Category

social media

• Experience Design, Internet, Management, Marketing, social media, Travel & Tourism

  3 things to think about in 2013

  01.01.13 | Permalink | 1 Comment

  Happy New Year everybody! Here are three things off the top of my head that are important things to consider for 2013. Do you have any more?

  1) PUT SOCIAL AT THE CORE

  

  I think it’s pretty clear by now that social media has a major impact on the travel decision making process. If your tourism business or DMO hasn’t realized this yet you better catch up. You should be at level 3 or higher by now.

  Most marketers think of social media as an add-on to a traditional campaign, or at least start with traditional thinking. It’s time to flip it around. Start with a social idea and support it with traditional methods. Or do traditional things in a social way. For example, we recently worked with a DMO who let it’s Facebook community vote on what photos would be published in it’s visitor guide.

  2) START USING SERVICE DESIGN

  

  Mitigating a mediocre experience with brilliant marketing doesn’t cut it anymore. The experience IS your marketing and the stories your visitors tell each other is what it’s all about. You have two choices. First choice is to join the race to the bottom and keep offering specials, discounts and special offers. The second one is to create remarkable experiences people love and want to be part of, regardless of what it costs.

  If your choice is the latter, you need to start thinking about service design. When you’re an operator you need to start thinking about the end-to-end experience you offer your guest. When you are a DMO you need to think about the end-to-end destination experience. Service design is gaining a lot of momentum in Europe, especially in Austria where destinations are starting to take an active role in the design of the destination experience.

  3) MOBILE: THINK DEVICE PLUS CONTEXT

  

  I was on a panel at a conference in Barcelona recently and somebody asked about mobile. Before I could even think about it I said “it’s not about mobile, it’s about device + context”. I probably heard it somewhere before but I have never really thought about it like that. But it’s true. Whether you build a desktop site, a mobile site, an adaptive site or an app, it’s not the device that’s important. It’s the context of use.

  When you search google maps, it takes into account your device, where you are and what date and time it is. That’s the context of your usage and the information you get back takes that into account. You need to so the same thing. A consumer accessing your content at home is looking for very different things than a consumer walking down the street in your destination.

  Now here’s the kicker. Often that means people use another website than yours. Somebody walking down the street looking for a restaurant is going to use Google Maps, Yelp or Tripadvisor, not a DMO website. Even a consumer planning as trip might never even make in onto your website (hello travel bloggers). Your content online strategy needs to include content on third party websites. From inspiration to transaction. Just like we used to do it in the 90s with travel guides and tour operator brochures.

• Management, Marketing, social media, Travel & Tourism

  5 levels of social media sophistication at the DMO

  04.23.12 | Permalink | 34 Comments

  

  Imagine you had to start a DMO. Your DMO. You have been given the same budget and must start from scratch. Would your DMO look exactly the same as it does now? The same departments, same positions? The same budget allocations? The same marketing tactics?

  The internet, and social media in particular, have completely changed tourism marketing. Forever. People might not talk on Facebook about which fabric softener they use or which soft drink they prefer, but everybody talks about their travels. Social media sophistication is crucial to modern marketing. Yet the tourism industry is way behind.

  We have worked with dozens of DMOs around the world, ranging from very small to very large. And we have spoken to hundreds more. Based on our conversations and experiences we have identified the following levels for social media adoption and integration into the organization.

  1) Ignoring social media
  This level represents DMOs who are not active at all in social media. Social media is seen more as a threat than an opportunity.

  Characteristics you can find at this level are:

  • Leadership that is very skeptical of social media (“Facebook is a waste of time,” “I don’t care what my old high school buddy had for dinner last night,” “Twitter is for young people,” etc.)
  • Fear of negativity
  • Restricted staff access to social networking sites through policies or technology
  • Lack of an internal social media champion
  • Lack of social media knowledge at marketing agencies
  • Traditional marketing methods
  • No budget for social media

  Two years ago, there were many DMOs at this level, but by today most have moved on. Most DMOs that remain here are tied to very restrictive government policies.

  2) Experimenting with social media
  DMOs experiment with social media without a specific strategy through random tactics.

  Characteristics you can find at this level are:

  • Leadership that is skeptical, does not know activities are happening, ignores them because of disinterest, allows it because an influential stakeholder asked questions, or is swamped dealing with politics
  • Fear of negativity and overreaction when something “bad” happens
  • Enthusiastic internal champions who have created rogue accounts but sometimes lack skills to properly execute. These people eventually leave the organization to properly grow their skills elsewhere
  • Hit or miss results
  • Chasing anything that is new and hot
  • Lack of social media knowledge at marketing agencies
  • No or very little budget
  • No metrics

  There are still a lot of DMOs operating at this level. It often takes a noticeable event to move them to the next level. This could be spurred by a social media success internally or by the DMO next door. For example, a rival’s viral YouTube video or growing number of Facebook fans.

  3) Social media supporting marketing campaigns
  Due to a lack of strategic knowledge, DMOs incorporate social media in paid, outbound marketing campaigns. Often this is an add-on to traditional marketing campaigns, such as a YouTube channel showing videos originally made for TV or using Facebook and Twitter to broadcast campaign messaging.

  Characteristics you can find at this level are:

  • Leadership that realizes social media can be powerful but still relies/insists on traditional methods because they are more comfortable with them, or do not know how to measure and compare the difference in results
  • Marketing agencies that reluctantly incorporate social into campaign strategies, often as an afterthought and/or without understanding social media principles
  • Little integration or collaboration with members/partners/industry
  • Heavy scheduling and approval processes for social media activity
  • Broadcast-style communication in social media
  • Viewing and communicating with fans and followers in a traditional outbound marketing way, such as a consumer email database
  • Year-round efforts on Twitter, Facebook, etc., that lack strategic direction
  • Social media black-outs when there is no campaign in market
  • Frustrated and/or maxed-out staff who understand the potential of social media but are not heard by leadership and sometimes need/want more training
  • Often staff skilled in social media leave the organization out of frustration
  • Budget that is a small portion of marketing campaigns
  • Lack of appropriate metrics, with success often measured either by big numbers (# of fans/followers) or a campaign’s level of creativity

  Most DMOs operate at this level, sometimes with some additional effort to keep Facebook and Twitter going year-round. Often the level of success depends on the sophistication of one or two staff members.

  DMOs at this level want to succeed but cannot break out of the traditional way of doing business. Getting to level four is usually achieved by having a strong social media success as part of a bigger initiative or having an epiphany that social requires a different way of thinking. Usually, level two experiments continue alongside level three activity.

  4) Following a social media strategy
  This level is typified by a DMO having a social media strategy in place or having social media integrated into its marketing strategy. The DMO still believes that it is in full control of the destination brand.

  Characteristics you can find at this level are:

  • Leadership that understands social media and has given it dedicated resources
  • Marketing campaigns that have social at the core
  • Agencies in place that are dedicated to social or a digital agency that (really) gets social
  • Social strategies in place tied to marketing goals and objectives
  • Stronger alignment/integration with members/partners/industry and other stakeholders
  • A move from mass to niche marketing
  • Activities that are measured and adjusted in real time
  • Staff that is trained in social media
  • Empowered staff that is allowed and encouraged to participate as a DMO professional in social networks
  • Social media monitoring and engagement that is in collaboration with members/partners/industry
  • Social media that is incorporated in customer service
  • Relaxed social media access policies and limited approvals for posting content
  • Crisis plan in place
  • Systematic experimentation that is part of the strategy
  • Dedicated staff and budget for social media

  Leading DMOs have entered this level. Over the next few years we expect a rush of DMOs moving here. DMOs that enter level four first are the ones with less restraining operating environments (such as funding) with innovative leaders and marketing managers.

  5) Embracing the social business model

  The level five social business recognizes that the destination’s story and reputation are based on visitors’ experiences at every touch point during their trips (see point 1 in “Top 5 Wrong Assumptions in Destination Marketing”). This DMO knows and accepts that it is no longer in control of the destination story. It recognizes and acts on the need to collaborate closely with its industry, residents, influencers and visitors, and that it must change the way success is measured.

  The level five DMO starts with the core of the passions that make a destination relevant and leads all partners that have an impact on those experiences. The sole focus is on delivering outstanding visitor experiences that are unique to the destination, and then making it easy for visitors to share these experiences in their own voices.

  As painful as it may be, the DMO re-organizes, ending much of its old way of doing business. Staff is re-trained and assigned to new activities.

  Characteristics you can find at this level are:

  • Leadership that understands that business models from 15 years ago must change and is willing to undertake the pain of changing the organization
  • Relentless focus on the consumer
  • Majority of marketing resources are allocated to digital
  • A shift from destination marketing to destination management, where the customer experience is seen as the primary way to build brand
  • Marketing strategies that are a collaborative effort between the DMO, industry, residents, passionate consumers and other stakeholders
  • A move from mass marketing to niche marketing
  • Culture of collaboration, internally as well as with members/partners/industry and even consumers
  • Flattened organizational hierarchy to increase efficiency and speed needed to respond and adjust quickly
  • Lean processes
  • Staff that is trained, empowered and supported to make decisions without requiring lengthy approvals or spending time in meetings designed by management to control every aspect of every tactic

  We’re not aware of any DMOs at level five. We have spoken to many DMO executives who know they need to get here and want to get here. Often, their funding models or destination-specific politics stand in the way.

  The DMO closest to a level five we are familiar with is Visit Sørlandet in Southern Norway. As a newly created regional DMO, this organization quickly realized it would be impossible to build a Southern Norway brand the traditional way. By creating a strategy based on collaborating with local DMOs and industry members to improve the visitor experience and elevate the collective digital marketing efforts, Visit Sørlandet is building it’s brand through every touchpoint while growing repeat visitation and encouraging word-of-mouth.

  For many DMOs that have not reached level four, level five may seem pie in the sky. But the further you move your DMO through the levels, the more you realize just how much the world has changed and the true impact this has. Once you enter level four, you can see level five. It is no longer pie in the sky. It is tomorrow.

  At what level is your DMO?
  Your DMO’s current level is not a sign of success or failure. Every DMO is different. Politics and funding models have a big impact. So does the size and scope of a DMO. A country DMO is different from a city DMO. This affects specific marketing strategies and tactics.

  It is also not a race. It is a process that organizations need to go through. Some might skip a step. For others, the levels could overlap. But in order for DMOs to stay relevant and effective, they need to climb up.

  We have worked with DMOs in all shapes and sizes at every level of this process. We enjoy helping DMOs make the climb.

  We have conducted audits, started Facebook pages, trained staff, implemented social media as part of bigger campaigns, run social campaigns, created strategies, helped to define entire business plans centered around social principles and much more.

  Inventing the future
  Alan Kay, the inventor of the GUI and object-oriented programming once said, “The best way to predict the future is to invent it.” Instead of all DMOs trying to invent level 5 independently, we think the best future is that we all invent it together and collectively stay relevant. Please share your thoughts in the comments.

  As always, thanks for all my Think! coworkers for their contributions in creating this post

• Marketing, social media, Think! Social Media, Travel & Tourism

  Tap into people’s passion

  12.02.11 | Permalink | 1 Comment

  A contestant for a contest we’re running for the Powder Highway tattooed “ski bum” on his butt in the hopes to win (see full video).

  

  At Think! we believe marketing should be relevant and add value to people’s lives. We believe in tapping into the passions of niche audiences by offering remarkable experiences relevant to that niche.

  When you tap into people’s passion, distance and money means a lot less. People will drive 5 hours to eat some cheeseballs if it means something to them.

  We use this concept when we create marketing campaigns as well. For the Powder Highway contest, the price is very remarkable to people passionate about skiing and snowboarding

  • Season’s passes at 8 ski resorts
  • 4 days of heli skiing
  • 8 days of snow cat skiing
  • 3 months of accommodation
  • a rental vehicle
  • $500 worth of gas

  Remarkable enough to get yourself tattooed.

• leadership, Marketing, social media, Travel & Tourism

  I’ve seen the future of travel media

  08.30.11 | Permalink | 13 Comments

  
  Steve Keenan, online travel editor from the London Sunday Times summarizes Valencia’s unique approach to a media/blogging fam

  Valencia Leads

  A few weeks ago the Valencia Tourism Region hosted a blog trip (#blogtripF1) and it could very well be the new standard for DMOs to model their traditional media trips or media fams after. I was fortunate enough to be invited on the trip.

  Valencia Tourism invited a mix of traditional journalist, travel bloggers, social media travel, web technology and web design professionals. These people of all ages, with diverse skill-sets and interests where hosted on a four day event centred around Valencia and the Formula One Grand Prix.

  It included all the hallmarks of a traditional media trip. Visits to the best restaurants, the top sights, attractions and accommodations. The trip included private guides and behind the scenes tours, all well organized as you can expect from any respectable DMO.

  

  Making the media trip social
  Valencia Tourism innovated the traditional trip by creating a place for these professionals to collaborate, discuss, debate and most of all develop new relationships. Social Media professionals are social by definition and unlike traditional journalists who are more driven by exclusivity, bloggers understand their individual success is strengthened by the success of their relationships and their network.

  Taking advantage of educational opportunities
  The place to kick-off the discussion was at a conference where attendees presented a topic related to their area of expertise (videos of presentations here). The event was attended by many local, national DMO’s and operators. A great way to get Tourism Valencia’s stakeholders access to the knowledge in the group.

  Fostering the creation of networks
  Over the next few days we got to know each other very well. There was enough time and opportunity to do so. We discussed and debated all topics digital travel professionals are interested in. And everything was tweeted in real time of course, creating a surge of Valencia exposure in real time, across many people’s personal and professional networks.

  

  Creating remarkable experiences
  Remarkable experiences turn into social objects, shared in social media. These are the things worth blogging, tweeting and Facebooking about. There were plenty in Valencia. Walking on top of a shark tank, eating the best Paella, incredibly photogenic modern architecture, random bars, more great food and of course the F1 race.

  Remarkable experiences was also the subject of my presentation, summarized in this interview
  

  Build in surprises
  Exclusive access, or including things money can’t buy will generate even more conversations. The trip offered personalized surprises such as a visit to the F1 paddock, a ride down the track in the safety car and even a drive in a converted 3-seater Formula One car for some.

  Results
  The tally so far? By the last count I’ve heard a while back a few dozen blog posts have been written, 61 YouTube videos created, 363 people tweeted 1,558 tweets reaching over 2 million people all around the world while articles in traditional media are being written.

  But the real value is not just the immediate exposure but the fact that Valencia sits at the centre of a strong network of travel bloggers and tourism professionals including their expended networks. Valencia will always be top op mind when I connect with any of the new friends I’ve made.

  Promoting by focussing on building networks and putting yourself in the middle of it. That’s the future. Valencia has re-invented itself over the last years with new tourism attractions, infrastructure and mega-events. They’re doing the same with destination marketing.

  Congratulations Joantxo and Arantxa, you’re setting the new standard for travel media.

  
  Valencia’s City of Arts and Sciences – Photo by Sherry Ott

• Internet, personal, social media

  Social media and technology creates stronger relationships not weaker

  08.25.11 | Permalink | 4 Comments

  What about all this BS that technology and social media stop people for having real and genuine relationships? Social Media is making my life, and my relationships with people better every day.

  Here’s my story.

  My wife and I adopted our daughter two weeks ago from Japan. It was an amazing experience. But hard as well. We had to wait for two weeks in Tokyo for paperwork to processs. Anybody who is a parent knows how weird those first few days are. Being in a strange city where you don’t know anybody without a real support system can be tough.

  But it didn’t feel like that at all. Skype allowed us to have our family in Canada and the Netherlands share the moment when our daughter got placed with us live. It was like they were there with us.

  

  And over the next two weeks, people checked in all the time, we never felt alone. There was always somebody to see and talk to.

  All our friends made us feel very connected and supported with an outpouring of well wishes and excitement from our personal networks on Facebook.

  

  Even my Twitter followers, some of whom I don’t even know in person, were amazing in their support.

  

  This wouldn’t and couldn’t have happened 10 years ago. And it was all free.

  Social Media and technology connects people and builds stronger relationships with more people over larger distances. Because it’s different doesn’t mean it’s artificial or incomplete.

  It’s just different, and it’s awesome.

   

• Marketing, social media, Travel & Tourism

  Travel Writers vs Travel Bloggers

  07.04.11 | Permalink | 4 Comments

  

  From left to right: Gary Arndt, me, Brooks and Steve Keenan at #blogtripF1

  What’s the difference anyways?

  A travel writer writes movie scripts, a travel blogger writes TV scripts.

  That quote comes from Gary Arndt, author of the Everything Everywhere blog. Gary has been traveling around the world since 2007. He has no permanent home. His website receives more visitors than most DMO’s. He has over 100,000 Twitter followers. Gary is the real deal.

  A travel writer writes a finished piece. It has a beginning, a middle and an end. On a good travel blog one episode leads to the next and the ongoing story makes the visitor come back over and over again. People are drawn in by the ongoing story.

  Awesome.

  For more of Gary’s insights, listen to his podcasts about (travel) blogging.

• leadership, Management, Marketing, social media, Travel & Tourism

  Tapping into influencers passion

  06.29.11 | Permalink | Comment?

  

  Most people don’t know I’m a huge F1 (Formula One) fan. I watch every qualifying session and every race, ever time. I’m depressed in the off-season.

  It started when I was a teenager. On Sundays, me and my Mom would always watch the races together. I don’t remember how it started but it was our thing and it has always stayed with me. Even after I left Europe and moved to Canada where F1 fans are few and far between.

  I frequently get asked to speak about tourism marketing at places around the world. It’s very flattering that people are interested in what I think and have to say. In the tourism marketing community, I suppose I’m some sort of influencer. Unfortunately I can’t make it everywhere. I try, but I have to pick and choose.

  I met Joantxo Llantada from the Valencia Region Tourist Board at the ENTER conference this year. I presented a case study about our marketing for the 2010 games at Tourism BC and he presented a fascinating case study about his F1 blogtrip. So I told him I was an F1 fan.

  A few months later he sent me this tweet.

  

  The decision was very, very, very easy. Come to Valencia to do a presentation and visit the F1 race? Uh… yeah!

  Connect with somebody’s passion and they’re easily convinced. Joantxo uses the F1 to bring influencers together for a conference and a blog trip. For 4 days we explored the (awesome) city of Valencia, had great food and inspiring conversations. An awesome mix of the biggest bloggers, journalists, social media marketers and digital professionals. From young to old and from all over.

  It was educational and inspirational. More about that in the next few days.

• Experience Design, Marketing, social media, Travel & Tourism

  Meh

  05.31.11 | Permalink | 1 Comment

  I often hear from hotel operators that negative reviews on Tripadvisor usually aren’t from their typical customers. A 4-star hotel receives bad reviews from customers who got a deal on a discount website because of high parking fees and the expensive restaurant. A family oriented hotel receives bad reviews from business traveler who complain about the noise from the kids playing in the pool.

  I use the chart below in some of my presentations:

  

  There are a lot of people will love your product and a lot of people who probably won’t. The people who love of hate your product are the people who will talk about you in social media. The people in the middle shrug their shoulders and won’t mention you either way.

  Two lessons from this chart:

  1. Stop marketing to people on the right side of this bell curve. They might deliver short-term cash flow but hurt your business in the long run.
  2. Moving the curve a little bit to the left will increase the number of positive conversations and grow your business through word-of-mouth.

   

• Marketing, social media, Think! Social Media, Travel & Tourism

  The story of our Super Bowl Social Media Campaign that got 2.4 million people talking

  02.01.11 | Permalink | 9 Comments

  

  This is the story about the ‘Mystery Man’ campaign we ran on behalf of the Dallas Convention & Visitors Bureau last week. It’s a story of the power of social media, passionate communities and bringing people together. We knew it was a great idea but the results exceeded our wildest imagination.

  Background

  Social Media is about sharing and bringing people together. When the Dallas CVB asked us to design a campaign around Super Bowl XLV we thought ‘Why not use social media to get people talking to each other about Dallas?’.

  At Think! Social Media, we work with the concept of passionate communities. These are groups of people connected through a shared passion. Engage a passionate community in the right way by offering something remarkable, and they will do the marketing for you through word-of-mouth.

  The Big Idea

  Needless to say, every NFL team has an extremely passionate community… and offering a chance to win Super Bowl tickets is pretty remarkable. Remarkable enough get people out into the street talking to each other.

  We decided to send a Mystery Man to each city of the teams who made it to the Super Bowl. The first person to find the Mystery Man and tell him the secret phrase,  ‘Have you been to Dallas lately?’ would instantly win tickets to the big game, 4 nights accommodation, tickets to the NFL experience and some cash towards travel.

  The Process

  We researched NFL and travel/lifestyle bloggers in each city and asked them if they would like to participate.  As “Exclusive Bloggers”, their role would be to share daily clues about the location of the Mystery Man.  We were careful in choosing bloggers that have strong social media presences and very engaged readers.  We chose 5 in Green Bay and 4 in Pittsburgh.  Their role was crucial in tapping into the existing communities and raising awareness about the campaign.

  

  The clues tied in to imagery and facts about attractions in Dallas and became increasingly specific as the weekend went on.   By printing the clues on photos they were easy to share through Twitter, and were eye-catching on the blogs and Facebook.

  The secret password could only be revealed by ‘liking’ the Visit Dallas Facebook Fan Page.  A campaign Twitter account (@DallasSBHunt) was created to coordinate all activities, answer questions and share the latest updates.  In addition two hashtags (#SBHuntGB and #SBHuntPGH) were introduced to facilitate discussion around the contest.

  Results

  Sunday

  The conference finals were played on Sunday January 23. We were prepared for each of the 4 cities. At the end of Sunday we knew the contest would run in Green Bay and Pittsburgh.

  Monday

  We finalized the details of the contest and sent out materials to the bloggers so they could prepare their first blog posts announcing the contest.  At this time we activated the contest tab on the Visit Dallas fan page which only had 600 fans.

  Tuesday

  By noon, the bloggers in each city had announced the contest.

  Green Bay: Total Packers, Brent Farvre, Packers Club, Purple Pants Green Jersey, All Green Bay Packers

  Pittsburgh: IheartPGH, Steelers Gab, Pittsburgh Sports and Mini Ponies

  Slowly the word started to spread.  At the end of Tuesday, the fanpage had grown to over 1,000 fans and the followers of the campaign Twitter account began to grow.

  Wednesday/Thursday

  We continued to build awareness over the next few days. By carefully listening in on Twitter, tapping in to relevant communites and joining the conversations where appropriate we were able to rapidly spread word of the contest. By Thursday, traditional media had gotten wind of what we were up to and a few stations began to report on the contest on the the nightly news.  By the end of Thursday over 3000 people had liked the Visit Dallas page.

  

  Friday

  At 9am the Exclusive Bloggers announced their first clues and the contest began.  We quickly learned that we had struck gold in both cities. The streets were full of people searching for our Mystery Man, many tweeting as they went and following along on Facebook.  By Friday @DallasSBHunt was trending in both Pittsburgh and Green Bay.

  

  Best of all, two whole cities were out on the streets talking to each other about Dallas.

  

  

  

  That night, the hunt for the Dallas Mystery Man was the headline news on all the local stations (this is my favourite). The Visit Dallas Fan Page had grown to 8,000 fans and the campaign Twitter account had well over 1500 followers.

  Saturday

  We were lucky that Friday’s clues had been vague enough for our Mystery Men to keep from getting caught, but by Saturday the amount of people on the street made it significantly more difficult to make it through the city unnoticed.

  Just after noon our Mystery Man in Green Bay was found and not long after our man in Pittsburgh was caught as well.

  The hunt was over, but the ride wasn’t. The winners were invited on news shows (1, 2, 3, 4, 5) and countless blogs, websites, radio stations and news papers were reporting on the contest and its winners.

  

  Sunday and beyond

  The winners in Green Bay turned out to be a couple who are homeless and live in a local shelter. They were invited on Fox 11’s morning show to tell their story.  Shortly thereafter CNN picked up the story and we had reports from our contacts all over North America (even as far as Australia) who saw the campaign on the news.

  

  The Results

  We definitely succeeded in getting people talking about Dallas. We also proved that when you run a Social Media campaign within passionate communities, you don’t need a big media budget.  And, if the community is passionate enough, you’ll even make it on the news.

  We grew the Visit Dallas Fan Page by almost 10,000 fans in three days. The fanpage received about 100,000 pageviews and generated over 500,000 news feed impressions.

  But what we’re most proud of is the incredible positive reaction from the people in Green Bay and Pittsburgh. We received many messages from individuals telling Dallas how much they enjoyed the weekend.

  

  

  We want to thank the Dallas CVB for giving us the opportunity to execute our crazy idea and give a big thank you to all the local bloggers and the great people of Green Bay and Pittsburgh. May the best team win on Sunday!

  This entry is cross-posted on the Think! Social Media blog.

• Internet, Marketing, social media

  Expert content on VisitFlorida.com

  12.29.10 | Permalink | 10 Comments

  Every year I use the ‘quite time’ around the holidays to have a look at what other DMO’s around the world are doing. I love poking around to see what I can learn. I’m thinking of creating a giant presentation with my findings (let me know if you’re interested).

  One of the things I’m looking at is what DMO’s are doing to incorporate real time information. This is a trend DMO’s can’t ignore. Brochureware websites are no longer acceptable and consumers expect content that is timely as well.

  Florida has created a Florida Live section on their website. The page includes their Twitter feed, Flickr photo’s, YouTube videos etc. It also includes a Google Map with the Twitter feeds from local DMO’s, live webcams, YouTube videos and Fishing Reports.

  

  The fishing reports are very cool. Every day the captains call in from their boats to give an update of the fishing conditions of their area. Users can listen to each captain reporting on the conditions.

  Incorporating expert content from industry members or residents is something I’ve been pitching for a long time now. Most DMO’s do this with expert bloggers (some better than others). This is a very creative idea to make it timely, relevant and credible.

  Great idea, good content, good execution. I love it.

  Do you have examples of ‘live information’ incorporated into DMO or other tourism websites?

William Bakker's Destination Marketing blog