MVA launches aggressive membership drive

The Marianas Visitors Authority has launched an aggressive membership drive, aiming to exceed its current number of members by the start of the new fiscal year.

MVA managing director Vicky Benavente said the tourism agency has added benefits to the membership package to encourage more businesses to join MVA. The additional benefits include website marketing and more participation in print advertising and trade shows.

MVA also updated its membership application form to include more information about the agency, the advantages of being an MVA member, and pictures of MVA activities.

The membership drive began on Sept. 1 and will run through Oct. 1, when the new fiscal year begins.

“With this drive, we hope to maintain the members we have now, and to increase our current membership by at least a dozen,” Benavente said.

At present, MVA has 269 members—the highest number in MVA’s history.

Membership to MVA is open to any person or organization, and is renewed annually by paying a $100 fee. This fee, according to Benavente, has not changed since MVA’s inception.

“It is not our objective to raise money from membership fees, but to get people to participate in promotions and public relations,” she said.

Nothing in the MVA by-laws require members to do anything else, Benavente said. However, they are encouraged to participate in MVA’s promotions and advertising events.

Last year, members provided MVA about $700,000 worth of in-kind contributions. These included hotel accommodations, airline tickets, optional tours, and meals for MVA members attending off-island trade shows, as well as for visiting media representatives from the NMI’s tourism markets.

According to MVA’s membership brochure, the agency provides members with participation in city seminars and conferences in major trade shows such as the World Travel Fair and the Korean Wedding Expo, and those fairs sponsored by the Japan Association of Travel Agents, Pacific Asia Travel Association, Diving Equipment and Marketing Association, and the Travel Industry Association of America.

The tourism agency also provides members with exposure through the distribution of promotional materials at major events, and cooperative promotional activities.

MVA has tie-ups with various leading publications such as Action Asia, Glimpses, Pacific Magazine, Hi-Wind Magazine, Tarzan, Wake Border Japan, Triathlon Magazine-Japan, and Korea Tourism News.

Further, MVA members have the opportunity to elect four of its members to serve on the MVA board of directors.

Members also get strengthened representation to communicate with CNMI government agencies; receive visitor statistics on a regular basis, together with in-depth analysis of visitor profiles, monthly e-newsletter with activity updates, and annual reports; and get their activities included in the MVA calendar of events.