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Internet, Marketing, tourism bc, Travel & Tourism
Thoughts about Montreal’s ‘army of bloggers to promote the city’
02.10.09 | Permalink | 6 Comments

Great to see all the attention Montreal gets from their initiative to hire an ‘army of bloggers‘ to promote the city.
Roberto Rocha writes on Canada.com

You also have to wonder just how honest these bloggers will be. Will they relate bad experiences as well as the good? Will they just omit the bad stuff? Being a government agency, Tourisme Montréal will be under a lot more scrutiny than any private body. Since so many restaurants, stores and hotels are stakeholders, it will be interesting to see how they balance authenticity with marketing.

Todd Lucier doesn’t agree.
I think Roberto has a point. Of course the bloggers won’t be critical. But that doesn’t mean it can’t be authentic. We’ve been doing something similar for a few months now with our Field Reporters. I’ve explained our strategy to create authenticity in a previous post. Our Field Reporters don’t do anything staged. It’s an experience any tourist could have. That’s why we’ve made it clear we’re behind them and we’ve build a random element into the execution (a recommendation). We have 37 videos to date and they’re wildly successful. Maybe I’ll give them a cellphone next 😉
I think the problem is with the word blogger and the solution is simple. Montreal should call these people something different because the word blogger creates a false expectation. My suggestion is to call them “Montreal Ambassadors” or something, like we did with ‘Field Reporters’. Then you can define the job any way you like.
The idea is great and I hope Montreal is smart enough to allow some room to let the program shape itself. Who knows what will happen when people start phoning; it can go to unexpected (yet wildly successful) places. Like Todd said “it’s all about the stories”.
Update:
Field Reporter Chris says in the comments: The more I do these Field Reporting videos the more I realize the value of being completely spontaneous during a shoot in order to make it authentic. No preparation of what to say… just a start location, talk with people (residents, tourists, event organizers, or even Raccoons!) and see what happens, have fun and cover the moment.
Marketing, Travel & Tourism
Does your tourism business or destination have a schizobrand?
12.21.08 | Permalink | 2 Comments

I know two companies named “Taco Bell.”
One is on television. It is clean, cheerful, and makes nice looking food.
One is in my neighborhood. It is dirty, disgusting, and I would never consider visiting it.

That was from Bob Hoffman’s brilliant “the ad contrarian” blog.
Does your tourism business or destination reflect your brand message Or do you have a schizobrand as well?
Internet, Marketing, Travel & Tourism
More about Tourism BC’s Online Video Strategy: Field Reporters
10.26.08 | Permalink | 4 Comments

A few weeks ago I posted about our call for video field reporters. I also promised more details. Here we go.

Our video strategy is multi-faceted based on the opportunities that are currently available. Some are traditional and some are new. But they’ll all work together in a framework.
Let’s first examine the types of tourism related videos out there.

First, there’s the destination video. Emotional music, breathtaking scenery, friendly people, incredible experiences. The intent is to create a strong emotional connection with somebody. The content include all the core brand attributes and the target audience enjoying them. These videos are often used at consumer and/or tradeshows and most destinations have put these videos on their websites and video networks such as YouTube.

Destination Marketing Organization’s TV commercials are often a mini version of the destination video. Sometimes, they include a touch of humour or clever creative, like this video from Utah. But they always include all the core brand tributes again. Watch the Utah commercial and you know what they market and who they market to. Often there’s a call to action to visit a website, a fulfillment piece (guide) or a price point (often through a trade partner).

Then there are the travel host videos, as you will find on travel shows on TV. A host visits a destination and documents some of his or her experience in an informal documentary style. Usually all the “must sees” are covered. Sometimes, if it’s a special interest show, a specific experience is covered.

New on the scene are DMO created documentaries. These highlight a specific iconic experience of a destination. Often, there’s also a host involved and it’s informative and specific to an iconic experience.

And there are the user generated videos of course. Nothing is more credible than real experiences from real people. The amazing video above was the winner of the best user generated video at the eTourism awards last year.

Each type of video has a specific purpose. From creating awareness through creating an emotional connection, to real and authentic experiences that makes somebody think “I can be part of this story”. We’re currently in the process of creating a new destination video, TV commercials and documentaries. We’re also encouraging consumers to share their videos with us on our blog section.

But what’s interesting is that we believe there’s room for an additional category, a variation of the travel host, with a user generated content feel. We call these “field reporter” videos. Last year we experimented with this concept.

The video above is one of our ski host video. The intent of the video was to create an authentic video but still hit on the core brand message. The result was positive. Chris did a great job and consumers responded positvice, but our key learning was that we created something that felt a bit off. It didn’t feel authentic, and it wasn’t a slick documentary either.

Together for our agency (Cossette Communication Group) we re-defined the video host concept and renamed it to “field reporters”. The idea was to hire 6 people who with good personalities who can handle a video camera. We would send them out into all corners of BC and document their experiences. In order to make it authentic, they have to find somebody and ask for a recommendation. After the recommendation, they need to follow through and document their experience. Nothing planned, nothing staged. They had to be host, camera person and editor. We did add our logo at the beginning of each video to be transparent that we asked these people to create these videos.

And that’s what we’ve done over the last month. We found 7 very talented individuals and send each one to each of our 6 tourism regions, and one on a circle tour on his motorbike. We did give each a list of “iconic” tourism products so they had an idea what was going on in the area. They all made 5-7 videos each. We will use these videos on HelloBC to complement our existing content.

Below is a sample.

Here’s Chris climbing the Squamish Chief.

Ivan visited Bella Coola, and found a first nation person to take him to old Petroglyphs.

Kelli visited the Thompson Okanagan and hiked the Kettle Valley trail.

Mike visited the Kootenay Rockies and was told to visit Fort Steele and the Bull River Guest Ranch near Cranbrook.

Ami was told to take a train ride from Prince Rupert to Prince George through Northern British Columbia.

And Gary rode the Coast Cariboo Circle Tour his motor bike.
We’re also encouraging our staff, communities and industry to create their own videos. It’s easy enough to do. All you need is a video camera and some video editing software.

Some have already taken us up on the challenge. Clint from our Norther BC region create the video above.

And here’s our online team member Mikala’s visit to a farmers market

By posting these videos on our blog, hopefully we’ll even inspire some BC residents and our travelers to give our their tips and insider information. The intent is to get many video’s capturing the diverse range of tourism experiences throughout the province. We will still use the destination video and professionally produced documentaries to get people excited, and the videos created by field reporters, industry, communities, staff and user will capture the details.
To watch all field reporter videos, keep an eye on Tourism BC’s YouTube channel and our Field Reporter playlist. Our field reporters are still editing some of their videos, so more will be added soon.
Internet, Marketing, personal, social media, tourism bc, Travel & Tourism
My interview for Online Revealed Caribbean
10.14.08 | Permalink | 2 Comments

I was supposed to present with Richard Kunz from T4G, our technology solutions provider, at Online Revealed Caribbean. I couldn’t go unfortunately but Richard interviewed me and incorporated some of the footage in his presentation. I received some good feedback so I decided to put the whole interview online.
We discussed Web 2.0, user generated content, social networks and one-to-one marketing for Destination Marketing Organizations and the tourism industry. I shared some of the things we’re working with T4G on to provide more relevancy to individual consumers on a mass scale.

Richard and I will hopefully be at the next Online Revealed Canada in Niagara Falls on April 13-15.
Internet, Marketing, tourism bc
Tourism BC’s blog widget
09.30.08 | Permalink | 2 Comments

Below you’ll find our Share the Excitement widget. We’re all very excited about here at Tourism BC.

This widget allows anybody to publish our blog entries on their own website. Every time a new entry is added to HelloBC, the content on the widget will also be updated,
We get a lot of questions from communities and operators in BC about consumer blogs. They ask if they should start their own. But without some significant website traffic, it would be very hard for smaller destinations and businesses to create critical mass. By collaborating on generating the right User Generated Content for all of British Columbia, we can all benefit through this widget.
The entries can be filtered by a British Columbia community so you can only show entries from a particular part of BC. Our Share the Excitement mark also contains our connection with the 2010 games.
The widget is available for download on HelloBC. It’s available in 3 sizes and 3 colours. It should be extremely easy for a webmaster to include it in any website.
We’re in the process of developing some new initiatives around HelloBC blogs. Stay tuned for more.
Internet, Marketing, tourism bc
Tourism British Columbia’s approach to international market websites
09.25.08 | Permalink | 2 Comments
Last week was a Milestone week for us. We launched 3 new Asian websites:
- Korea: HelloBC.co.kr
- Taiwan: HelloBC.tw
- Japan: HelloBC.jp
We stay true to our user centered approach while supporting a growing number of websites. Our decisions are driven by research; we try not to guess. Turning research results into sounds decisions regarding technology, content and acquisition strategies is where the fun is at.
Our approach to our Asian was no different from our other websites. We worked with in-market specialists, including our staff, who where instrumental at turning this project into a success. Here are some details about our approach to international websites.
Technology
Our core technology platform now support websites for our North American, UK, Australian, Japanese, Korean and Taiwanese markets. Our websites are integrated with our Destination Management System that serves as the core of our content management. Product information collected through TourismBC.net is included on all 6 websites.
Information Architecture
We have conducted focus groups, phone interviews, card sorts and/or usability tests to find the best way to organize the content on each website. We start with research about how our target audience in a particular market approach their trip planning; their mental model.
We adjust our taxonomy where needed. For example, in North America a farm accommodation is called a ‘guest ranch‘. In the UK it’s called a ‘cowboy ranch‘ and in Australia a farmstay.
Templates & design
We’ve re-used our templates for HelloBC.com for our other market websites. This is partly because of economic reasons. We don’t have unlimited people and budget. By keeping things consistent, we also make it easier to maintain the templates over time. Content makes a website appropriate for a market. Changing a picture around can have a significant impact. We keep a close eye on things and might migrate into more a distinct look and feel for certain markets if our research tell us to do so.
Content
As I mentioned earlier, all tourism operators who have enrolled in our HelloBC Listing Program are automatically published on all 6 websites.
We also support a large volume of destination information on each website. In order to make this more efficient, we have connected certain pages on our market websites with HelloBC. Even though they might fit someplace different in the Information Architecture, the copy and images are the same as HelloBC. If anything changes on HelloBC, so does the copy on the other websites. There are still areas on each page to publish market specific content. Each website also has disconnected pages. These pages are either unique for that market, or need different copy from HelloBC (the getting to British Columbia page for example)
This is “easy” on our UK and Australian market websites because they are in English. But it’s different for our websites in a foreign language. For these websites we are using the services of a translation partner. Pages can still be connected. But when a page on HelloBC is updated, our content specialist has to option to send a work order to our translation partner. A translator who’s located in the respective country will translate the new or updated content. One of our in-market staff members will approve the copy and publish the new content. It’s fully automated with a work-flow system.
There’s no time to sit still. The 2010 games are just 500 days away and we need to be ready. We kicked off our German website project last week. But that’s not the only things we’re working on. More about other activities soon.
Internet, Marketing, Travel & Tourism
Hotel ‘behind the scenes’ blog
09.12.08 | Permalink | 4 Comments
I’ve started to incorporate 5 e-marketing tips for tourism operators in my presentations for a while. They were the inspiration for the “Marketing your small tourism business in the 21th century” were based on.
One of my tips is to start a blog. I always envision this blog were an operator can provide some ‘behind the scenes’ info about their property. Introduce the staff, the experience, guest comments, etc. I’m sure every business deals with hilareous moments as well that would be fun (and appropriate) to share.
The Opus Hotel here in Vancouver has an awesome blog, but I’m always looking for something a little less corporate. And I could never find one, until today. The Hawtorne Hotel is a 3 star hotel in Salem, MA. They’ve posted stories about the hotel, its gardens, the town, their staff, guest comments, special menu items from their restaurant since March 2005. In the 3.5 year, they’ve accumulated almost 2000 postings.
I think it’s a great example of using a blog to create a connection with potential visitors. I would suggest to share more stories instead of making announcements. Where people travel, stories happen.Where people work, stories happen. Somebody with a bit of wit can create a great blog that can create a following like a soap opera. People will want to visit the real deal and be part of the story.
Marketing your small tourism business in the 21th century:
Internet, Marketing, tourism bc
Thanks John from Terrace
08.30.08 | Permalink | Comment?

I don’t know John from Terrace. But on April 4, 2007 he posted a blog post about the Seven Sisters Mountain Range on HelloBC’s blog. It’s a short paragraph, but contains perfect information and he added a beautiful photo as well. Great for us, great for our website users.
Google indexed the entry and the last month, the term “Seven Sisters Mountain Range” was the 14th most popular keyword driving organic traffic to HelloBC. There are 25 other variations of the keyword driving traffic to the website as well.
Thanks John, and all other HelloBC bloggers. You’re helping us market, and helping travelers plan.
Internet, Marketing, personal, tourism bc, Travel & Tourism
Couple of recent panel apperances
05.22.08 | Permalink | 7 Comments

I had the opportunity to join two panel conversations the last few weeks.

The first one was at the Online Revealed conference in Calgary where I joined Terri McCulloch, Tom Wilson,
Jens Thraenhart and Stephen Joyce. Alicia Whalen and Phil Caines did a great job moderating. I particularly like Phil’s live web servicing to show the websites we talked about. This was the third time we took the Tips from the T-List on the road and it was another great session where we discussed and debated the opportunities blogs, User Generated Content and Social Networks provide for the tourism industry. I like these sessions because I represent myself as a travel blogger and Tourism BC for our HelloBC Blogs initiative. It was the first time I met Terri and Tom, and they provided great insights. I’ve been a fan of Terri’s blog for a while now and Tom’s work is a great example of maximizing the medium with limited resources.
Thank you Patricia and Alicia from a Couple of Chicks marketing for inviting me. You’ve done a great job again.

Today I joined Ben Stringfellow (Director of Internal Communications, McDonalds USA), Thierry Hay-Sabourin (Senior Ecommerce Manager, Future Shop), William Azaroff (Interactive Marketing & Channel Manager, Vancity) on a panel called ‘Giving Your Brand Away’ at the Convergence 2008 conference. It was a pleasure to share the stage with this diverse group who’ve all done great things with building communities.
Ben gave us the story and result from a brand new closed community for McDonalds’ staff, reducing cost of printing newletters and creating efficiencies through shared learning between the restaurants. William gave us the remarkable story behind the Change Everything community while Thierry provide insights into Futureshop message boards, including Aaron, the search guy.
The biggest take-away I got from the session was that the first 500 members of your community will set the tone. So it’s important that the first members set the right tone, otherwise it will be hard to recover from that. Thierry shared that the tone on the English boards is very different from the French boards for example. At our HelloBC Blogs, we accidentallyThak did the right thing by starting our efforts with staff and our visitor centres, who set the right tone for consumers. Sometimes you need a bit of luck.
Thank you Sandy from Fjord Interactive for inviting me and a great conference.
Internet, Marketing
Micro Interactions + Direct Engagement
05.16.08 | Permalink | Comment?

Brilliant presentation from David Armano’s Logic+Emotion blog. His concepts of Micro Interactions is extremely appropriate for travel. Through research and observation I’ve learned over the last years that a travel decision is often a result of these small and unexpected interactions. The impact of one or more micro interaction can lead to a travel decision. This can be as simple as a blog entry, a picture on Flickr, or a comment on Twitter.
Seth Godin says: “Conversations among the members of your marketplace happen whether you like it or not. Good marketing encourages the right sort of conversations.”

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