2013-14 Marketing Plan & 2012-13 year-end review Mission Statement 4 Advisory Board & CVB Staff 5 Organizational Chart 6 Year-End Review 7 Marketing Plan 13 Executive Overview 14 Revenues & Expenditures 15 Sales Department 16 Marketing & Communications 21
The Las Cruces Convention and Visitors Bureau serves as a catalyst for the area s hospitality industry working in concert to build a year-round destination that offers a quality experience to all visitors as well as sustainable economic and social growth for the local community. Toward this end, the Las Cruces Convention and Visitors Bureau will play a leading role in defining and branding Las Cruces as a desirable destination offering a variety of activities, attractions and events now and in the future. 4
2012-13 CVB Advisory Board Members Convention & Visitors Bureau Staff Chair Belia Alvarez General Manager, Hotel Encanto de Las Cruces Vice-Chair Mark Santiago Director, New Mexico Farm & Ranch Heritage Museum Members Mike Beckett Owner, Coas Books, Inc. Vince Vaccaro, Owner, Lorenzo s Restaurant Monika Denten General Manager, Ramada Las Cruces Executive Director Philip J. San Filippo Director of Marketing & Communications Chris Faivre Director of Sales & Service Jennifer Bales Convention Sales Manager Albert Herrera Convention Sales Manager Rochelle Miller-Hernandez Tourism Sales Manager Andrea Lawrence Sports Sales Manager Ed Carnathan Sales Coordinator Hilary Dutcher Administative Assistant Jill Rockhill Visitor Information Specialist Sonia Bañuelos Distribution Specialist Sergio Salinas 5
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Fiscal year 2012-13 was a busy year and one of significant changes for the Las Cruces Convention and Visitors Bureau (CVB). The CVB participated in an exhaustive branding exercise in order to better understand how we are perceived by visitors and the local community. The branding process included an internal marketing audit, two focus groups in Las Cruces and two additional focus groups in Albuquerque. Using data gathered during the focus groups combined with research and strategic meetings, we redefined our branding in three words: Explore. Experience. Discover. Throughout this document, there are examples of how the new branding is being incorporated to sell and promote Las Cruces. Las Cruces Lodgers Tax collections Las Cruces convention center fee collections One of the key lessons we learned through the branding exercise is that people need a very specific reason to visit Las Cruces. Special events seemed to be the major driving factor for prospective visitors making a decision to visit. As a result, the Las Cruces CVB hosted its first annual Country Music Festival in May 2013. The event drew thousands of people to downtown Las Cruces over the weekend and gave us the opportunity to host locals and visitors from Albuquerque, Santa Fe, Midland/ Odessa, TX Tucson, AZ and many other places 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 8
throughout the Southwest. Although it was a firstyear event, it has already become one of the more prestigious festivals in the area. In addition, Las Cruces received over $300,000 of media coverage from this event. We continue to work closely with our industry partners. The CVB hosted a customer service training seminar in September with over 120 participants attending. We have also worked individually with a number of properties to engage staff by increasing their knowledge of the events, activities and attractions in and around Las Cruces. We also continue to participate throughout most of the year at the Saturday Farmers and Crafts Market, providing information to visitors and locals alike. The CVB has been working diligently to ensure that the Convention Center serves as an economic driver for the community. Toward this end, we led the way to negotiating a new contract with the Center s management company, Global Spectrum, that refocuses efforts to bring in out-of town business. This fundamental shift in focus will bolster the local economy as more visitors will come to Las Cruces for meetings and conventions. The Las Cruces Convention and Visitors Bureau continues to reshape itself as it adapts to the needs of our community and the local hospitality industry. We have broadened our vision beyond bringing visitors to our area. We now also focus our energies on enhancing the visitor experience and ensuring that we continue to have a vibrant and sustainable tourism product. 9 SALES DEPARTMENT YEAR END OVERVIEW This past year was a turbulent one with government sequesters, economic uncertainty and the loss of the Navy s contract with the Las Cruces International Airport. The effects of these factors can be seen in the lack of growth of the average daily rate and occupancy based on the STR report, a hotel market share analysis company to which the Bureau subscribes. There was also a slight decline in Lodgers Tax and Convention Center fees collected; however, this was not due to a lack of effort on the part of the CVB sales staff. The sales staff of the CVB exceeded all of their goals and saw an increase in all areas. From sales calls and tradeshows to direct mailings and special promotions, we were able to generate more lead opportunities and increase the visibility of Las Cruces as a destination for meetings, conventions, sporting events, group tours and leisure travelers.
Rochelle also managed to secure the re-booking of the Christian Congregations of Jehovah s Witnesses Convention for 2014, which will bring nearly 12,000 attendees for over 4,000 room nights. In addition, her response to the Request for Proposals from the New Mexico Municipal League won Las Cruces the bid for the 2019 Annual Conference. This is another great event for Las Cruces that will bring over 800 attendees and more than 2,000 room nights. Finally, this summer the Bureau hosted the National Tour Association s 2013 Summer Board Meeting which garnered great exposure for the city. It was a positive year for conventions and meetings, with larger conventions returning and new business on the horizon. Conventions The Convention Sales manager, Rochelle Miller- Hernandez, booked and assisted in bringing 42 conventions and meetings to Las Cruces, including bringing the New Mexico Mining Association to Las Cruces for the first time ever. Her efforts brought in over 30,000 attendees for over 8,000 room nights and resulted in an Estimated Economic Impact (EEI) of $3,842,000.00. Sports The Sports Sales Manager, Ed Carnathan, had an exemplary year in sales. He booked and assisted in bringing 40 sporting events to Las Cruces for an EEI of $3,320,000. His work brought in over 40,000 attendees and over 15,000 room nights to Las Cruces. 10
One of the signature events that Ed worked to bring to Las Cruces was the 2013 Ultimate Gladiator Dash an extreme 5K obstacle course event. With the Gladiator Dash hosting nearly 1000 participants and returning in 2014, Las Cruces is definitely finding a niche for extreme and specialty running events. 2013 also saw two inaugural events: the Austin Trout Youth Boxing Classic, and the Sonoma Ranch Half Marathon through the United States Running Association. We will also see the return of the Las Cruces Marathon from the United States Running Association in winter of 2013. Tourism Tourism Sales Manager, Andrea Lawrence, booked and assisted in bringing 32 tour groups to Las Cruces, with over 1500 attendees and nearly 1200 room nights. Last year Andrea worked with clients to develop tours from start to finish, in some cases with people who had little to no knowledge or interest in Las Cruces, and subsequently planned and conducted successful tours that exceeded the company s and its client s expectations. She also conducted several site visits last year that resulted in some companies booking their tours through Las Cruces, and other companies interested in doing so in the future. Andrea also worked diligently on product development for the leisure traveler, conceiving special programs such as Ticket 2 Taste and the Explorers Kids Club. Andrea led staff through the first annual Ticket 2 Taste passport program this year with great success. A total of 47 local restaurants participated in the program, hundreds of passports were turned in for both the local and out-of-town participants 11 and we received positive and encouraging feedback from the restaurateurs at the conclusion of the program. Staff worked to re-develop the family travel package, which was rebranded as the Explorers Kids Club and got its own mascot, LC the Las Cruces Roadrunner. Andrea was instrumental in securing deals from the hotels, restaurants and attractions for participation. The program started off slow but
gained some momentum towards the end of the summer. We look forward to seeing LC back again next year. Media department year-end review 2012-13 was a very busy year for the Bureau and, in particular, the Marketing Department. In August of 2012, the CVB kicked of a very lengthy but necessary rebranding process designed to create a marketable identity for Las Cruces. The process began with focus groups in Las Cruces and Albuquerque, intended to gain a local perspective of Las Cruces strengths and weaknesses as well as to gauge the level of knowledge and interest of potential visitors. The groups in Las Cruces, comprised of community leaders and representatives of the local hospitality industry, talked about our friendliness, culture, cuisine, unique experiences, sense of adventure and discussed how Las Cruces is the gateway to Southern New Mexico. Their insights reaffirmed many of our beliefs, but it was important to see that as a community we were moving in the same direction. The focus groups in Albuquerque painted a very different picture and, although the comments were not always pleasant to hear, it helped lay the foundation for a great deal of our marketing efforts moving forward. Groups in Albuquerque were separated into people who liked to travel and had been to Las Cruces in the last five years, and people who like to travel and have not been to Las Cruces recently. We learned that a good number of people in Albuquerque were somewhat familiar with Las Cruces, but did not have a firm handle on what you could see or do. There was also some confusion about exactly where Las Cruces was and how far it was from Albuquerque. Overall, the consensus seemed to be that if we could give people a good reason to visit, they would. As a result of the process, the Bureau developed the brand Explore. Experience. Discover. which we feel gives us the flexibility to market to a range of potential visitors from families with children to seniors. The remainder of the year was spent developing collateral materials to support the sales and market- 12 ing efforts of the CVB. This included the creation of LC the Roadrunner, a mascot used to brand our Las Cruces Kids Explores Club, a kids program disigned to attract families to Las Cruces. Additionally, we conducted a photo shoot to continue developing our image library.
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This past fiscal year brought on big and bold changes to the Las Cruces Convention and Visitors Bureau, and we move into the next fiscal year focused on building our brand and establishing Las Cruces as the perfect place to stay to Explore. Experience. Discover. Southern New Mexico. Many challenges remain, but we continue to build a strong alliance with the hospitality industry and collectively work towards making Las Cruces a great destination for meetings, conventions and tourists who want a New Mexico True experience. Las Cruces is perfectly situated to grow and flourish as a tourist destination. Within the next twelve to eighteen months, visitors will be coming to our area to take the first commercial flights into space. Many more visitors will want to visit to be an eyewitness to the future of air travel. Spaceport America is tomorrow s Kitty Hawk. It is estimated that approximately 200,000 visitors each year will visit Spaceport America. It is incumbent upon the CVB to ensure that Las Cruces receives its fair share of these prospective visitors, and that our industry partners are prepared for the influx of tourism. Efforts are also underway to make the Organ Mountains Dessert Peaks area a national monument. This natural treasure, which is literally at our doorstep, is exactly what many prospective visitors are looking for. There are trails, petroglyphs, caves, and mines to Explore, Experience and Discover. Today s visitors are looking for more than sightseeing. They are much more focused on sight-doing and, Las Cruces has many hands on experiences for people to try. The official designation as a National Monument would send a strong message to the rest of the world that Las Cruces is a great place to visit. The Las Cruces CVB is committed to working with the local industry to ensure we are prepared to support these new attractions. We sponsor training opportunities for the industry so that collectively we can be ready for the anticipated tourism growth. As part of our stratergy, we have set our goals for the next fiscal year and have developed a sales and marketing plan to ensure our success. The staff and Advisory Board are proud of its past accomplishments but look forward to building a better tomorrow for all who visit or live in our great city. Toward this end, we have established the following goals for the coming year: Build the Las Cruces brand as a desirable destination for groups, sporting events, meetings and individual travelers. Work with the hospitality industry to in crease occupancy and ADR by 5% during the next fiscal year. Broaden the appeal of Las Cruces to a younger demographic by establishing and improving programs and events targeting a younger audience while not diminishing the business derived from senior travelers. 14 Establish a long-term strategy to promote sustainable tourism offering a quality experience for all who visit. Partner with the local industry to ensure Las Cruces is committed to providing outstanding customer service, a variety of amenities, activities and events that broadens the tourism base for Las Cruces. Secure a permanent home for the CVB. Work with the Las Cruces Convention Center to attract business outside of the local area and to ensure that the center is run in a fiscally responsible manner. Promote enhanced regional tourism cooperation. Expand CVB s role in the promotion of Las Cruces. Ensure that the community of Las Cruces receive a reasonable return on its investment for its ongoing support of Spaceport America.
Las Cruces Lodgers Tax collections Las Cruces competition Annual Convention & Visitors Bureau Budget The Las Cruces Convention & Visitors Bureau is funded through the collection of a 5% Lodgers Tax assessed to every room night sold in the Las Cruces city limits. For fiscal year 2012-13, the Bureau s budget is $1,923,587. Las Cruces Competition Below are the annual Lodgers Tax collections of regional destinations that Las Cruces competes with for visitors. 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 Albuquerque, NM Tucson, AZ El Paso, TX Santa Fe, NM Las Cruces, NM Albuquerque, New Mexico Tucson, Arizona El Paso, Texas Santa Fe, New Mexico $10.2 million $9.2 million $9.1 million $6.7 million 15
Las Cruces is a community on the verge of great things. From a newly renovated downtown to Spaceport America just up the road, Las Cruces has a lot to offer. Like all communites however, Las Cruces is faced with challenges. Here is break down of both. Strengths Weather Affordability Festivals & events (Country Music Festival, The Whole Enchilada Fiesta, Harvest Wine Festival, etc.) Las Cruces Convention Center Arts, culture & history Cuisine Accessibility Las Cruces Farmers & Craft Market Variety of meeting venues Friendly people State & National Parks & Monuments Spaceport America White Sands National Monument Mesilla 2nd Largest city in New Mexico Softball / baseball capital of New Mexico Weaknesses Lack of infrastructure and commercial flights to municipal airport Not widely known Lack of transportation Lack of night-life Underdeveloped downtown Lack of major attractions Minimal shopping No resorts No convention center hotel Lack of adequate breakout space under one roof Proximity to area and regional attractions Limited amount of full service hotels Disproportionate number of limited to full service hotels Majority of teams and association member ship is in the north No state of the art multi-sports complex Opportunities Spaceport America Adjacent convention center hotel Organ Mountains as a National Monument New CVB branding / advertising campaign 16 Development of new festivals & events Special promotions: Explorers Kids Club, Salsa Experience, Ticket to Taste dining program Laser Visa / Border Expansion program New Mexico State University Military WSMR / NASA / Holloman Industry training initiative Redesign of visitors center Social media Threats Budget / Lodgers Tax Border conflict Lack of understanding of CVB goals and objectives Customer service Overall competition Economic uncertainty Deterioration of tourist related product (hotels, restaurants, shopping, attractions, etc.) Drought Military / federal cutbacks Virtual meetings
Overview The Las Cruces Convention & Visitors Bureau sales staff worked hard last year to overcome a number of obstacles that were encountered by the entire travel industry. In spite of these obstacles, they all persevered and managed to exceed goals and to end the year positively. Last year was a year of firsts with the Inaugural Country Music Festival, the Ticket 2 Taste dining program and the redesigned Explorers Kids Club. The CVB hired an additional Convention Sales Manager to help book business into the Las Cruces Convention Center as well as local hotels and meeting venues. We are happy to announce the hiring of Albert Herrera, Convention Sales Manager for the Las Cruces CVB. Albert comes to us with a strong background in hotel convention sales. His targets will be the SMERF (social, military, educational, religious, and fraternal), government and aerospace markets. We welcome Albert to our team. We will be bringing back the Las Cruces Country Music Festival, the Ticket 2 Taste restaurant passport program and the Explorers Kids Club. We have regrouped and redesigned many elements of each program and we have developed streamlined and manageable products. Conventions Not all of the product development we will be working on this year is geared toward the individual traveler. The Convention Sales department will be working on developing some special projects for the conventions and meetings markets. Rochelle Miller-Hernandez and Albert Herrera, Convention Sales Managers, will be retooling the Bring it Home campaign. The campaign was originally developed to ask City of Las Cruces employees to reach out to the associations and groups they belong to and help bring them to Las Cruces. It was an incentive program, and we did see some business from its launch. Now the staff, working in conjunction with the Las Cruces Convention Center, will be expanding and developing a program that will be available to anyone in Las Cruces. It will be launched with press releases and a press conference, and will be sent out through our partners in the business community. The incentives will be increased to draw more attention and excitement for the program. Although the sales staff works very hard to bring conventions and meetings to town, sometimes even we need a little help to get in the door or to close a deal. We are confident that the new campaign will help bring home some of the meetings and conventions we 17
have not seen in a while, or that we have not been able to convince to visit in the past. Another program the Convention Sales staff is working on is a planner s reception that will be hosted by the Las Cruces CVB in Albuquerque. Because most of the association planners and decision makers are located in Albuquerque or Santa Fe, the CVB staff and some of our local partners will be traveling to Albuquerque in November to host this networking reception. We will use our time before the reception to go on sales calls and have encouraged our partners in Las Cruces to do the same. It will be one large, cooperative sales blitz to get in front of these planners and decision makers to let them know what Las Cruces has to offer and why they should bring their next meeting or convention here. This event will also help planners meet key players in Las Cruces and help to develop and strengthen relationships with our clients in the north. Although the reception is geared mostly to the meetings and conventions markets, we will also be inviting some of the key tour operators and sports organizations. Convention Center Some major changes have been taking place in regards to the Las Cruces Convention Center over the past few months. The contract with the management company was rewritten and a new marketing and sales plan will be implemented. As part of the new plan, the convention sales department of the CVB and the Convention Center sales department have begun to work together more closely to bring business to Las Cruces. The two departments have always worked together in the past, but a new initiative and focus has been set in place and we will collaborate even more for the common goal of bringing events to town and filling hotel rooms. This collaboration mirrors the CVB s overall goal of creating one unified tourism industry in Las Cruces. Two big elements of this collaboration are travel and marketing. CVB convention sales staff and the Convention Center staff will be aligning sales travel 18
so that we will be able to reach a larger audience. This will reduce any overlap in efforts thus reducing overall travel expenses, and will enable at least one sales manager, either from the CVB or the Convention Center, to be present at all appropriate and worthwhile tradeshows and events. The two teams will also be doing sales calls to northern New Mexico at least 4 times per year and we are prospecting sales trips to Arizona, Colorado and west Texas. These one on one meetings will help to develop and foster relationships with planners as well as work to create more of a sales force for Las Cruces. The CVB sales staff will also be opening up more opportunities for area hotels to participate in travel to help Las Cruces become even more visible. Sports It has been a busy and exciting year for CVB Sports Sales. Ed Carnathan, Sports Sales Manager, has been working diligently in recent years to book a substantial, high profile event for Las Cruces, and this year his work paid off. In January 2014, Las Cruces will host the Biggest Loser Run/Walk. This is very exciting for the CVB and Las Cruces as this is a very high profile event that will put the name Las Cruces in front of hundreds of thousands of people. Not only are we excited for the Biggest Loser event, but the Ultimate Gladiator Dash, a 5 mile extreme obstacle course, will return to Las Cruces in 2014. Because of our excellent year-round weather, we are confident that more and more running and extreme events will see Las Cruces as the perfect destination. Ed will focus energy in finding more marathons and extreme obstacle course events to bring to Las Cruces. 19 Sports sales have proven year after year to be very lucrative for Las Cruces, especially in our leaner summer and winter months. Because of that, Ed has begun to travel to more tradeshows that have started to implement a sports element, such as Connect, which has historically been convention and meetings based only. He is also working with more event developers and organizers to bring consumer based shows into the Convention Center. Over the next year he will work to seek out comic-con types of events that will fit in the Convention Center and that will work for Las Cruces. Tourism Historically, tourism sales have been focused on group tours, but over the past few years that has been slowly changing to focus more on the individual traveler. This realighment creates the need for product enhancement and development as the individual traveler seeks more of an experiential rather than an observational travel experience. Andrea Lawrence, our Tourism Sales Manager, took the lead in developing the Ticket to Taste restaurant passport program last year and to redevelop the Explorers Kids Club. She will continue with both programs this coming year.
customer service training to yield management. These seminars will be held during the summer and winter months when attendance will be optimal. We will also begin to implement a certification program geared towards the hospitality industry in anticipation of Spaceport America and the opening of their Visitors Experience. The goal of this program is to give to the clients and visitors of Spaceport America a listing of partners who are dedicated to customer service, and provide these visitors with the peace of mind knowing they will have the best possible experience when visiting Las Cruces. This program will also involve basic customer service training, as well as how best to work with foreign visitors. This will be an ongoing effort and will involve webinars as well as live workshops. As always we will work together to increase awareness of Las Cruces in order to bring more business to town and increase the impact to the general fund, while using as little city services as possible. We will attempt to reach our goals in the most economic and sustainable ways possible in order to increase our overall return on investment. In addition to the restaurant and kids programs, Andrea will be working to create a litany of new itineraries for the individual and group travelers. All of the itineraries will include some element of experiential travel, such as a field-to-table tour or a visit to a local artist s studio, both involving handson elements. Department Goal The Sales Department of the CVB as a whole will be working to develop a training program for the local hospitality industry. This has been a long time goal of the CVB and one that has started to gain enough momentum to turn into something tangible. There will be three to four training seminars a year to help our hospitality partners with everything from basic 20
The 2013-14 fiscal year comes on the heels of a nearly year-long rebranding process which culminated in the development of the Explore. Experience. Discover. brand for the Las Cruces Convention & Visitors Bureau. The new branding allows the CVB to target the leisure, meetings, group tour and sports markets with a message that will also clearly resonate with the travel professionals and consumers. The first half of 2013 saw the development and rebranding of several key marketing tools, such as a new size and design for the visitors guide, a new mobile-friendly website and sales and promotional materials. This year the focus will be on further development of those key items, and on defining and executing an advertising strategy that will work to promote Las Cruces as a destination for meetings, sports, group tour and leisure. Branding is an ongoing process and lives in every detail of the marketing process. The key to great branding is to always be on the lookout for new and creative ways to incorporate and showcase brand elements. Even though several of the main sales materials such as sales guides, website and visitor guides have been rebranded, there is still a tremendous amount of work to be done to fully immerse Las Cruces in the Explore. Experience. Discover. brand. Goals The department has set several goals that will continue to build upon the CVB s new Explore. Experience. Discover. brand, and continue to make Las Cruces known as a business and leisure destination. Branding, Advertising and Public Relations Create stronger awareness of Las Cruces in markets within a 300 mile radius Our focus groups made it very clear that there is a tremendous amount of work to be done in our own backyard when it comes to letting people know what Las Cruces has to offer. For that reason, and because of budgetary limitations, we will be focusing our advertising efforts on an area within 300-500 miles of Las Cruces. Those markets include but are not limited to: West Texas, Northern New Mexico (Albuquerque and Santa Fe), Tucson, and Phoenix, Arizona. Advertising efforts in these cities will focus on package deals and special promotions targeting key demographics within each community. Examples of these programs include the expanded Las Cruces Explorers Kids Club program (which features hotels offering special 21
rates, restaurants offering free meals to kids 12 and under and attractions offering free admission to kids 12 and under) and the Las Cruces Country Music Festival. Advertising will include a mix of print, digital, radio and TV. Other marketing efforts include targeted email marketing based on selected demographic or geographic parameters. We will also continue to build our consumer database through online visitor guide requests, online sweepstakes, traditional and online advertising. Expand and develop public relations efforts Because of the size of our advertising and marketing budget, it is important to be innovative with our resources. One way to accomplish this is to incorporate public relations tactics that often generate a greater return on investment than advertising. The CVB will work with the New Mexico Tourism Department s contracted public relation agency to generate additional exposure for Las Cruces as well as look for additional PR opportunities that can continue to spread the Las Cruces brand. Publications and Electronic Communications Boost online marketing strategy and digital footprint The department recently launched a redesigned mobile-friendly website that will allow for easy and professional viewing on all computers and mobile devices. The department scaled back the number of websites in its network to one main site in order to focus on the search engine optimization and to ensure the CVB remain atop the most popular search engines for key search terms related to Las Cruces. There will also be an attempt made to expand Las Cruces key word reach into terms that include New Mexico instead of just Las Cruces. The CVB will also incorporate its branding into at least two mobile apps. One will be a general information app, more in line with a mobile visitors guide, and the other will be specifically designed for attendees at local conventions, sporting and special events. 22
Redesign the Las Cruces Visitors Guide to better serve as a trip planner and local resource for visitors The department was able to make several needed changes to the 2013-14 visitors guide, but there is still much work to be done to make the guide a more relevant trip planning tool. The guide will become a more interactive publication both in print and in digital form, with the intent of keeping visitors connected to the most current information. The guide is set to be printed and distributed in late April 2014 in time for the Las Cruces Country Music Festival. Build a more engaging social media program that will incorporate current trends No one can deny the power of social media. Over the last few years, brands have taken to sites like Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest to spread the word about their brand and to engage consumers to do the same. As a result, no marketing strategy can be complete without the use of social media. The CVB has been actively involved in social media for the last few years and has built a following of over 11,000 on Facebook and around 1,100 on Twitter. This has provided the Bureau with an opportunity to have instant access to potential visitors and to reach them with special deals and offers. The Bureau will continue to engage current followers, creating content designed to generate feedback and developing special offers only available to followers. The baureau also will be incorporating Pinterest and Instagram into its social media strategy to keep up with current social media trends. The goal for this year will be to create an integrated social media plan that supports all other advertising efforts and builds an active and engaged audience. Staff Support Streamline support staff to become a greater resource for visitors and sales and marketing department Part of the function of the Marketing and Communications Department is to provide support to the Bureau s sales staff. This year support will include working closely with its contacted brand consultant and graphic design firm Moetiv8 Marketing to further develop the department s photo library, and to rebrand sales and promotional materials. The department will also be looking to add part-time help to assist with the duties and responsibilities of marketing Las Cruces. 23