Sunshine Matters

The winners of the 35th Annual Telly Awards were recently announced and VISIT FLORIDA was honored with three statuettes.  The Everglades in 60 Seconds video won in both the Nature and Wildlife category and the Travel and Tourism category, and Soaring Over the Everglades won in the Travel and Tourism category.  Both videos were produced by freelancers from VISIT FLORIDA’s network of nearly 90 content providers.  Continue reading »

I am pleased to announce that VISIT FLORIDA’s efforts to market the Sunshine State to visitors around the globe in 2013 had a significant influence on their travel planning decisions.  Results just in from the annual Return on Investment Influencer Study show that, of the surveyed respondents who had been to Florida in the past year, 38 percent were significantly influenced in their decision to visit the state by one or more VISIT FLORIDA marketing initiatives. Continue reading »

I’m proud to share that our recently revamped consumer website  has been named one of the 20 best designed tourism websites in the world by Skift.com.   Skift, a travel intelligence startup that offers news, data, and tools to the travel industry, says they searched through hundreds of tourism websites for countries, states, and cities to produce this list of the 20 best designed sites.   Samantha Shankman, a reporter with Skift, explained that for VISITFLORIDA.com and the other sites on the list “their design sense is right on and should be an example to destinations still stuck in the era of online brochures.” Continue reading »

With the 2013 Hurricane Season beginning tomorrow, I wanted to share the resources and action steps VISIT FLORIDA has developed to ensure Florida’s visitors have access to consistent, real-time, statewide information.  It is our hope that these efforts will allow our visitors to make the most informed travel planning decisions possible in preparation for a potential weather threat that might impact the state. Continue reading »

While Viva Florida 500 is a year-long commemoration of the discovery of the Sunshine State by Spanish explorer Juan Ponce de Leon and his crew, April marks the celebration’s biggest push.  To kick things off, VISIT FLORIDA participated in a press conference hosted by Florida Secretary of State Ken Detzner on April 2 to coincide with the actual anniversary of Ponce de Leon’s landing.  One of the big announcements was the impending arrival of El Galeón, a replica of Spanish ships from 500 years ago, that would be sailing from Spain to Puerto Rico and on to four ports of call in Florida. Continue reading »