While Seaside hit the height of summer activity last month with thousands of visitors in the short span of time between the Seaside Beach Volleyball Tournament and the Hood To Coast relay, the Visitors Bureau was running the opening steps of an interesting and novel advertising approach.

Yes, we put a full-page ad focusing on stewardship in the Volleyball Guide. Yes, we partnered with KOIN TV to feature our marquee events during weather broadcasts with the Seaside cam. Yes, we even coordinated a live segment on the Oregonian’s Facebook page during volleyball weekend.

But none of those are what I want to write about. What’s really remarkable, to me, is that during the month of August — one of the busiest times of year here — we put a geo-fence around the beach and downtown Seaside to build a potential advertising database for the shoulder and winter seasons.

What is a geo-fence and how did we put it up? Good questions. Six months ago I didn’t know the answers either. While this isn’t new technology exactly, the approach we’re taking with it is cutting edge stuff for the tourism industry. At basic, a geo-fence is a virtual boundary via GPS/RFID technology overlaid on a real-world geography that triggers a response when a mobile-connected device enters or leaves a designated area. We put it up by collaborating with experts — in this case, the Oregonian Media Group. As we all learned in kindergarten, it’s important to have the right friends.

At basic, we’re building an anonymous list of mobile devices that were present here at Seaside in August and — this is important — quickly left town and returned to the Portland metro region. Imagine a family member of a volleyball player who only huddled around one of the hundreds of beach courts or an exhausted but thrilled Hood To Coast runner who just got a taste of the magic of an extended stay in Seaside. Starting this month and again in October, we’ll begin pushing hyper-targeted digital ads to exactly these kinds of folks inviting them to come back and experience all Seaside has to offer now that things are less hectic under our spectacular fall weather.

From a marketing perspective, it seems like a fair bet. We don’t know their names or personal details — the technology isn’t that creepy, thankfully — but we do know they’re familiar with Seaside and we know they’re within driving distance. That’s a good place to begin the conversation.

Next up we’ll evaluate the results of this experiment in the coming months and then iterate and reiterate the process to best results with fresh opportunities in the new year. Or else we’ll abandon and move on to try other things. This is an experiment, after all.

Each season we’re sure to build a bedrock of solid advertising through radio, internet, and magazines first in order to serve as a foundation for these more esoteric efforts. It’s the combination, I think, that will put us on the map with younger generations while staying connected to those who have come to Seaside for years (and will continue for years to come so long as we keep the welcome mat out for them).

Got a tourism-related comment or question? I’d love to hear from you. Write me at jheineman@cityofseaside.us.