#Breckenridge #Colorado
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| Summit Daily |
Realizing people are increasingly favoring mobile devices over computer screens, the Breckenridge Tourism Office has revamped GoBreck.com to be a more cinematic, mobile-first website that works equally well on any platform.
The website aims to showcase the best of Breckenridge and, perhaps, catch some additional tourism dollars in the process. Now, GoBreck.com has been redeveloped by Bellweather Agency, with content from the Breckenridge Tourism Office.
Bellweather is a company that specializes in branding, marketing and digital experiences for the travel and tourism industry. One of the credits on its resume includes NYCGo.com, the tourism website for New York City, which has been described as "a new standard" for travel websites, integrating content, eCommerce and advertising throughout 9,000-plus pages. Since the relaunch, website visits have increased by over 20 percent, according to Bellweather.
The new website promoting Breckenridge tourism shares many of the same characteristics as the one for New York, and Breckenridge's has also been designed to "seamlessly" reproduce content on all different types of devices — including smartphones, tablets or even desktop computers.
"Breckenridge is known for being a very authentic, welcoming town, and we wanted the website to feel that way, too," said Austyn Dineen, a spokeswoman for the BTO, adding that the new website will still work well with more traditional technologies, such as desktop computers.
However, because the new website is focused on being mobile-first, people will immediately notice it's heavy on the vertical scroll, which is the most natural way people navigate webpages on their smartphones.
In many cases, the new website does away with horizontal images altogether, which often get cropped or resized to be too small for mobile devices. Instead, it features a wide variety of vertical images and videos, more easily consumed on mobile devices.
The new site also comes with over 50 videos, 1,000 images and 250 reimagined pieces of content inspired by the beauty, nature and adventure of Breckenridge, according to the BTO.
This is all part of the BTO's ongoing efforts to keep up with modern technology and the changing ways in which people consume information, Dineen said.
According to a recent study referenced by the BTO, travelers are increasingly using smartphones to plan and book arrangements. The study found that 51 percent of people reported using their smartphones for planning trips in 2016, while 63 percent said they use multiple devices for planning and booking trips.
"With more people using their mobile devices to plan their vacations, we wanted to develop a new site that makes it easy for mobile users to experience and research everything Breckenridge offers its visitors," said Brett Howard, the BTO's marketing director, in a prepared statement.
The new website comes with "a movie-like feel" for its videos and with a plethora of new animations to help attract viewers to Breckenridge's landscape and imagery.
"This all comes from a growing trend," Dineen said, adding that one driving force behind it is Google, which has been favoring mobile-first websites in its rankings over computer-based sites.
"Our commitment to vertical video is a radical departure from the standard horizontal imagery seen on travel websites," said Emily Lessard, chief creative officer at Bellweather. "By building the strategy around vertical video, we are able to provide the best experience for a viewer on a mobile device."
Since its founding in 2016, Bellweather has done branding and marketing for destinations such as New York; Philadelphia; Danville, California; and now Breckenridge.
