News Story, Adirondack North Country Association

Request for Proposal

ATTACHMENT A

Adirondack North Country Association’s
Market Trend Assessment of Scenic Byway Visitors
under the Adirondack Tourism Information Project

MARKET TREND ASSESSMENT PROJECT GOALS AND OBJECTIVES

ANCA and Byways communities and businesses will use the outcomes to maximize the return on investment of our marketing resources. We want to:

Ascertain that our brands resonate in our target markets
Clearly focus our messages
Plan and deliver promotional tools and campaigns that assure and enhance conversions
Identify where and when infrastructure investments by stakeholders are needed

PROJECT DELIVERABLES

ANCA wants to know and/or confirm:

How do visitors learn about the Byways?
Why do people come specifically to the Adirondack North Country Byways?
Where are they coming from?
What are the most important features of what is available on the byways? Why?
What are the most interesting destinations? Why?
What is the relative importance of the things, events, people, community attractions, of most interest to travelers and prospects?
How do the Byway brand/look/messages resonate with prospects and repeat travelers? Why? What different is needed?
What tourism website features do byway visitors like best/need/would like more of?
What services/information are visitors getting in other ways that they would prefer to be able to get from the website?
What are three marketing campaigns for byways or scenic driving routes that could be good models for ANCA Byways promotion?

QUALIFICATIONS

1.Describe your business/organization.

2.State your qualifications to undertake the Market Trend Assessment. Include:

a summary of your experiences with projects that are similar in scope, complexity, and size and specific benefits/outcomes of those projects to your client
specific examples of relevant technical expertise
technical tools, resources, and professional affiliations you will utilize for this project

3.List personnel resources that will be assigned to this project and their roles. Provide brief descriptions of the specific qualifications/skills/experience of each.

4.If you will be subcontracting for any portion of the project deliverables, include their information relating to questions 1 – 3. Describe the nature of your relationship with the subcontractor and relevant projects on which you have worked together.

5.Describe any previous direct experience with the Scenic Byway programs.

6.Provide at least two examples of past experience with similar marketing research projects and give details on your successes. Please include samples or references for our review.

7.Describe other valuable skills and qualifications that you will bring to the project

8.On time delivery and completing projects within budget are important components of this project. Provide details on your organizational and project management skills.

9.Why is your firm ANCA’s best choice as the firm to conduct the Market Trend Assessment of Scenic Byway visitors?

MARKET TREND ASSESSMENT PROJECT DELIVERABLES

The market research firm will conduct market research to test Adirondack North Country Region Scenic Byways marketing efforts with a target market of visitation groups within a one day drive or less of the large Adirondack North Country Region and will explore visitation patterns. Market research will include, but not be limited to:

assessment of interests of today’s travelers-- what brand messages resonate with prospective visitors and repeat travelers and what else is needed
assessment of relevant websites, maps, signage, brochures, etc.
assessment of visitation patterns changes in Adirondack visitation and visitor spending patterns and trends
assessment of website functionality and what visitors prefer
identification/assessment of why travelers come to the Adirondack North Country Scenic Byways:

-- the most appealing byway features,
-- the most interesting destinations, and
-- what things, events, people, community attractions are of most interest to travelers and

identification of at least three scenic byway or relevant marketing campaigns that ANCA could use as models for enhancing our marketing strategy and plans.

PROPOSAL REQUIREMENTS

1. References: Please submit three professional references.

2. Your proposal should include a timeline, task descriptions, and deliverables.

3. Attach a cost proposal.*

*Any professional fees/costs that you plan to waive can be credited to the project expenses and can be applied as a match. The waived fees for this ANCA grant project are tax deductible.