Driving Tourists to an Unforgettable Location

The Challenge

To establish Ventura County Coast as a leader in travel and tourism by highlighting its commitment to preserving the region’s unique environment while catering to the rising demand for viable travel options.

VCC’s greatest assets — the four cities of Camarillo, Oxnard, Ventura, and Port Hueneme — also posed the greatest challenge. With each destination having something unique to offer, we needed to figure out how to highlight the distinctive qualities and offerings that made each city special while keeping VCC’s overall brand consistent. Easier said than done.

The brand is administered by the Ventura County Lodging Association (VCLA), which consists of more than 60 lodging partners and destination marketing organizations. From day one, our goal was simple: find creative ways to attract more visitors and promote longer stays. With so much to offer, Ventura County Coast was in a prime position to reach multiple audiences. It was up to us to get the message out — and do it in a way that captured that unmistakable VCC essence.

The Solution

Create data-driven integrated marketing campaigns to increase overnight visitation and support local businesses and communities.

We’re not a traditional tourism agency — and that allowed us to bring a fresh perspective that tourism-specific agencies simply couldn’t provide. We knew our team’s collaborative creativity and brand-first process would produce one-of-a-kind campaigns that would set Ventura County Coast apart from other travel destinations. So, after reviewing their current brand presence, we started developing collateral and campaigns to increase awareness, sentiment, and visitors.

We launched a new, fully integrated marketing plan that targeted three primary audiences: outdoor lovers, good vibes seekers, and families. In all our campaign work, we implemented a strategic mix of awareness and conversion tactics to introduce VCC to potential visitors and show them all the unforgettable sights, attractions, and experiences the area has to offer.

Results

• 37.6M

  Paid Media Impressions

• 129%

  Increase YOY in overall web traffic

• 8%

  Average Paid Media CTR

Paid media came out of the gate strong, generating impressive results from the outset. Our creative team — a tight-knit collaboration between designers and copywriters — developed a variety of campaign assets tailored to resonate with VCC’s three core target personas. These were not just visually captivating; they were strategically aligned with persona behaviors and preferences to maximize engagement.

From there, our media buying teams introduced dynamic creative into the market, leveraging advanced geo-targeting and affinity-based audience layering. This precision targeting ensured that each impression was both relevant and timely, funneling high-quality traffic to persona-specific landing pages and the VCC booking engine.

Our paid search campaigns consistently outperformed industry benchmarks, which hover around a 3% click-through rate (CTR) according to Google. In peak months, our efforts drove CTRs as high as 11.5%, showcasing the exceptional effectiveness of both creative and targeting.

The outcome? Not only did Ventura County Coast experience all-time-high traffic and engagement across digital channels, but they also gained access to new, high-intent audience segments — adding long-term value to VCC’s overall marketing strategy.