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Tourism commission weighs website, visitor-guide overhaul and SEO fix for 'Celebrate Franklin' redirect
Summary
The Franklin Tourism Commission discussed options to modernize the city's visitor website and printed guide, including a proposal to pursue a vendor-style platform used by similar communities and to ensure Celebrate Franklin redirects to Engage Franklin for search results.
The Franklin Tourism Commission on a routine meeting discussed steps to improve the city’s visitor-facing website and printed visitors guide and to fix a lingering search-engine redirect that still surfaces an older "Celebrate Franklin" site.
Commissioners said the current web presence is confusing to potential visitors because both the city pages and the older Celebrate Franklin site appear in search results; members urged staff to finish transferring control so visitors searching for "Celebrate Franklin" are redirected to the newer Engage Franklin pages. Commissioner Barbara Wisser raised the issue after checking Google results and said the Celebrate Franklin pages still appear as a shell in searches, which can confuse users looking for lodging and events.
Commissioners and participants discussed examples from other communities, including Pleasant Prairie, and a vendor referenced as McDaniels (a private firm with a regional representative) that produced Pleasant Prairie’s site. Members said they were less interested in a specific vendor than in the “look-and-feel” and capabilities — itinerary planning, CRM components and ticket-selling integrations — that would let staff produce and sell itineraries, sell tickets and hand off site maintenance without vendor lock-in.
Commissioners said the site's search-engine ranking and redirection need attention from city staff and from Brandon, who has been working on the transfer. They requested that Engage Franklin and city staff confirm that Celebrate Franklin is redirected or disabled at the top-search level so the public lands on current listings and event pages.
The discussion also covered the visitors guide content and a desire to make the guide partly revenue-neutral through advertising sales once the product is established, and the potential for Engage Franklin to offer ticketing and fee-based services to smaller local event organizers. No formal votes were taken; commissioners asked staff to follow up with Engage Franklin and city IT and to place the items on the next agenda for action.
Commissioners said they will pursue a clearer handoff plan with Brandon and with Engage Franklin leadership so that search results and site content present a single, up-to-date resource for prospective visitors.
