PHILIPSBURG--The St. Maarten Tourist Bureau (STB) organised a familiarisation trip for Angela Yee, co-host of the immensely popular radio show The Breakfast Club.\n\n\t\t\t\n\n\t\t\n\n\t\t\t\n\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\n\n
The radio show highlighted St. Maarten to millions in the key market of the New York tristate area during the Memorial Day weekend this past May. The trip is aimed to expand on Yee’s prospects of working with the island to bring more attention and ultimately bookings to the destination.\n\n
“St Maarten has lost quite some momentum in the New York area behind our competitors. I believe that making the mainstream media genuinely fall in love with our destination to always be a more cost-effective means of getting them to speak highly of the destination and tell people to join them in discovering our island,” stated STB Director Rolando Brison.\n\n
While traditionally familiarisation trips, or fam trips as they are called, are organised with general media personnel, shifting trends in marketing result in more marketers, including destinations, using “influencers” to utilise not just the mainstream media but also social media to promote.\n\n
“Influencers were one of the key feedback received from stakeholders in our recent stakeholder seminar and STB has hit the ground running in getting influencers to experience, love and thus promote the destination,” said Brison.\n\n
Yee arrived on the island Monday and visited several locations. She aims to return to host much larger events and engage in bartered promotional activities for the key market of the New York tristate area.\n\n
“The majority of all travellers out of the US originate from the New York tristate area and it has been many years since the island has had any significant marketing presence in the area. It does appear that in recent months the momentum has swung back in favour of St. Maarten, as can be seen by the increase in interest from media outlets in the region like Breakfast Club, as well that of JetBlue, who are headquartered in New York,” said Brison.\n\n
The Breakfast Club is a syndicated radio show based in New York City hosted by DJ Envy, Angela Yee and Charlamagne Tha God. It currently airs in 50+ markets around the country and on REVOLT TV every morning. Common topics of discussion on the show are celebrity gossip (especially in the hip hop industry), progressive politics, and sexual and dating issues. The show is known to have collectively the largest social media presence of all radio shows in the United States.
Source: The Daily Herald https://www.thedailyherald.sx/islands/67473-stb-welcomes-breakfast-club-co-host-angela-yee"
