Nationwide Rallies Spark National Tourism Day
The entire meetings industry has galvanized its effort to promote the value of the industry in the face of tough economic times. TBA Global, LLC, played a major role by launching the “Keep America Meeting” campaign. Alison Smith Jenks, Vice President of Marketing for TBA Global, offers her views on the program in this interview.
Why did you launch Keep America Meeting?
In January, all of us at TBA Global were really frustrated by the way mainstream media was portraying the meetings and events industry. All the coverage was one-sided and negative, and it felt like no one was speaking out about the benefits of meetings and events and incentive travel.
We wanted to create a forum where everyone could come together and voice their opinions in hopes to change the criticism of our industry. Our strategy for “Keep America Meeting” was to keep it simple. We centered it around an online petition that would deliver two messages: Meetings and events are important to building successful businesses, and that they are a critical part of the American economy.
We invited the media, associations, and all industry companies to join the effort as ‘official endorsers’ and asked them to promote the campaign to their networks. We made this easy to do by posting all logos and banner and print ads on the website (www.keepamericameeting.org). From there, it took off like wildfire as everyone seemed to understand the urgency of this message.
What are the results of this campaign?
We believe Keep America Meeting succeeded in galvanizing the entire meetings and events industry around this critical issue. We are thrilled by the success of the campaign!
More than 21,000 individuals signed the petition and it received support from people in all 50 states, and even around the world. It was signed by people employed in all facets of the events, meetings and incentive travel industry, including caterers, décor companies, event producers, meeting planners, hotel managers, and numerous local small business owners. The petition was also signed by family members concerned about the loss of meeting and event revenues and the impact on their lives.
The campaign helped to support the U.S. Travel Association’s press outreach, and we saw that mainstream press coverage became much more balanced. On May 13, 2009, the Keep America Meeting signatures were delivered to the Senate Commerce Committee to continue our industry’s advocacy efforts.
What are the next steps for Keep America Meeting?
Now that the petition signatures have been delivered, we hope people will remain connected and involved. The silver lining in all of this is that our industry has come together like never before, and we hope everyone will stay engaged by joining our “Keep America Meeting” groups on Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter (@keepmeeting) to continue our discussion about the importance of meetings and events.
Many hospitality organizations supported your cause during National Tourism Week and especially on National Tourism Day, when many rallies were held across the country. What were a few of the highlights of these rallies?
May 12th was an incredible day – there were more than 40 cities across the country that united to make a bold statement that travel matters! Each event was unique and included industry leaders with a unique twist, such as a parade in New Orleans and a skyline view with the White Sox mascot in Chicago. All of the rallies delivered a common message about the impact that travel has on each city’s economy, businesses and community as a whole. We connected all these events digitally through Twitter, letting technology enhance the power and reach of the local events. This is a great example of how technology won’t replace meetings, but it will broaden the reach! I think we counted 500 Tweets that day.
