Speaking in Florida on Social Media

I received confirmation last week that I have been invited to present as a keynote speaker at the Florida Association of CVB’s annual Destination Marketing Summit in Orlando. The presentation will be two hours in length and cover two segments; an introduction to social media and it’s impact on tourism marketing and strategies in using social media to market destinations to a changing user landscape. I’m really looking forward to presenting to this group primarily because: The use of social media and user generated content is a very timely subject. The audience is well positioned... Read more »

A Lesson Learned - Big Changes at VisitScotland.com

Earlier in February I wrote about the role of the DMO and the lesson learned from VisitScotland.com. That post received a number of comments back that added more depth to the conversation. Today there was an announcement from Visit Scotland that the VisitScotland.com website would be changing the way it does busy to better support the grassroots tour operators. Ofcourse, the small operators are ecstatic about the change and are praising the work of organizations like ReclaimVS.com who petitioned to have VisitScotland.com returned to public control. The big issue for many was the fact that... Read more »

The Role of the DMO - A Lesson From VisitScotland.com

There has been a lot of discussion about the role of DMOs and how DMOs should be implementing technologies for the benefit of stakeholders. In the struggle to maintain viability and revenues, some DMOs have turned to a sales model. How does this model affect the DMO’s primary mandate to market the destination? We need look no further than VisitScotland.com to see an example of a DMO whose priority has shifted from marketing the destination to generating revenues from commissions. There are many, especially stakeholders, who are not happy with the direction that VisitScotland.com has... Read more »

Canada-E-Connect video interview with Darren Johner

This is a interview Darren Johner, the webmaster for Tourism Vancouver. I was introduced to Darren through Phil Caines, who works for me at Rezgo.com. Phil used to work with Tourism Vancouver before working at Rezgo. According to Darren, the biggest take away from the Canada-e-connect conference is the sense of collaboration and community. Sphere: Related Content Read More →

DMOs should focus on web initiatives

I read a post today by Joe Buhler about the Caribbean Tourism Organization and the excellent job being done by Vincent Vanderpool-Wallace. The part of the post that resonated the most with me is the following quote: “What I also applaud him for is the strong focus on web based initiatives to get the message out and stimulate market demand. It is today the most effective means of communications with any audience. Also, the tight integration of information with a direct online booking functionality for the entire region will only increase the effectiveness of effort and improve the ROI of... Read more »

Academic Research Supports Industry Trends

As an IFITT member, I’ve had an opportunity to review the materials presented at the Enter 2007 Conference, which took place in Ljubljana. Much of the focus of IFITT is on the research and academic side and I must admit, the quality of the presentations is very impressive. The presentations, which are produced by academics from around the World, reflect research into a wide variety of tourism related areas. One paper I found particularly interesting and relevant to the upcoming Canada-e-connect conference is titled “Assessing eBusiness Models of U.S. Destination Marketing Organizations”.... Read more »

Being there is ALL the fun

I just read an interesting post on Tim Hughe’s blog about some comments from Rob Cuthbert at Viator about how hard it is for consumers to travel . In the last sentence, Tim writes something that I think is vitally important to the travel purchase experience and that is “the need to keep the purchase and consumption process simple for consumers.” The travel industry, especially the airfare and hotel sides of the industry are rampant with overly complicated pricing models, rates, discounts, commissions, and such. In the end, I think that everyone loses out because the traveler... Read more »

Managed Content is dead, long live UGC

I’ve been commenting a lot recently about the impact that user generated content is having on travel and tourism online. Now it would seem that others are also recognizing that ugc is quickly becoming the content of choice for most savvy travelers. In a recent post, Jens Thraenhart, commented that DMOs and other tourism agencies also had to start looking at ugc seriously if they want to continue effectively marketing to a growing online audience. In my previous post titled “Keeping Travel Agents Relevant“, I discuss how travel agents can increase their value to clients by providing... Read more »