Tourism website seeking ideas for online sales

Hi everyone,

I am so excited to have discovered this website and to now be a part of this online community! I know it is going to be very helpful to me, and hopefully I will be able to share comments that will be helpful to others as well.

This message will be a little longer than usual since it serves both as an introduction and request for help. My work is tourism marketing. I help produce a statewide website that provides information on hundreds of leisure events and attractions in South Carolina. The listings currently primarily promote events in part of the state, but we are steadliy expanding the content of the site and adding cities.

We previously published the information through a magazine for the last five years that focused on only one part of the state. As of the first of this year, we discontinued the magazine and began publishing the information exclusively online.

This has proven to be a good move for us at the right time. The market for print advertising has gotten a lot tighter--especially among local publications. We've been able to dramatically cut our costs by taking the magazine online and greatly expand our content and reach. People seem to like the change, and so do we.

As a result of cutting our costs by producing the information online, we are able to offer advertising at a MUCH lower rate than we ever could with print. In some ways, however, this is more of a challenge in addition to being a benefit.

Providing much lower ad rates necessitates a much greater focus on the volume of our sales. My goal is to work smarter--not harder, but I have a lot to learn about that. Now more than ever, however, it's crucial. Because there's only one of me, I really have to maximize my time--focusing more and more on sales and marketing. Fortunately, I am able to outsource much of our technical work on the website, but sales, of course, is what determines its continued future.

We spent much of the first quarter communicating the change about moving online and fine-tuning Phase 1 of the website. We are now getting more heavily into the sales and marketing phase. It's exciting and challenging for me since my background is print publishing, and sales is not my forte'. I am learning to embrace it, however, as the vital part of business that it is.

In the process, I welcome ideas for ways in which I can improve in advertising sales--and now website advertising sales, which is why I am so excited to be a part of this online community.

So here is my first official request for feedback and info. Can anyone recommend good additional resources for information on selling advertising online? (...in addition to this website, of course.)

Thank you for sharing...and reading this long message.

Leisure

I can't help you with your question Leisure, but I wanted to say "welcome."

Welcome to the community.

Advertising sales sounds interesting. What's your strategy? How do you go about finding and selling prospects?