Albuquerque, NM—The Visit Albuquerque’s (Visit Albuquerque) redesigned website, http://www.itsatrip.org, was recently awarded with the Standard of Excellence WebAward in the Regional Category by the Web Marketing Association and a Gold 2007 MarCom Award in the Web Site Overall Category by the Association of Marketing & Communications Professionals.

“We are thrilled to receive this recognition for the hard work our team has invested to create a dynamic destination website,” said Dale Lockett, Visit Albuquerque President/CEO. “The new website is a tremendous representation of what Albuquerque has to offer to visitors and potential clients.”

The Visit Albuquerque’s http://www.itsatrip.org website showcases the artistic traditions of Albuquerque in keeping with Visit Albuquerque’s branding campaign design. The new http://www.itsatrip.org encompasses more than 400 web pages with exciting features including:

Photos & Videos - More than 250 photos and 17+ videos
Maps  - More than 65 maps are included in color and black and white
Neighborhood Guide - Detailed articles, photos and maps about each unique area of town
PDA/Mobile Site - A micro-site with listings optimized for PDA and cell phone screens 
RSS Feeds - Updated events and media releases available through RSS subscriptions
Site Search - An integrated database search powered by Google
Trip Planner - Tool that allows you to create and share a customized itinerary
Uniquely Albuquerque - Articles that highlight what makes Albuquerque so special

Additional content, tools and resources have been created for special Visit Albuquerque audiences including Meeting & Event Professionals, Travel Professionals and Media representatives. These audiences are encouraged to stay current on Albuquerque news by subscribing to the new RSS feeds, which are available to provide regular updates on media releases and Albuquerque events.

Visit Albuquerque’s website has monthly averages of more than 117,000 user sessions (up 49% over last year), 40,000 unique visitors (up 31% over last year) and search engine traffic has nearly doubled over previous year statistics. The new site was launched in May 2007. Visit Albuquerque’s website was developed in partnership with Aristotle Interactive (http://www.aristotledesign.com).

The Web Marketing Association WebAwards recognize the talent of individuals and teams in website development, and create internet marketing exposure for the award winning websites. The contestants represented interactive agencies and website marketing departments from 33 countries around the world. Entries are judged based on design, ease of use, copywriting, interactivity, use of technology, content and innovation. Other winners in the regional category include digphilly.com, visitwesthollywood.com and CincinnatiUSA.com.   

The MarCom Awards are an international creative competition that recognizes outstanding achievement by marketing and communications professionals. The Awards are administered and judged by the Association of Marketing and Communication Professionals. The 2007 competition consisted of 5,000 entries. The winners were selected from more than 200 categories in seven forms of media and communication.