Kerrville River Festival

Working with the CE Communications Team was overall a positive experience. They were knowledgeable in their field, professional, and friendly. I was very impressed with the report they provided at the end of the project that included detailed analytics on the media coverage our event received.

Rain Thoresen, City of Kerrville Tourism and Event Coordinator

OPPORTUNITY

The City of Kerrville, Texas and the Kerrville Parks and Recreation Department took a new approach to their annual Kerrville River Festival Event in 2023 aligning the music festival with the October annular solar eclipse. The CE Group was tasked with event promotion and media buying across the state of Texas to spread awareness about the festival and increase tourism to the city. With an abundance of eclipse events occurring on the same date, it was necessary to position the event as a unique celebration and create buzz surrounding the event elements that set it apart from the rest, such as its designation by NASA as a prime eclipse-viewing location.

SOLUTION

The CE Group Communications team developed a strategy that involved pitching to media, influencer partnerships, social media advertising, and community calendar listings to reach targeted Texas markets. To specifically speak to individual segments, our team narrowed in on three different personas to market to; fans of headlining country music act, Danielle Bradbery, families with interest in child-friendly free events, and astronomy enthusiasts.

Through a partnership with a local travel influencer, we were able to speak to an audience of over 600,000 followers that are primarily Texas-based and family-friendly. Additionally, we pitched press releases with quotes from NASA and emphasized their attendance at the event to media contacts who had either previously covered or shown interest in covering the eclipse. A collaboration with an event promotion website with reach in Houston, Dallas, San Antonio, and Austin included e-mail promotion, social media promotion, and community calendar listings. Spotify and Meta ads were created in partnership with the headlining artist to attract her fans to the event for a free concert. Lastly, our team submitted event details and visuals to additional community calendars in large Texas markets that were close enough to the event to road-trip.

Overall, our efforts garnered over 650,000 paid impressions and reached 723,000 through unpaid media efforts. The media coverage that the client received was entirely positive and totaled to a publicity value of over $350,000. The Kerrville River Festival was mentioned statewide and was even mentioned by The New York Times in a post-eclipse feature.

OPPORTUNITY

SOLUTION

Publicity Value

$350,000+

Impressions

1,373,000+