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City hears marketing report showing strong lodging referrals and new AI strategy to maintain visibility
Summary
Marketing contractors reported 2025 referral and advertising metrics and described an AI/SEO strategy to retain Solvang content in emerging AI search results; council asked for dashboard access and clarity on metrics. Some numeric figures in the presentation were approximate and will be verified by staff.
City marketing contractors presented a year‑end review of tourism marketing and digital work, showing that targeted campaigns continued to drive lodging referrals and that the team is shifting tactics to respond to the rise of AI‑driven search.
John Sorkinfrei of TJA (presenting for the marketing team) summarized paid advertising, creative development and lodging referral performance. He reported that over a 12‑month period the marketing program generated roughly "102,000 times lodging referrals" and that, applying the campaign's look‑to‑book assumptions, the team estimated lodging sales attributable to the website traffic in the low millions (presentation cited an estimate around $13,000,786) and an estimated contribution to TOT on the order of the low single‑millions. Sorkinfrei said the work focuses on converting targeted household audiences into overnight stays.
Claudia, the social media manager, said Meta ads averaged just under 17,000 link clicks per month and that Pinterest impressions and user‑generated content performed especially well; she cited a top e‑blast open rate of about 47% for a campaign piece and described automation to convert social engagement to email subscribers.
Tom, who leads website work, walked council through AI and SEO changes: search behavior is shifting toward summary answers delivered directly in search results, reducing low‑intent sessions. Tom said the strategy is to make Solvang the source AI cites so users who want detail are routed to the city site for high‑intent conversion.
Council members pressed for dashboard access and clarification of metrics such as sessions versus conversion rates. Staff and the contractors said they will provide logins and follow up with verified, exportable metrics for council review. The presentation included granular campaign spend and impression counts; staff noted some numeric transcription oddities in the meeting record and said they would verify and correct figures in the packet so the council has final, audited numbers.
Quotes in this article are drawn from the March 23 presentation; numeric figures are those presented by the contractor in council materials and will be subject to staff verification.
