Expand<\/a><\/p>\nFor Ronalds, who took over as Hotel Bethlehem general manager in January after spending several years in management roles, the honor never gets old.<\/p>\n
She said the hotel \u201chas a deep-rooted connection to the community.\u201d Since it was originally built via community-sold shares, generations of Lehigh Valley locals have celebrated milestones there, such as weddings and banquets. That creates a legacy guest base that drives its success in public voting contests.<\/p>\n
Kassie Hilgert, president and CEO of ArtsQuest, which runs Musikfest, says being named the best music festival four times \u201cis an incredible honor and a testament to the energy, creativity and community spirit that define Musikfest.\u201d<\/p>\n
She said the largest free music festival in the country, which reported a record 1.45 million visitors last August, brings in visitors and artists from around the world.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis recognition belongs to our entire community \u2014 from the musicians on our stages to the local businesses, sponsors and volunteers who help make the festival possible,\u201d Hilgert said.<\/p>\n
ArtsQuest also runs Christkindlmarkt and the Peeps drop at its SteelStacks complex in Bethlehem.<\/p>\n
Getting noticed<\/p>\n
In an email to The Morning Call, USA Today said it picks an expert panel to put together a final set of nominations for a particular category, which are reviewed by the media outlet\u2019s editors for the 10Best section.<\/p>\n
When voting is open, the public gets four weeks to cast ballots. An individual is eligible to vote for a favorite in each category once a day.<\/p>\n
So how do Lehigh Valley attractions get noticed by USA Today\u2019s experts?<\/p>\n
Ronalds said Hotel Bethlehem is visited regularly by travel writers, some of whom are on the USA Today experts panel.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe more travel writers we host, the more attention that we get for the great things that everybody\u2019s doing, whether it\u2019s Musikfest \u2026. or Coca-Cola Park,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
Sam Jellinek, manager of broadcasting and media relations for the IronPigs, says it\u2019s important to have a track record of excellence across many facets.<\/p>\n
\u201cFrom consistently high attendance, excellent ballpark amenities that extend from fan-focused areas to on the field, guest service that goes above and beyond, an overall guest experience that exceeds expectations, concessions that are delicious and also seamless,\u201d Jellinek said, \u201cthere are so many check-boxes you have to hit across so many different areas to put together an all-around case for USA Today to take notice.\u201d<\/p>\n
He said the nomination was an indication that USA Today had its eye on Coca-Cola Park for years on how it conducts fan experiences.<\/p>\n
Laurie Monteforte from Strong Mountain Media has helped with 10Best campaigns for Hotel Bethlehem and Main Street Bethlehem. She says using a public relations and marketing firm can be helpful, especially ones with experience in tourism and travel PR.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe worked with historic Hotel Bethlehem on two-tiered strategies to earn nominations and wins for the hotel and for Bethlehem\u2019s Main Street,\u201d Monteforte said. \u201cThe first tier involves gaining the experts\u2019 attention to secure nominations.\u201d<\/p>\n
That entails creating media pitches to show journalists on the travel panel \u201chow amazing both the hotel and the city are\u201d to raise awareness with them. For example, a travel writer that stays at the Hotel Bethlehem will receive an itinerary that shows the city\u2019s highlights, including local historical sites.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe second tier involves generating public enthusiasm for the voting phase,\u201d Monteforte said.<\/p>\n
The campaign<\/p>\n
Jellinek said getting IronPigs fans engaged to vote was the easy part.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur partners and sponsors love our relationship so much that they encouraged their employees to vote, and in turn like with Hotel B and the city\u2019s downtown we were happy to return the favor for them,\u201d Jellinek said. \u201cCombine that [with] we have been the most attended ballpark in MiLB the last three years and there\u2019s a lot of people who care about Coca-Cola Park and want the world to know just how great it is.\u201d<\/p>\n
The fans did the work themselves once they knew about the nomination.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are so lucky in that regard, as despite being one of the smaller markets in Triple-A baseball, we have a very passionate fan base that has a lot of pride in letting the world know just how great Coca-Cola Park, and Hotel B and Main Street, are,\u201d Jellinek said.<\/p>\n
Monteforte said a kickoff news conference helps get the word out and generates excitement. During its news conferences, Hotel Bethlehem gets involved with other community partners such as the IronPigs, Historic Bethlehem Museums & Sites and Lehigh University.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen planning the news conference, we work to involve local business owners and community leaders,\u201d she said. \u201cOnce the announcement is made, local marketing efforts ramp up. Hotel B has an incredible force of marketing experts that combine modern digital outreach and good-old-fashioned boots on the ground efforts. So, you\u2019ll see everything from social media marketing and digital newsletters, to flyers in windows and community members wearing \u2018vote now\u2019 T-shirts.\u201d<\/p>\n
USA Today posts running results over the first three weeks, but goes dark for the final week.<\/p>\n
Ronalds says Hotel Bethlehem has fun with the campaign and is in friendly competition with other historical hotels, such as the Hotel Hershey and the Peabody in Memphis, Tennessee. She noted that at least one rival hired a New York PR firm to take over the top spot, but failed.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have fun with it. It\u2019s a little competitive, but I think it\u2019s a fun competition.\u201d<\/p>\n
Morning Call reporter Evan Jones can be reached at ejones@mcall.com.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Bethlehem has the best main street in the U.S. That\u2019s not just an opinion \u2014 it\u2019s the findings…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":168452,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[119,225,153,155,154,1391,60,8790,2181,23879,6290,3487,4341,433,182,22777,139,434,28,664,432],"class_list":{"0":"post-168451","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-bethlehem","8":"tag-allentown","9":"tag-artsquest","10":"tag-bethlehem","11":"tag-bethlehem-headlines","12":"tag-bethlehem-news","13":"tag-bethlehem-area","14":"tag-business","15":"tag-dorney-park","16":"tag-easton","17":"tag-easton-public-market","18":"tag-easton-area","19":"tag-hotel-bethlehem","20":"tag-ironpigs","21":"tag-lehigh-county","22":"tag-local-news","23":"tag-musikfest","24":"tag-news","25":"tag-northampton-county","26":"tag-pennsylvania","27":"tag-south-whitehall-township","28":"tag-top-stories-tmc"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/168451","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=168451"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/168451\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/168452"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=168451"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=168451"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=168451"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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