It’s back to school for Clinton’s tourism director

By Randy Bell

While most students are out for summer break, Marlee Price-Cook is spending the first week of June at Mercer University in Macon, Georgia, attending the Southeast Tourism Marketing College. For Clinton’s Director of Communication and Tourism, it’s another step toward earning a Tourism Marketing Professional (TMP) designation.

“It’s one week each summer for three years,” she says. This is year two.

According to Price-Cook, the first year was an eye-opening experience regarding Clinton’s readiness to attract tourists.

“I think my biggest takeaway from last year was that we are actually not as far behind as I thought we were. We have a spot in the tourism industry, and it’s just really delving into those assets that we have, like history and that small town, home-away-from-home attraction that we are. And I think that is what we need to focus on moving forward.”

Her goal will be to get all those working to bring visitors to Clinton to pull in the same direction.

“I think everyone is still speaking a different language when it comes to tourism,” she says. “Everyone definitely has their own idea of what tourism is.”

Price-Cook believes becoming a TMP is helping her hone in on the city’s potential.

Her hope?

“Learning how to use this marketing skill set for not just bringing new people to Clinton, but letting the residents who are already here be well aware of what we have to offer. Because, a lot of times, I think people who live in Clinton aren’t really aware of what’s in their own backyard.”

She says she learned a lot during her first year at Tourism Marketing College and expects the second-year curriculum to build on that structure.

“How to recruit volunteers, how to create a board, how to read data, how to apply data, how to budget, what to budget for—those kinds of instrumental pieces that, once you have an idea set in place, you need to move that idea forward.”

Price-Cook says it’s important for a community to know as much about its tourists as possible, including where they’re from and what they do when they arrive.

She expects to see people who are within a two-hour drive coming to Clinton.

But sometimes, she’s surprised.

“Last year, we had an influx of visitors from Dallas, Texas,” she notes. “My assumption would be [that it was] sports-related.”

But, she says, without the budget to pay for a deep dive into the data, she can’t be sure.