Sep 11, 2026
2026 NYS Tourism Excellence Awards Honoree: Printed Materials
More Than a Guide: How the Cooperstown & Otsego County Inspiration Guide Became a Workforce, Advocacy, and Belonging Tool
Ryan Geraghty, Marketing & Communications Director of This is Cooperstown, will join us on Thursday in Corning at the 2026 NYS Tourism Excellence Summit to share how the Cooperstown & Otsego County Inspiration Guide isn't a typical visitor guide - it's the anchor publication of their entire organization. Built entirely in-house with no grant funding or advertising sales, this publication weaves workforce recruitment, lake advocacy, accessibility, and authentic local storytelling into a single piece that serves visitors, prospective residents, and lifelong locals alike.
From Bassett Healthcare Network using it to onboard 76 practitioners, to a 131,225-copy print run backed by a new distribution tracking system, this session walks through how a small-market DMO turned a printed guide into genuine destination stewardship - and what any DMO can take from treating community alignment as strategy, not an afterthought.
Why You Should Attend This Session:
- Learn how to diversify a single publication's audience to include visitors, workforce recruits, students, and locals, without diluting its voice or purpose.
- See how AI-informed, chatbot-driven visitor data can replace guesswork with real, actionable editorial decisions.
- Discover how a printed guide can become an unexpected workforce and advocacy tool, well beyond traditional tourism marketing.
Key Takeaways:
- A practical framework for building multi-audience content that speaks authentically to visitors, prospective residents, and community stakeholders at once.
- How to fund and produce a flagship publication entirely in-house, and what that independence unlocks creatively and strategically.
- Real distribution and impact data including print run, placement partners, and PDF engagement, that demonstrates measurable ROI for a community-first publication strategy.
About Ryan:
Ryan Geraghty is the Director of Marketing & Communications at This Is Cooperstown, where she leads brand strategy and integrated marketing across web, social, email, and paid media for one of the most recognized destinations in youth baseball and sports tourism - reaching a 3M+ audience and driving visitation from national and international markets where the Cooperstown & Otsego County Tourism Inspiration Guide became more than a visitor publication: a workforce, advocacy, and community-belonging tool built entirely in-house.
Ryan holds a Professional in Destination Management (PDM) certification from Destinations International and previously served as Managing Director at Paperkite, a Cooperstown-based creative agency, serving tourism, higher-ed, and economic-development clients. Earlier in her career, she managed live-events portfolios and station operations for Townsquare Media Group across the East Coast. Ryan is known for building cohesive brands, writing RFPs like it's a competitive sport, and sneaking a little unhinged energy into copy wherever she can get away with it.
About This is Cooperstown:
This Is Cooperstown is the officially designated Tourism Promotion Agency and Destination Marketing Organization for Otsego and Schoharie Counties, New York. Best known as home to the National Baseball Hall of Fame & Museum, Cooperstown anchors a broader region rich in youth sports, outdoor recreation, arts and culture, and craft beverage. This Is Cooperstown works year-round to promote both counties as visitor destinations while investing in the community infrastructure - from workforce recruitment tools to lake advocacy and accessibility - that helps to frame tourism as a shared asset for residents, prospective locals, and guests alike.