Leading up to summer 2025, Saint Paul faced a familiar destination marketing question: how to re-energize travelers who assumed they already knew what the city had to offer.
THE CHALLENGE
Driving growth in high-awareness markets
In historic drive markets where awareness was already high, the challenge for Visit Saint Paul’s marketing team wasn’t discovery, but rediscovery. Visit Saint Paul needed to inspire longer stays, higher visitor spending and measurable summer visitation, all while maintaining efficiency in its highest-performing markets.
THE SOLUTION
Saint Paul, a Little Extra.
Rather than emphasizing “more things to do,” the campaign reframed Saint Paul as a destination that delivers more than expected.
The “Extra” creative platform challenged travelers to level up their summer plans, positioning Saint Paul as *the* place that offers extra charm, extra flavor, extra fun and extra connection. Messaging flexed across five key traveler personas while remaining unified under a single, confident idea.
The campaign was activated through a full-funnel digital strategy, including paid search, social, programmatic display and native ads. All media drove traffic to a dedicated landing page designed to convert interest into trip planning.
THE RESULTS
From strategy to real-world impact
The summer 2025 campaign delivered record-setting performance across digital and real-world visitation metrics:
- 29,497 digital conversions, influencing an estimated $1.9M in visitor spending.
- 446,700 attributed visits, representing a 36% lift in in-market visitation.
- 20:1+ return on ad spend, significantly exceeding the 13:1 goal.
- $53M+ in total economic impact.
- 14.2M impressions, with strong engagement across all channels.
By pairing a bold creative idea with a high-intent media strategy, Visit Saint Paul turned familiar markets into meaningful growth—proving that going a little extra delivers extraordinary results.
