In the early 1980's the community leaders of Van Buren County, Iowa saw that the agricultural economy was taking a serious downturn, and chose tourism as a way to boost their economy and sustain the region. They began the transformation process by identifying what they had to offer and then employed a tourism professional to develop strategies for tourism. Through careful planning and the hard work and dedication of community leaders and residents, tourism in Van Buren County is still going strong today.

Many communities are turning to tourism as a strategy for economic development. Experiential tourism in particular, including natural, historical, cultural and recreational activities, can help diversify a community's economy while enhancing the region's vitality and quality of life. Van Buren County, Iowa is just one tourism success story, exemplifying tourism's potential for bolstering economies even through turbulent economic times. Communities don't just decide to focus on tourism as a development strategy overnight. Achieving and sustaining your full tourism potential requires innovative and effective tourism development strategies, committed leadership and diligence on the part of the entire development team. Here we summarize four keys to a successful tourism development program.

Resource Assessment

• Identify leadership and define community organization
• Profile current and potential visitors
• Survey resident attitudes
• Develop vision and set goals
• Inventory resources, natural amenities, historical events, architectural structures, local culture, etc.

Market Research

• Gain insights into tourists' behaviors and preferences
• Learn the factors that affect tourists' behavior
• Understand tourists' decision making processes, particularly those effecting destination choices
• Identify customer expectations of products and services

Product Development

• Interpretation: telling the story of a place to translate your community's resources into valued tourism products.
• Based on sound market research, create high quality experiences that tourists will pay to enjoy.
• Facilitate collaboration and partnerships between businesses
• Sustain and promote the community's identity
• Fulfill its citizen's visions

Marketing and Promotion

• Assess the community's overall objectives (i.e., raise the number of tourists, increase visitors' length of stay, grow local expenditures, develop/change the community's image)
• Analyze today's experiential tourism market and trends
• Segment and evaluate tourism markets and establish marketing plans for eachC
• Create an implementation plan and methods to evaluate its effectiveness

Embarking on the development of a tourism program as part of your overall economic development strategy can be daunting, particularly for those small communities that typically have the most unique experiences to offer would be visitors. There are a number of state, federal and private foundations that offer financial support as well as technical assistance to entities seeking to develop and implement tourism strategies. TEEX can offer this support or point you in the direction of an abundance of resources (look for a future article on this topic). In the meantime, you can get started on your plan by following these seven steps to plan, deploy and maintain a successful tourism strategy.

1. Conduct a resource assessment, including human, institutional, recreational, natural and physical resources.
2. Hold a workshop to articulate tourism objectives, and identify stakeholders, leaders and opposition.
3. Identify potential pitfalls, including concerns of businesses and interest groups, and develop management strategies.
4. Create and execute a detailed action plan, including outcome-oriented tasks with measurable objectives.
5. Provide ongoing support for tourism operations via web resources, access to technical assistance and performance support tools.
6. Develop methods to monitor success, and evaluate and minimize negative impacts through contingency planning.
7. Continually evaluate the process and outcomes; modify plan as needed to ensure success.