Membership has its advantages.
Our members have the advantage of a
variety of promotional opportunities at discounted rates due to the purchasing power of
belonging to a larger group.
Our members share many common
business interests, a common target market and benefit from promotional campaigns specific
to the tourism industry and beneficial to the local economy.
Our members enjoy B2B networking
opportunities, cross marketing opportunities, discounted purchasing opportunities and
shared promotional opportunities where working together we can reach out to a wider
audience of tourists across Texas, the US and beyond.
The Lakes and Hills Tourism
Coalition, founded in 2004, boasts over 150 members.
During the past six years this coalition has promoted the Highland Lakes region as a
tourism destination through a number of successful campaigns, including a multi-state
billboard advertising promotion, attendance at Travel related trade shows throughout
Texas, distribution of a Tourism Guide Book throughout Texas, exposure on our www.lakesandhills.com tourism website, reciprocal
linkages, bulk e-mail promotions, media Fam Tours, and direct promotion to tour operators.
Our current promotional
opportunities include:
 Our Lakes and Hills Tourism Guide Book, which is also
available as an on-line publication, has the largest circulation of any Tourism
publication for the Highland Lakes region. It is distributed by over 223 promotional partners across the State of
Texas, including all of the TxDOT Travel Information Centers (including the Capitol
Building), Chambers of Commerce, Convention and Visitor Bureaus and Visitor Centers.
It is widely distributed as well by Tourism Coalition members to their guests. The
book is currently in it's 4th Edition. The 5th addition will begin accepting
advertiser in mid-2011 for release in 2012. Advertising in the Guide Book is ONLY
available to members of the Lakes and Hills Business Alliance. Members who advertise
on our Lakes and Hills .com Website receive the first option on advertising locations
within the book. Current advertisers within the book are given the first option for
advertising locations on our website. Thus, the more you participate, the more you
benefit.
More information about the Lakes and
Hills Tourism Guide Book . . . . Click on the Book Cover >
Our Lakes
and Hills Tourism Website enjoys high rankings in all of the major search
engines for relevant key search phrases and significant visitation by the traveling public
as a result. The  website features Things-To-Do,
Lodging, Dining and Local Area Events. Our directories include Free listings for
EVERY tourism related business in our market so as to make it the most comprehensive
on-line tourism information resource for our region. This provides value for our
website visitors and contributes to our ever increasing popularity.
Not only are we offering display
advertising on the various directory pages, we have a section for Free Coupons that our
advertisers can deliver to our visitors. Our display ads have a tracking mechanism
to provide our advertisers with a measure of performance. Advertising on the Website
is ONLY available to members of the Lakes and Hills Business Alliance.
For more
information
^ Click on the Screen ^
B2B Marketing
& Information Exchange: Within
the Members section of this website we are providing discounts on goods
and services between alliance members and participation in cross marketing opportunities
such as our coalition link farms for enhancing the search engine performance of our
members' websites.
Also in the Member section we will
share known opportunities for Free exposure on the internet that can help our members get
more exposure for their business websites.
There is a section of discount
coupons from Alliance members for Alliance members. You can take advantage of the
various discounts to save money as well as promote your business through coupon offerings
to the Alliance.
We will have a section of Trade Show
information detailing major events around Texas for exhibition opportunities and
coordinate members who wish to participate. As a group, we are able to collectively
get the advantage of quantitative purchasing of exhibit space, exhibit services, lodging
and travel associated with the event.
Trade
Show Promotions: As has been the case in the past, we will renew our
efforts to structure promotions at major travel shows around Texas. We plan to
acquire a custom built, portable trade show exhibit, based on a design we came up with
through our experience at the many shows we attended in the past.
With the addition of several LED
monitors for computer generated slide shows, this configuration provides an excellent
information delivery system for literature and the open design lends itself to the
"Come on in" message that we are delivering. This mobile exhibit would be
available for use by Members who wish to attend trade shows independent of a promotion
organized by us.
FAMILIARIZATION
TOURS: Another successful promotional
tool for the coalition members has been in conducting Familiarization Tours for
Journalists, writers and media publishers. Hosting such a group with accommodations
at area lodges, meals at various restaurants, bus or caravan tours of the tourism
attractions and sights around the region and social mixers where tourism business owners
have an opportunity to discuss their business offerings and answer question.
We plan to organize another tour in the fall of 2010.
TRAVEL
PROMOTION PARTNERSHIPS: We have worked closely over the years with various
other tourism promotion entities. As discussed above, the Lakes and Hills Tourism
Guide Book is distributed by over 223 tourism promotion partners throughout Texas.
In addition to those valuable partner we have established relationships where reciprocal
promotion benefits both entities. Below is the two-page advertisement in Travel Host
Magazine, distributed at hotels in Austin, which was done in return for the promotion of
Travel Host within our mediums.
 Another area where we have established some partnership
relationships is with operators of Tour Buses. Operators in other markets
around Texas, given arrangements with local lodging, dining and entertainment venues in a
package that they can sell in their market has the potential to bring in a significant
amount of tourists.
One tour operator, with whom we have
had a long-standing cooperative relationship with is the Austin Steam Train Association.
With regularly scheduled trips from Austin to Bertram and Burnet their groups have
been a regular source of visitors for those communities. Broader, special trips can
be organized among Members to generate more interest for Austin Steam Train's customers
and enjoy the added exposure that they provide. The Austin Steam Train Website has been
the #1 non-search engine referrer of visitors to our www.lakesandhills.com website
and we are delighted to mention and link to them here.
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