Client Stories
Take a look at how destination leaders
are using data insights to realize new
possibilities for their communities.
Case Studies
Experience Champaign-Urbana Turns Intelligence into Community Impact
When Terri Reifsteck set out to rebrand Visit Champaign County into the more regionally resonant “Experience Champaign-Urbana,” she knew she needed more than a new name. She needed evidence, something that could prove where visitors were coming from, what they were spending on, and why the shift made strategic sense.
Visit Lake Charles Unlocks ROI and Efficiency with Zartico’s DCO
In today’s dynamic marketing environment, destinations face growing pressure to justify every dollar. For Visit Lake Charles, this meant moving beyond typical campaign metrics to test a smarter strategy rooted in performance intelligence. They partnered with Zartico to pilot Digital Campaign Optimization (DCO)—not as an experiment, but as a bold move toward precision, transparency, and community impact.
Building Trust With Data: Crystal River Transforms Stakeholder Relationships
When Auvis Cole stepped into his role at Discover Crystal River in February 2024, he saw clear opportunities to make a big impact as the destination’s new leader: improve community stakeholder relationships, refine the strategic direction, and enhance efficiencies with the organization’s budget.
NBA All-Star Weekend, Salt Lake City
To illuminate the extensive impact of the 2023 NBA All-Star Weekend in Salt Lake City, Zartico teamed up with our partners at Visit Salt Lake and the talented design team at Ito World to create a visualization of visitation throughout the region during the event.
Visit Lake Charles Uses Smart Data to Fuel Smarter Marketing
Located in Southwest Louisiana and leading the way in data-driven decision-making, Visit Lake Charles (VLC) puts integrated data insights at the center of their marketing strategy. Early on, the team used Zartico insights to cook up an award-winning ad campaign. Now they’re placing continuous data optimization at the core of all of their work.
Getting On the Map: Roost
The Regional Office of Sustainable Tourism (ROOST) in northeastern New York has a challenging assignment — to promote and manage visitation to more than two dozen towns, villages, and wilderness areas spread across a region the size of Massachusetts.
Diamonds & Dreams: Seminole County, FL
Sports tourism — and youth baseball in particular — makes up a significant portion of visitation and overnight stays in Seminole County, Florida. In the 2023 fiscal year alone, sports brought in more than 200,000 visitors, thanks in no small part to substantial community investment.
How Visit Baton Rouge is Using ZDOS® Insights To Light Up a Low Season
Visit Baton Rouge developed a data-led plan to ensure their holiday lights campaign will have maximum impact and ROI. The event is already filling an otherwise quiet period, so its success now depends on attracting the most desirable visitors and enticing them to stay longer and spend more.
This Destination Leader Is Over Reporting Economic Impact
Tim Brady, President & CEO of the Charleston WV Convention & Visitors Bureau, is ready to stop talking about the big economic impact number.
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How Impact Reporting Drives a Data-Backed Strategy at Travel Lane County
Travel Lane County is a private non-profit that supports and promotes tourism to a large county in Oregon anchored by Eugene and Springfield.
Epic Ride: How a W.V. County Used ZDOS® to Transform Local Tourism
The Meeks Mountain Trails initiative is the brainchild of local resident Brandon Doerner, who was enjoying a walk in the forest adjacent to a city park when it occurred to him that it would be a great spot for a mountain biking system.
Destination Madison’s Data-Led Marketing Makeover With Zartico
Destination Madison’s mission is to generate an economic impact in the Wisconsin capital through tourism. In 2023, the organization stepped up its content marketing game.
This Night is Sparkling: Swifties and the Impact of The Eras Tour
Taylor Swift is in her sold-out stadium era, and destinations across the U.S. are enjoying the afterglow of thousands of fans traveling for “The Eras Tour” and spending their dollars at restaurants, accommodations, and retail shops.
How Asheville, N.C. Fuels Community Conversations With Data
This past summer Asheville, North Carolina hosted a two-day retreat, inviting neighborhood and business associations, municipalities, and other community groups into conversations about what’s happening in their Blue Ridge Mountain city.
Smart Destinations Use Data to Tackle the Roads Most Traveled
The pressures generated by the growth of these highly-desirable places present an industry-wide concern. We see it frequently in smaller destinations that serve as gateways to adjacent national parks or popular recreation areas, but it can — and does — happen anywhere.
Using ZDOS™ To Cook Up an Award-Winning Ad Campaign
When Visit Lake Charles rolled out their culinary travel campaign to attract Austin travelers to their destination, it was a truly integrated affair. Eye-catching ads wrapped around Uber and Lyft vehicles, an Instagram influencer shared views of brilliant sunsets, and digital ads directed hungry travelers to a gourmet inspiration guide.
Destination Spotlights
Visit Myrtle Beach
Jen Brunson
The 2023 World's Strongest Man competition in Myrtle Beach, S.C. showcased incredible feats of power and set a new benchmark for boosting local tourism and community engagement through high-value events. Zartico insights helped the team communicate the impact and secure the event for the following year.
Visit Tampa Bay
Sherri T. Brown & Santiago C. Corrada
Tampa Bay hosted the Kappa Alpha Psi Fraternity Inc. Grand Chapter meeting, enhancing the city's reputation as a premier destination for multicultural events. By leveraging Zartico insights, the team created a compelling narrative of community benefits to highlight the city's hosting excellence.
City of Palm Desert
Thomas Soule
Palm Desert's marketing team and agency drew on Zartico insights to understand visitor behavior and create an innovative social media campaign. The campaign effectively reached a diverse, multigenerational audience, inviting them to experience more of the city's neighborhoods and locally owned businesses.
Case Study Presentations
Data-Driven 2024 Content Planning
Destination Madison leveraged Zartico to revamp its content marketing strategy with data-led insights targeting its campaigns to increase quality visits.
Cottonwood Canyons Custom Analysis
As a result of visitor and resident experience with capacity on the mountains, Visit Salt Lake used data to create a public/private partnership to address transportation and improve visitor/resident sentiment. **This client story was completed as a custom Zartico analysis.**
Spring Mountain Biking Campaign
Putnam County CVB used ZDOS data to create a mountain biking campaign that brought in a new category of visitors from untapped markets on a limited budget.
Focus on Rural Communities
The state of Tennessee worked with its distressed and at-risk rural counties to find ways for tourism to help lift the communities.
Integrated Brand Awareness Campaign
Visit Lake Charles, in partnership with Zartico, identified Austin as an opportunity market and launched a data-led integrated marketing campaign to target the area.
Two-Pronged Holiday Campaign
CRVA used data to develop a holiday campaign that inspired locals to stay in Charlotte during the holiday season and become hosts. The campaign also invited relatives of residents to become guests during the holiday season.
Illuminating Seasonal Impacts
Board members needed insight into Visit Lake Tahoe’s strategy shift due to a stall in winter storms and the winter travel season.
Driving Off Season Demand
Baton Rouge needed to drive visitation in their need period of December. They used ZDOS to find an underutilized location with proximity to hotels and retail to plan a holiday lights event.
Client Testimonials
“Our marketing team harnesses ZDOS insights to develop visitor profiles and refine our strategies for quality visits. With this data-driven approach, we enhance our marketing effectiveness, increase our ROI, and clearly communicate our positive impact on the local community."
Timothy P. Bush, CDME, TMP, CDTP,
Chief Marketing Officer
Visit Lake Charles
“The (ZDOS) platform has been invaluable to helping us track the effectiveness of our rebrand, allowing us to see new markets and visitor behavior that allows us to better tailor our ads.”
Terri Reifstec
Vice President of Marketing
Experience Champaign-Urbana
“The data is not only painting the picture of what our tourism visitation looks like, but where its impact truly is, and what the trickle-down effect of that could be, as we try to move our community and our region forward.”
Alexis Berggren
President & CEO
Explore Evansville
"Most research tells you if something worked. Zartico’s Lodging Data, specifically the pacing insights, tells you if it’s working, giving you time to impact change if necessary."
Dan Quandt,
Director of Tourism & Conventions
Waco Convention & Visitors Bureau
"The team is easy to work with and communication is on point. Deliverables are on time and as promised."
Wendy Swenson
Director of Tourism Marketing
Alaska Travel Industry Association
"Zartico has given me the tools I need to effectively advocate on behalf of the community, making what would be a very difficult task a thousand times easier."
Kelli Steele
Executive Director
Putnam County CVB
"I access Zartico's Destination Operating System in real-time during board meetings. By analyzing data on the spot and immediately addressing our director's questions or concerns, I can deliver clear insights that directly inform our destination management and marketing strategies. This reassures the board that our decisions are data-driven, exemplifies our commitment to transparency, and builds trust with our stakeholders."
Stuart Maas
Senior Director of Marketing & Business Development
Visit Lake Tahoe
"Zartico has transformed recently in the best way. We love the ZDOS platform improvements—they’ve been a huge boost for the West Volusia Tourism office, helping us enhance our marketing and better understand tourism's impact on our 14 communities. It’s refreshing to work with a company that evolves its product to meet client needs and push the industry forward!"
Georgia Turner
Executive Director
West Volusia Tourism Bureau
“Everybody wants to talk about economic impact, but I talk about community impact as well. We get addicted to that big number — and we’re as guilty of it here as anybody — but I’m trying to change the narrative.
This [ZDOS® report] actually helps me a great deal because we can show that our visitor spending was up 22% but our visitor share was down. That means locals were out enjoying the event too — and they’re also spending money, which is not calculated into that visitor spend figure.”
Tim Brady
President & CEO
Charleston WV CVB