BY CONSUELO MCABOY
The Pure Michigan campaign has been recognized all over the country for its tourism efforts. Recently, the campaign was honored with five national awards.
Pure Michigan won five Mercury awards this past week for having the best state tourism television advertising, radio advertising, social media presence, partnership advertising, and public relations efforts.
To receive a Mercury award, each state submits their work for 12 different categories, including best website, travel guide, television advertising or public relations.
George Zimmerman is the Director of Pure Michigan. He said the awards are flattering, but it's not the campaign's primary focus.
"Winning awards is not our primary objective. To us, the most important data is not how many rewards we've won but how well the campaign is doing as far as attracting visitors to Michigan and their money so that's the main prize for us but it's always nice to be recognized for the work you're doing
Zimmerman said since its launch in 2006, Pure Michigan has been recognized with a total of 15 Mercury awards.
He said the campaign brought 3.2 million visitors to Michigan last year.