Visit Quad Cities Uses New Tech to Promote the QC
November 23, 2020
Quad Cities (November 23, 2020) – Visit Quad Cities, the region’s official destination marketing and management organization (DMMO), continues to expand its digital platform to build our brand and share our regional destination’s story.
Visit Quad Cities' website is one of the primary destination marketing tools used to promote the bi-state region and to provide information and experiences for visitors and Quad Citizens. The new site was launched in May 2020, and updates in content including videos, information, and new technology continue to be added. VisitQuadCities.com features some of the newest technology and is ADA and GDPR compliant.
“We need to continually innovate and improve our customer service delivery through technology,” said Dave Herrell, President and CEO, Visit Quad Cities. “Our platforms are evolving and VisitQuadCities.com is the clearinghouse for all things QC and our regional destination’s story. These enhancements and other innovations on the horizon will strengthen our brand.”
Now, Visit Quad Cities has taken another pro-active step to provide new technology for the hundreds of thousands of visitors and Quad Citizens that visit the site each year. This week, new voice search technology was activated on the site providing users with the convenience of searching the site through voice activation.
With the rise in voice assistants, internet voice search could be set to disrupt SEO conventions. Media analytics firm, comScore, predicts that half of all online searches will be made through voice in 2020, while Gartner predicts that in this year, 30% of online searches will be made on devices without a screen. This suggests an enormous rise in voice search, as well as the increased adoption of smart speakers and virtual assistants. Earlier this year, Juniper Research predicted that 3.25 billion voice assistants were in use – a figure they forecast to reach eight billion by 2023.
VisitQuadCities.com was built and designed by TAG in Davenport, Iowa, and they built the new voice search technology using the Google Voice-to-text API. To search, click the microphone icon in the top right of the site, and then speak into your computer or mobile device. If your microphone is active, it transcribes what was said into text, and then sends back that text as a query to the search page in real-time.
In addition to new website technology, Visit Quad Cities has expanded on where you can find its new QC Current radio show. Now the weekly episodes of QC Current are available to stream on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Amazon music, and iHeart radio (coming soon). Just search QC Current or Visit Quad Cities to find the episodes. The episodes can also be found on VistQuadCities.com.
The new radio show launched at the beginning of October 2020 and airs on WOC 1420 AM on Saturdays at 10 a.m. The half-hour show focuses on telling the untold stories of this must-experience riverfront destination. Through in-depth interviews with Quad Citizens, listeners will learn more about little-known local history, new innovations, and unexpected entrepreneurs—all who capture the energy, culture, and spirit of the Quad Cities.
About Visit Quad Cities
Founded in 1990, Visit Quad Cities is the official Destination Management and Marketing Organization (DMMO) for the region. Visit Quad Cities is a private 501(c)(6) non-profit engine charged with driving economic opportunity through tourism, building our authentic brand, telling & selling the Quad Cities story, and enhancing Quad Citizens’ quality of life and quality of place.
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Media Contact: Charlotte Doehler-Morrison, VP Marketing & Communications, Visit Quad Cities, 309-781-4235 cell