County Tourist Agencies Hope Web Sites Will Lure Travelers

If employees at Channel Islands Harbor Visitor Center and other local tourism agencies have their way, Ventura County will be accommodating tens of thousands of surfers in the months ahead.

Internet surfers, that is.

The harbor, as well as Channel Islands National Park and the Oxnard and Ventura tourism bureaus, have created or upgraded sites on the World Wide Web since the start of February to promote their activities, special events and visitor accommodations.

Last week marked the upgrading of Channel Islands Harbor’s Web page and the debut of its e-mail address, a move that tourism officials there said will enhance the harbor’s marketing ability.

“We’ve already listed our festivals, along with information about the harbor, such as boat races, sports fishing, boat rentals, whale watching, anything and everything that goes on here,” said Susan O’Brien, marketing director for the harbor.

“San Francisco, Catalina and Palm Springs are on the Internet. We wanted to keep up with those tourist areas.”

The page can be cross-referenced by Internet users surfing the Web for topics such as fishing and boating.

O’Brien said the Internet has proven itself as a valuable marketing tool since an earlier, limited version of the page was created last summer.

“We get requests for information from all over the world. We’ve gotten calls from Europe; one day there was a call from Iraq,” she said.

“Now with our own e-mail capabilities, people can leave messages asking for more information. They can message us and say, ‘I’m coming to the harbor in April. What’s going on at that time?”

Placing the harbor on the World Wide Web is part of a stepped-up marketing campaign by the harbor’s business association.

Although the group has been around for 30 years, “only in the last three years have we turned into a full-time marketing entity,” O’Brien said. “Only in the last year have we gotten to this level.”

The association opened a visitor center to handle tourist inquiries in March 1995. Last December, the marketing staff created and distributed a full-color promotional brochure; and next month there are plans to erect a permanent billboard, touting the harbor, at the Del Norte Avenue exit of the Ventura Freeway. A temporary billboard is currently being displayed.

In 1995, according to the association, there were 8,240 requests for tourism information, with about one-third of those requests coming from first-time visitors. An estimated 113,125 people attended special events at the harbor, with the Christmas Parade of Lights accounting for about 50,000.

“Until we got on the Internet, our main market was Ventura County, Los Angeles County, Bakersfield--places within a two- to three-hour drive. That’s who we reached with our advertising, promotions and brochures,” O’Brien said.

“To go national or international had been too costly, but now we have the potential to reach around the world.”

Bob Grant, a partner in Channel Islands Internet, said general online access costs about $25 per month through his 8-month-old business. The cost to create a home page on the World Wide Web ranges from $100 to $1,000, he said.

Grant and his partner, Barry Rothstein, also consulted with Channel Islands National Park, which earlier this month opened its own Web site.

The local park, like the 364 other national parks, had been listed under a National Park Service Web site since last summer.

The NPS provides directions, costs, facilities, activities, climate and other general visitor information for each park.

At the beginning of February, Channel Islands National Park added extensive graphics and detailed descriptions of each of the five islands.

“The Park Service’s idea with the Internet is to use it for visitors, educators and park service employees and scientists looking for information. But it’s mostly for private users,” said Kent Bullard, who designed the Web site for Channel Islands Park.

“This is not something that’s just growing, this is exploding in the amount of people using the Internet to gather information, compared to any other kind of information resource.”

Bullard, an offshore maintenance supervisor at the park, said the new and improved Web site received nearly 250 online visitors in its first two weeks.

Other county tourism promoters would like to start catering to computer visitors of their own.

The Greater Oxnard & Harbors Tourism Bureau has been online since early February, and a Web site for the Ventura Visitors & Convention Bureau is under construction, although a portion has been up and running for about two weeks. The Conejo Valley Chamber of Commerce has had a Web site for about a year.

Bill Clawson, director of the Ventura bureau, said the Internet is important to today’s tourism industry, but he doubts it will every replace brochures, pamphlets and other printed visitors guides.

“It’s going to be one small piece in the puzzle, not the be-all and end-all of tourism marketing,” he said. “It’s nice to be able to bring the information up on your desktop, but it does not by any means replace the published paper versions of what we do.”

The Ventura Web site, when completed, will offer Internet users a hotel guide, a calendar of events, a list of attractions around town and information for meeting planners and other travel professionals. Web surfers will also be able to fill out e-mail information request cards to receive printed brochures and travel guides of the area.

Clawson anticipates offering Web site information in multiple languages in the near future. He also expects to link up with the state’s tourism office, so that anyone who accesses the state Web site will be able to find Ventura.

“Clearly the advantage of this is that anyone in the world can access it,” Clawson said. “It sure is handy for me to be at my desktop and be able to type in Salt Lake City and get information on that town. And I’m sure somebody in Salt Lake City is saying, ‘It sure is nice to get information on Ventura.”’

The Channel Islands Harbor World Wide Web address is https://www.channelislandsharbor.com;the Ventura tourism bureau address is https://www.ventura-tourism.com;the Oxnard tourism bureau address is https://www.oxnardtourism.com; the Channel Islands National Park address is https://www.nps.gov/chis/; and the Conejo Valley Chamber of Commerce address is https://www.cvcc.com/chamber/.