The final installment of the Southern Oregon Coast Rural Tourism Studio will take place April 18th and 19th in North Bend. Over the past four months Travel Oregon has put on a series of workshops focused on local economic development through tourism. OSU Sea Grant Extension has been participating in this program and will be available to offer communities and businesses assistance as they go through the program and in the future.

Tourism Marketing & Communications Workshop

Join us for an active, inspiring day of marketing training and planning for your individual business or destination, and for the region as a whole. We’ll discuss Visitor Lifecycle Management (VLM) and explore opportunities and resources associated with each step of the cycle. In addition, we’ll define the potential you have to interact and engage with the visitor as a business owner or as part of the region while aligning marketing efforts to support resource efficiency and regional awareness. This session will also tap into partnership opportunities with Travel Oregon and others in the region.

Teaming for Impact & Action Planning Workshop

The distance between your region’s vision and its reality is called action. This day is all about laying the final groundwork and jumping into action feet first alongside other motivated community members. During this workshop, you and others in your region will work together to establish local action teams and begin developing priority projects in line with the region’s 15-year vision for tourism. Participants will implement strategies to form well structured teams (of individuals, groups or organizations) in order to increase a project’s success and sustainability. Participants who attended prior workshops are strongly encouraged to attend this results-oriented session. Get ready to roll up your sleeves, get engaged, and move to action.

Community Tourism Celebration

Plan on attending the Community Tourism Celebration with your friends, family and colleagues. Graduates will be awarded certificates of completion and the new community tourism vision, action teams and priority projects will be shared with the community. Please make sure to extend the invitation to other movers and shakers from the region! This will be an important event to transition from training to community action.

Sign up for the final workshops and community celebration!

Each spring, Oregon’s travel and tourism industry comes together at the Oregon Governor’s Conference on Tourism to educate, share and develop new ways to create the best Oregon experience possible for our visitors and the industry itself. Access to Oregon’s key travel and tourism industry players at the conference is an unparalleled resource for individuals new to the industry or to the state, or those who want to become more involved at a local, regional, state or national level. Conference attendees will have an opportunity to learn about tourism trends, best practices and the latest thinking around product development, social media, marketing, and other travel and tourism industry topics and trends.

Mark your calendars for May 10-12, 2017 and join us at the Salem Convention Center. Register today – early bird rates end March 31st!