As the Executive Director of the Southern Midcoast Maine Chamber (SMMC) a key project for me right now is the Chamber companion guide. We produce an annual guide that we send to tourists and relocators upon request and we distribute them in information centers, rest stops and other chambers of commerce around the state. This week and next, the chamber is looking for your feedback on what your favorite trips, amenities and places are in our region.
It’s a big job to summarize the best parts of a region when tourists and relocators could be coming here for numerous different reasons. They could be travelling for a wedding, a funeral, a child’s sports tournament, to get a new job, to retire, to attend college, to simply vacation, to explore or dozens of other reasons. In this guide we try to have information that is useful to the broadest amount of people.
However, chambers of commerce have another roadblock. One of the problem with chamber guides, goes back to a core tenet of a chamber of commerce. We have hundreds of businesses who are dues paying members of our chamber and we want to promote them as evenly as we can- at the very least giving them each the same opportunity for promotion. For instance, if someone asks a citizen “What’s the best place to buy a lobster” you can name you favorite restaurant or two. But with a chamber, we need to give everyone the same opportunity so we mention all of our restaurants. That may be fair, but it may not be that helpful to a traveler.
The only way for our chamber of commerce to stay relevant, is to do the work that is needed, and in terms of a guide, that means providing the most relevant information a traveler may need. Last year, the SMMC Marketing Team set out on a quest to revamp our guest guide with that challenge in mind- be fair to all members, but provide travelers with useable information.
The work the team did was remarkable. We went from having the Allure of the Coast guest guide to now having the Eat Play Stay companion guide. The difference? The guest guide was geared to travelers and previewed the area, but had ineffective content like the Four Seasons in the Midcoast, a Food & Drink page that didn’t mention any restaurants and a Careers in the Midcoast page that didn’t mention any businesses by name. They were typical sections you see in many guides, but is was also a missed opportunity to provide the traveler with useable relevant information. So we scrapped those sections and created new ones.
The 2018 Eat Play Stay had relevant information like a travel matrix from a dozen different locations both inside and outside our region with both time and mileage. The travel matrix helped trip planning, by giving those not from the area the information they need. There’s a distinct difference trying to get over the Wiscasset/Newcastle bridge at 7AM and 1PM- if you don’t know the area, you don’t know that. On a map Bath to Boothbay Harbor looks to be 23 miles- if you aren’t from here you may think you can get there in 30 minutes. Seeing it may take an hour or more, helps make sure you don’t miss the whale watch, for instance.
The 2018 Eat Pay Stay also had travel information that we already know we are going to keep in the 2019 version like a tide chart (essential for boating and swimming), an updated frequently asked question section (taken from the info centers and the questions most asked by travelers), community profiles of the towns in our region, a lodging and restaurant matrix with the amenities of the member properties marked and a member directory broken out by industry. This is all relevant information for the companion guide. Additionally, we call it a companion guide because we want people to take this with them when they travel so we design it to have information that is as useful while they’re travelling as it is when they’re making their plans to travel.
Here is where we need your help for the 2019 Eat Play Stay.
We had three top ten lists in 2018 and we will have them again in 2019. They may or may not be the same topics as 2018- this is where your feedback comes in. Last year we did top ten hiking trails, top ten live entertainment venues and top ten regional events. What top ten lists would you like to see?
Also, to make it fair and give each business the opportunity, we asked for votes on these top ten lists as polls on our chamber Facebook page last year. Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday April 24-26 there will be a new poll posted each day. If you want your favorite place to get mentioned in the top ten, you go there and vote.
Our guide has 4-5 maps that last year we intentionally left with very few landmarks so information center staff could plot routes for travelers. We got the feedback that more icons would be helpful to find the most popular destinations. What tourist attractions would you like to see plotted on the maps?
Finally, we had an accolades page for members which we want to expand. Did you win an industry award or acknowledgment from a publication or group? If you have proof of the award then let us know and we’ll publish this in our accolades section. It’s a free way for our members to get recognized.
The best way for you to help is to e-mail your thoughts to the chamber at executivedirector@midcoastmaine.com or info@midcoastmaine.com so we have your thoughts in your own words. Or vote next week on the polls on our Facebook page and share it with your friends. Help us make the 2019 guide the best representation of our area.
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