NWT Tourism Member Advocacy and Tourism Marketing Update

Dear members,

NWT Tourism continues to work on behalf of all members on the advocacy front, as well as being very active in our target markets for tourism marketing. We'd like to give you a brief update today.

NWT COVID-19 Situation
Many of you will likely be aware of the news this week that Yellowknife, N'Dilo and Dettah are under new restrictions on gatherings, based on current public health orders. This follows several community lockdowns in the Sahtu, and a new containment order for Behchoko. The impact of the ongoing COVID situation in the NWT, and the current outbreak in particular, has contributed to the NWT border not opening to leisure travel yet, we understand that it is very frustrating for all members and for our industry. NWT Tourism has been, and continues to, request clarification on benchmarks being used to determine the status of the border opening to leisure travel in the NWT.  Once the current health orders expire on September 22, the COVID-19 situation will be reassessed in the NWT.

Work with the COVID-19 Secretariat and Remote Tourism Operations
NWT Tourism has been working closely with the COVID-19 Secretariat for many months, and we meet regularly. This does not prevent outbreaks of COVID-19, but it does mean that we are connected and working with the people close to the public health orders, and advocating for reopening as soon as this is possible. This ongoing relationship was extremely helpful when it came to the work involved in allowing remote tourism operations. We would like to acknowledge the hard work of several members of the NWT Tourism Board of Directors, and in particular Wendy Grater whose expertise greatly advanced allowing this initiative to happen. We have heard from tourism operators who successfully applied for this program and benefited from being able to receive visitors, and we have heard from others who did not apply to the program because they felt the application process was too onerous. We would like to share that the process has become much more streamlined. The Remote Tourism Operations plan affords your business some certainty, in uncertain times, that you will be able to host any visitor that is allowed to be in Canada. We encourage anyone who is interested in the program to apply, and you can start by contacting our office.

Federal Government Allowing Leisure Travellers to Enter Canada
As of September 7, Canada is now allowing fully vaccinated foreign nationals for non-essential reasons, such as tourism, with a number of requirements which must be met. For your information, we'd like to include this link that you may find helpful. Information shared with us in our work with Destination Canada is also included here:

• Infographic: A one-page document outlining requirements for all travelers entering Canada by land or air.
• Traveller information Tool: Tool for potential visitors to find out if they can enter Canada

Provincial and Territorial Restrictions on Travel Within Canada
While there are no federal restrictions on travel within Canada, many provinces and territories have their own rules and restrictions in place. In Canada, as of today, there are five provinces and territories that have no restrictions on travel within Canada. These five are Alberta, British Columbia, Ontario, Saskatchewan, and Yukon. In the other eight provinces and territories, restrictions differ widely. This federal government web page is the most up-to-date resource on travel restrictions within Canada. Differing rules for different jurisdictions for travel within Canada is terribly confusing for everyone. At NWT Tourism we frequently field calls from potential visitors who ask if (and then when) our territory will be open for leisure travel. We are attentive to the travel restrictions in place in all jurisdictions in Canada. We work to keep all of our colleagues, and especially our General Sales Agents and Destination Canada up to date on our current realities.

Tourism Industry Association of Canada - Tourism Advocacy on the National Front
NWT Tourism continues to be a very active member in the Tourism Association of Canada. Work is being done at the national level to advocate for: continued economic support for this hardest-hit industry, the delivery of a seamless proof of vaccination certification program, and the implementation of progressive strategies to address other critical issues facing our industry. There are two issues in particular we would like to highlight in this work.

1. Labour Shortage
   Throughout our industry, locally and nationally, we are hearing about critical issues with attracting and retaining staff. We have heard this from tourism operators, restaurant owners, accommodation providers, and many others within the NWT.  NWT Tourism itself has been unable to recruit for two positions in our office, despite arranging multiple interviews and making job offers both within the NWT and within other parts of Canada. Through our work with TIAC, we are advocating the federal government to look at progressive strategies to address the labour shortage in our industry.
2. Traveller Confidence
   Travellers feeling safe to travel will have a big part to play in the recovery of our industry. Much has been done on the national front, including developing best practices and research and consumer surveys. Destination Canada has a helpful web page on this topic. The World Travel & Tourism Council (WTTC) has developed common protocols for businesses to utilize. NWT Tourism is working on the website materials and other components so that members will have access to the WTTC Safe Travel Stamp program. Please watch for a separate communication to be sent to all members soon, when this program is ready to be rolled out for our industry in the NWT.

TOURISM MARKETING
There is a ton of work being done in tourism marketing from our office. Here are just a few highlights we would like to share.

Travel Guide
The Spectacular Guide (formerly known as the Explorers' Guide) is in the final processes of being prepared for printing. As always, the guide will feature all regions and all sectors in the Northwest Territories. We have acquired new images and will also be featuring some of our newer videos (through the use of QR codes) in the guide. We are looking forward to sharing the new Spectacular Guide with all of you.

Tourism Marketing Plan
The writing of the annual NWT Tourism Marketing Plan is underway. Our plan is backed by solid data and incredible research we have initiated which allows us to target a very specific market segments with our digital, social, and other marketing activities. Like last year, the plan will have flexibility so that adjustments can be made based on whatever unforeseen events might come our way during fiscal year 2021/22. Members will get a more in-depth update on some of these things at a presentation by Joel Walton, Marketing Director, during our AGM and Conference.

Website and Digital Presence
NWT Tourism continues to have a presence in the digital marketplace, as we have throughout this entire pandemic. We have been kept up to speed on what our competitors have been doing throughout, and have utilized some unique strategies to keep us top of mind for consumers. We know that this work will be instrumental in the recovery of the NWT as tourism destination.

• In this calendar year, from January through August, we have averaged over 62,000 pageviews per month on our website. Visitors are going to many pages on our site, with our spectacular stories being the number one content category.
• Organic Search continues to be the number one way that people find our website. This means that we are appearing in google search when people are looking for the activities that tourism has to offer in the NWT, and this along with digital ad performance demonstrates that interest in the Northwest Territories is high. This can also be attributed in part to the hard work being done on our website in the area of Search Engine Optimization - the work that is being done continually to update wording to capture key search terms and refresh images on the site.
• We have undertaken some website upgrades during the pandemic. One project has been to work on the page load time of our website, and an other is to do the work required to introduce new landing pages for our sector-based activities. This will begin with the Aurora landing page.
• We continue to add new content and refresh the writing on all of our website pages. In the past few months, we have undertaken an audit of all attractions listed on our site, updating text and adding new imagery wherever possible.
• Social media continues to be very active. We regularly monitor feedback on social posts, and have been very pleased that almost all comments have been positive. We have grown our following on Facebook on Instagram since before the pandemic started. As of today NWT Tourism has just over 76,000 followers on Facebook, and over 25,000 on Instagram.

There is far more work being undertaken on the advocacy and marketing fronts than we can enumerate here. Our hope in sharing these highlights is to help you be aware of some of what is currently going on in the industry. We continue to hear from members with updates and particular concerns, and we welcome this. Please continue to stay in touch.

Thank you,

Donna Lee Demarcke
Chief Executive Officer
NWT Tourism
Executive@spectacularnwt.com