Tourism staff told the Seaside Tourism Advisory Committee about a fall advertising push across Portland and Seattle broadcast markets, recent visitor-guide distribution numbers, and year-over-year website and email growth.

Staff described negotiated TV schedules secured through a public-relations partner: a mix of 60‑second, 15‑second and 5‑second spots on Portland and Seattle broadcast affiliates (examples cited included KGW, KPTV/FOX 12 and a Seattle NBC affiliate). Staff said the 60‑second spots will mix a “how-to” piece featuring Seaside activities with a 60‑second sizzle reel drawn from the tourism office’s existing website video assets; 15‑ and 5‑second spots will include shorter seasonal creative and existing North Coast clips. The Portland schedule included more total 60‑second spots compared with the Seattle buy, reflecting negotiated placements in high-viewership programming such as NBA games, college football and holiday specials.

Staff also provided distribution and engagement statistics: visitor-guide mail orders and onsite pick-up remained strong year-over-year; email sign-ups were reported as roughly 43,000 subscribers; web sessions and inbound traffic were described as “very strong” with a substantial share coming from paid-search and retargeting campaigns. Staff warned that organic search had declined over several years, and said the department is watching shifts in how AI-driven search agents route traffic to content.

The committee discussed how to measure return on investment for advertising and whether increased tourism funding should be requested in future city budget cycles. Staff explained that the city budget process determines the tourism fund allocation and that any request for added money would require a specific pitch during the city budgeting cycle.

Committee members asked staff to continue providing regular metrics and to flag when the department believes additional budget would generate demonstrable returns.