
NW News on 03/25/2017