Eric Pateman

A presentation from Destination Food 2018, Australia’s first food tourism conference. The post Eric Pateman from Edible Canada talks food tourism – episode 91 appeared first on Holly G.

A presentation from Destination Food 2018, Australia’s first food tourism conference. The post <a href="http://www.hollyg.com.au/tourismupgrade/eric-pateman-from-edible-canada-talks-food-tourism-episode-91/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Eric Pateman from Edible Canada talks food tourism – episode 91</a> appeared first on <a href="http://www.hollyg.com.au" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Holly G</a>.

Eric Pateman from Edible Canada talks food tourism – episode 91

A presentation from Destination Food 2018, Australia’s first food tourism conference. When Brenda Fawdon and Chris Sharp were commissioned by local council to produce the Eat Local cookbooks, the Scenic Rim region experienced unforseen media exposure, a surge in tourism and a swell of community pride. Dates have been announced for Destination Food 2021. An event that brings together Australia’s food tourism industry. A culinary tourism conference to network, learn and share ideas. So if this interests you then save the date: Monday 2 August 2021  More information coming shortly, see www.destination-food.com.au or join our Facebook group to connect with other food tourism professionals. You may also enjoy episode 68 of this podcast series, Food Tourism to attract visitors to your destination – episode 68.    The post Eat Local: How a cookbook boosted food tourism – episode 90 appeared first on Holly G.

A presentation from Destination Food 2018, Australia’s first food tourism conference. When Brenda Fawdon and Chris Sharp were commissioned by local council to produce the Eat Local cookbooks, the Scenic Rim region experienced unforseen media exposure, a surge in tourism and a swell of community pride. Dates have been announced for Destination Food 2021. An event that brings together Australia’s food tourism industry. A culinary tourism conference to network, learn and share ideas. So if this interests you then save the date: Monday 2 August 2021  More information coming shortly, see <a href="http://www.destination-food.com.au" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">www.destination-food.com.au</a> or join our <a href="https://www.facebook.com/groups/DestFood" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Facebook group</a> to connect with other food tourism professionals. You may also enjoy episode 68 of this podcast series, <a href="http://www.hollyg.com.au/tourismupgrade/food-tourism/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Food Tourism to attract visitors to your destination – episode 68.</a> The post <a href="http://www.hollyg.com.au/tourismupgrade/eat-local-how-a-cookbook-boosted-food-tourism-episode-90/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Eat Local: How a cookbook boosted food tourism – episode 90</a> appeared first on <a href="http://www.hollyg.com.au" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Holly G</a>.

Eat Local: How a cookbook boosted food tourism – episode 90

Engage your community through visual content – episode 89

Talking social and digital insights with High Tea Society founder Michelle Milton    Show notes to come Find more at highteasociety.com The post What’s working with digital and social marketing with founder High Tea Society – episode 88 appeared first on Holly G.

<h2>Talking social and digital insights with High Tea Society founder Michelle Milton</h2> Show notes to come Find more at <a href="https://highteasociety.com" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">highteasociety.com</a> The post <a href="http://www.hollyg.com.au/tourismupgrade/whats-working-with-digital-now/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">What’s working with digital and social marketing with founder High Tea Society – episode 88</a> appeared first on <a href="http://www.hollyg.com.au" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Holly G</a>.

What’s working with digital and social marketing with founder High Tea Society – episode 88

Changes to the Facebook algorithm and what this may mean for tourism marketers. Welcome to Episode 87 of Tourism Upgrade. The podcast unpacking marketing trends from travel, tourism and marketing leaders. I’m your host HollyG and today I have with me Rachel Beaney a digital and social media specialist – And we’ll be discussing the recent changes to the Facebook algorithm and what impact this may have on our social media activities. Welcome to the podcast Rachel!    HollyG: We were just talking before we started about the announcement that Facebook made just really about a month ago at the start of 2018, about some changes they were making. Do you want to tell us a little bit about what happened, and what they said? Rachel: Sure. Facebook announced in the beginning of 2018, around early January, that they were changing their algorithm so their Facebook feed that was distributing content was now going to be focusing on friends and family, rather than pages. Their big spin on the situation was that they were going to be promoting conversations and engagements, and less on brand pages. Facebook as a whole, it sounds like what they’re trying to do is promote organisation conversations a bit more, but for marketers, for us, that meant that our page reaches would drastically, well, I don’t know about drastically reduced, but they’ll reduce from what they were. HollyG: He certainly created a lot of hype, and a lot of fear within the marketer community. Rachel: Yeah, for sure. I received so many SMSs and notifications over 24 hours of people saying have you seen this news, have you seen this news. The thing is that Facebook has been making these changes for a really long time, so we’ve been seeing these changes over years. About every six months they do something like this, but for some reason this particular change, maybe because it was January, I don’t know, people really were quite passionate about this particular change. HollyG: I think that’s a really good point you make that actually people like us who are living and breathing this social media everyday, there is changes all the time, and I agree it’s sort of just another one of those things really. Rachel: I think that it is a case of rolling with these updates as they happen. Every month there’s a new kind of change, and we need to think about how we’re gonna adapt to that change. This is another one of those which was a little bit of a surprise, but looking at Facebook’s news in the past it’s something we kind of could predict, seeing their declining reach over the past three or four years from 100% to 50% to 25% to 1%, and now the mysterious less than 1%, whatever that amount is. I think it’s something that we sort of could predict, so it’s not too big a surprise I think for a lot of people who are immersed in this space. HollyG: I guess we want to talk about what this means, and the questions that we need to be asking ourselves as marketers and as business owners who have a Facebook page and use this as our marketing, what this means. I guess I first wanted to ask did we see a drastic decline overnight in organic reach? We both look after a lot of pages. Did you note anything? Rachel: Not particularly across what I’ve been working on, just because our Facebook reach is about 1% already, so less than 1% … Look, Facebook hasn’t any switch that they turn on overnight, so it’s something that does roll out over time. Of course the Facebook algorithm depending on the kind of content you post or what time of day you post, or whether you’re posting a really engaging news article, whether or not you’re getting more or less reach is based on so many factors. I think that even as I’ve been looking through my pages, these things it’s not just a case where suddenly I’ve got minuscule reach. These changes happen over time. Your content that you post also impacts that as well. HollyG: Definitely. I saw that. I actually did see a couple of days where things were looking a little dire, and then it’s sort of back to almost normal. As you say, there’s no switch that gets flicked. It is more of a gradual thing.    HollyG: What do we mean when we talk about quality content? Rachel: It’s a big question. I think in terms of content there are a couple of ways we can look at it. One of which is looking at the content that is right for your audience, and then there’s content that the algorithm favours. They’re two slightly different things. Content that your audience engages with is obviously content that really taps into what connects with your audience, whether that’s creating conversation or creating something amazing that has an emotive reaction. Maybe it’s beautiful photos of a scenery around a tour that you’re creating, something that creates an emotive reaction. In terms of the Facebook algorithm, Facebook has always favoured different content types over time. Sometimes they explicitly state that, and sometimes they don’t. It’s just through testing that we say on our page, on this particular page, photos work really well for this audience, or links work really well for this audience. In the most recent update in January, they did mention they’re more likely to favour things that create conversations and live postings, so things like Facebook live. They’re skewing basically towards anything that starts a conversation or anything that’s about engaging community. HollyG: That’s interesting. You see that with content. You know that if you post something and you do have a lot of responses or conversation around it, it gets more reach. That happens because people are engaging with it and that sort of thing. I think that’s actually a really good point to remember. In the old days, it’s sort of just post a picture, and people would Like it, but maybe that’s not really performing as well as other things. We’re seeing good success with web links to quality content and that sort of thing. I guess thinking about it from a broader perspective, should we as marketers be phasing down Facebook? Is it still going to be relevant, or is social media still relevant for marketing? Rachel: I think it is a really tough question, and I think for some businesses they’ll have looked at this Facebook change and said you know what, I’m done. I can see that it can be quite stressful. I think that it really depends on your objective with your business. I think that social media does some things really well, and some things not so well, and it’s about looking at what you want to be doing. I think it’s also worth keeping in mind that when we talk about social media we’re talking about a lot of things. Talking about a Facebook page when you’re organically posting content is different to running a Facebook group, is different to running Facebook ads, and is different to working with an influencer on Instagram. Each of these things are different, and they bring different results. HollyG: I think that’s a great point. One of the reasons that we’re having this conversation is that you wrote a really great blog post on your blog about the Facebook algorithm change, and sort of saying these are some of the things that we can do now, so don’t panic. One of the really great points you raised was about looking at other tools and platforms. Can we talk about that a little bit? I guess the one takeaway I took from your blog post was don’t put all your eggs in one basket, don’t just put everything into your Facebook page, really make sure that you’ve got other options there. Is that sort of what you were saying? Rachel: Yeah, for sure. I think it’s worth saying that putting all your eggs in one basket for me isn’t necessarily about saying being on every single social network, because that’s exhausting, and impractical in real life. It’s about diversifying the way that you engage with your customers. That can be by making sure that you have people who are on your Facebook page that are also on your mailing list or people who are following you on Instagram also on LinkedIn if they’re the same audience. It’s about diversification because if any of the big social platforms make a change we could have potentially lost that audience. It’s about making sure you’ve got some of that audience on the third party social platforms, also across your own platforms. Your website and your mailing list, you can either have people who are on your mailing list or people who just visit your website, you can then tag them for retargeting with ads. Whether it’s a case of diversification in terms of having people across different platforms, or whether it’s your owned and earned platforms, it’s about spreading that out so if one drops out you’ve got some other options to keep engaging your audience. HollyG: Are there any that you think would work particularly well for tourism businesses or destinations? Rachel: What I first was thinking about it, tourism is actually in a really great position for social media marketing because there’s such a passionate engaged community. Everyone loves talking about travel, so it’s the perfect platform for social media. I think some opportunities for people who are looking for new ways to combat the Facebook page changes is looking at things like Facebook groups. Whether it’s coming up with a group that people travelling to an area or a particular sport, or people who love kayaking or whatever it is, it’s looking at Facebook groups to engage that community aspect, but also the visual aspect. Looking at things like Instagram and Pinterest are really useful in terms of they’ve got such a strong visual component. Off the back of that, I’d also say that it’s also worth keeping in mind your audience for that as well. Each social platform has a slightly different audience, so if you’re targeting people who are slightly younger focusing on Instagram would be more effective, if you’re targeting maybe women in their thirties, Pinterest would be really solid as well. It’s also thinking about who your audience is and which platform they’re on. Maybe it’s LinkedIn. If you’ve got a corporate audience and do corporate tours, looking at LinkedIn in order to tap into that audience there I think is the other way to approach that. HollyG: One of the things I think is really important, and I’ve probably mentioned on this podcast lots of times, is making sure that we, and we’ve touched on it already, but making sure that we’re not just leaving everything up to the hands of these third party social platforms, that we actually are creating our own platform, and the best way to do that is through having an email database. Is that something that you see is still really important? Rachel: Yeah, I do. I think email is important to have a strong marketing mix. As I was saying earlier, not just putting all your eggs in one basket. People might find out about you on Facebook and they might visit your website to find out more about you, they might get reminded of you through email. Making sure that you’ve got all of these touch points so that they’re getting to know you and trust you all the time, I think email is particularly important in terms of things like running Facebook ads, and actually any ad platform I think these days, definitely LinkedIn ads now, you can upload your email list, and then you can use those to target ads to customers, or you can build lookalike audiences off those where Facebook [inaudible 00:15:14] … People with similar characteristics, and shows ads for those people as well. Even if you’re not using email just for email, having those emails are so important for digital marketing because you can use them in a lot of other ways as well. I would definitely endorse working hard to build up a strong email list. HollyG:  Are there any other tactics we need to be looking at to future-proof our business from a marketing perspective? Rachel: I think the thing that I would focus on is making sure that I’ve got that diversification, looking at making sure I’ve got a solid owned property, so that’s our website and our email list, and looking at making sure we’ve got solid traffic, we’re tagging that traffic so we can re-target ads to those people long term. Setting up something like Facebook pixel for example or the LinkedIn pixel [inaudible 00:16:09] marketing means that if anyone ever visits your site you can retarget them with an ad. Setting that up now means that even if you don’t use it for five years time, you can still retarget people down the track. I think that having that diversification of social platforms, thinking about your top social platforms that your audience is on and focusing on those, but also trying to get those people across different platforms just so that if things change we are in a better position. There’s already rumours that Instagram might do a similar thing to Facebook, and reduce their reach as well. While that’s only rumours, it’s not impossible because Facebook also owns Instagram. It’s something that we can suspect might happen in the future. I think it’s worth keeping in mind diversifying that. Don’t put all your eggs in one basket. HollyG: Also thinking not to panic, that changes are going to happen, that is actually part of being a good marketer, is being across this sort of stuff. Also to educate other people that we’re working with that these things are going to happen, and to keep across them. I wanted just to flag with people because I thought it was a really good point, it was an earlier post, I think it was around November, you talked about your website might actually impact how your posts perform on Facebook, and that linking people back from Facebook to your website having a really good website is going to actually make your Facebook posts perform better. That’s what I took out of it. Is that what you’ve seen? Rachel: Yeah. In terms of looking at what Facebook had said in terms of what has impacted their algorithm, in 2017 and I think some content from 2016, they explicitly said we will look for this specific criteria on your website to determine whether it’s a legitimate site or not. In their quest to defeat spam and fake content on their website, or shared on Facebook, they look at websites to see is the content legitimate, is it authentic, and if it’s not they’ll reduce the reach of that post. If your website takes a really long time to load, if it’s got a really high bounce rate, if it’s got lots of popup ads, if it’s got a really click-bait title, Facebook will reduce the amount of people it serves that post to. Making sure that your website is up to scratch might make a difference in terms of the algorithm. As you say, this was announced before the most recent changes, but I think that it’s good practice to get into anyway because it’s good for SEO as well. Google looks at these exact same factors when they’re ranking your website for SEO. Even if you’re not doing it for Facebook, it’s good practice for SEO just to polish up your website and have a look at how fast is it loading. Can you optimise some of your images to make it load a bit faster, that kind of thing? HollyG: Yeah, and obviously making sure that it is also mobile responsive, as well. I know definitely with Google, but also from our experience with Facebook, your posts aren’t really going to perform very well if you’re linking people back to a site that’s not mobile responsive. That’s a very important one as well. How can people find out a little bit more about you or connect with you? Rachel Beaney: Yeah, sure. People can find out more about me through my website, which is rachelbeaney.com or they can get in touch with me on Twitter. My handle’s beaney, so @beaney. It’s not like the hat, it’s a bit different. Yeah, anyone can feel free to get in touch, ask a question and have a chat. I’ve also got a Facebook group called Bean Social that people can come and hang out in as well, so there’s plenty of ways to get in touch and have a chat. If you only had a one thousand dollar marketing budget, what would you spend it on? HollyG: Last time, in episode 77, I did ask you the question if you only had a $1000 marketing budget what would you spend it on. Now looking back at episode 77, we talked about retargeting, I believe, I think. I thought maybe I could ask you the question and say would you change that answer, or would you keep that answer? I guess time changes, so … Rachel: Yeah. I’ve been playing a lot with using lookalikes on Facebook lately, so I think uploading your mailing list or using something like anyone who’s engaged with your ad before and building a lookalike audience based on people who you already are really engaging, I think that’s a really effective way of finding new audiences. If you’re looking for new audiences, I would upload your mailing list or existing customer data, build a custom audience, and build a lookalike off that custom audience, and I would give that a go. Otherwise, I’m still staying with the re-targeting idea. HollyG: They sort of relate, very closely related anyway. Rachel: Yeah. I think it depends I guess what I’m trying to do. HollyG: That’s right. I guess the moral to the story, and I would agree with this as well, is definitely exploring the beautiful thing of Facebook ads, because they are very cost effective and there’s so much you can do with them to either reach an existing audience or reach new audiences. In the age of where we’re seeing organic reach decline, really we all need to be across and up to date with what’s happening from a Facebook ad perspective. Rachel: For sure. HollyG: Cool. Excellent. Thank you so much. Good to chat with you. Rachel: It was lovely to be back. You can subscribe to this podcast on iTunes, Stitcher or your preferred podcast service. Tweet me with any comments or feedback @hollygalbraith or email is good too holly (at) hollyg.com.au We love to read reviews and reviews really make a difference to our ranking in iTunes. If you could take the time to add a review to iTunes this would be greatly appreciated and i’ll give you a shout out on an upcoming episode! DID YOU ENJOY THIS EPISODE? CHECK OUT EPISODE 77 FOR A FURTHER CHAT BETWEEN HOLLY AND RACHEL. The post Thinking beyond Facebook for your tourism social media strategy – episode 87 appeared first on Holly G.

Thinking beyond Facebook for your tourism social media strategy – episode 87

Bike tourism opportunities for tourism destinations – episode 86

Alfonso Calero

Photography tips for tourism: podcast with photographer Alfonso Calero Tourism Upgrade the Podcast Episode 85  Welcome to Tourism Upgrade. The podcast unpacking marketing trends from travel, tourism and marketing leaders. I’m your host HollyG and today we welcome Sydney photographer Alfonso Calero and we will we chatting about photography inspiration and creativity. http://www.alfonso.com.au https://www.photographytravel.net   HollyG:                   How did you get into photography in the first place, Alfonso? Alfonso:                  Professionally, I’m what’s considered in photography a late-starter because I decided to go to the Sydney Institute of Technology TAFE in Ultimo to study a diploma when I was 30 years old. I, of course, started photography when I was about 19, and I’ve been doing it ever since. HollyG:                   Wow. Yeah. Well, there’s a bit of a growing trend I’ve been reading about lately of this, making a career change in your 30’s and 40’s, and with so much of our work life still yet to go, I think yeah, it can be a good move to make. What are the things that you like to take photos of? Alfonso:                  Mainly people and places. HollyG:                   Because you travel so much by the looks of it. Alfonso:                  Yeah. I really enjoy stopping people on the street and asking their permission to do a street portrait, and also, I love to take photos of cityscapes at night or landscapes out in rural areas, so it’s that combination of being able to switch genres that makes it quite interesting. HollyG:                   What are people like when you ask them if you can take a photo of them? Are most people like open to that sort of thing? Alfonso:                  I’ve been lucky so far. You will have to accept that maybe 10% of the time, you will get people saying no, but I think it’s the people you approach and how you approach them that can either make or break the … getting the permission working [inaudible 00:02:26]. HollyG:                   Yeah. Alfonso:                  You look at the body language. You look at … If they’re walking in a hurry, they’re probably going to say no to get somewhere. HollyG:                   Yeah. Alfonso:                  If they seem to be floundering around or standing around and you don’t seem like you’re intimidating them … I don’t usually have a very long lens on my camera as well, so it doesn’t feel as scary for them, and explain what you’re doing, why you’re doing it. You take your sunglasses off. You give them a handshake if the culture allows for it. Just show a little bit of trust quickly. HollyG:                   Yeah. I like that because when I travel, I’m a very amateur photographer, but I actually just love taking photos of people, but I am often very, very shy about asking, so yes, I might try and practice that a little bit more. You’ve been obviously in photography for quite a while, and I guess I wanted to ask a little bit about how it’s changed over the time that you’ve been practicing. Alfonso:                  Massive shift. When digital photography started over 10 years ago, there was a massive drop in the work because everyone suddenly became a photographer, being able to have that access to digital photography. That’s a massive shift, a technology shift, but it’s exciting that we have that available to us now. I’m 52 years old, and the younger generation are much faster at learning because we used to shoot with film, so we have to spend the money, make the mistakes, wait for our results, and then look … Alfonso:                  With digital, you can learn from your mistakes immediately and the young are so tech-savvy, and they’re so fast. You’ve seen some people out there that are 19, 20, and they’re doing incredibly beautiful work. HollyG:                   I think you raise a really good point actually because one of the things that I find when I talk to people, tourism operators, or people in the industry who maybe have been in the industry for quite some time and they have … They’re not used to using a camera, and they’re quite scared to take photos, but really, today … I guess two points. One, in this world of social media or in social media marketing, business owners and people really need to know how to take a good photo in my view, and we can talk about that in a minute, but also, the learning curve can be a lot easier because it is digital, so you can practise and make mistakes, and it’s not a … Yeah, it’s not a costly exercise. Alfonso:                  Yeah, definitely. All those points are spot-on. I think that the immediacy is great, but the question is just because you can take photos and see them quickly, does it mean that you will probably be getting better? Yeah. Like you said, it’s down to your confidence. You come back from your holidays typically with thousands of photos and you’re overwhelmed by the amount, so you almost want to try and consider shooting less, but getting better quality instead of shooting a lot and hoping to hit the target. HollyG:                   Yeah, that is very true. That works in marketing as well actually. I guess is that some of the things that you teach people when you take people out on photography tours, and photography walks, and things like that? Alfonso:                  Yes. Yes, but every person learns differently and every person has a different form of visual communication, so I have to figure out what they’re like, what they like to photograph, but also how they like to photograph, and then try and guide them in that way to enhance that style of shooting. HollyG:                   Okay, so what are some of the different styles that you come across with that? Alfonso:                  Okay, so for example, you might have somebody who’s a very organised person, a very neat person, and they would prefer to shoot with less distortion of maybe architecture, so all the lines are really straight as opposed to someone who has more of a photojournalistic style where they shoot really wide angle. Let’s say, if you’re shooting architecture, the building might look a little bit more distorted. Either way is fine. It’s just that it communicates a different message. HollyG:                   Yeah. I love that. I have never thought about that before. Before we get into a few more tips because I’d love you to share some tips with us, I just wanted to talk a little bit about why is quality photography for those working in the tourism industry really important? Alfonso:                  Because we’re saturated with visuals and video, you really need to stand out with a quality shot. If you don’t, then you just get lost in the mix. HollyG:                   Yeah. There’s ridiculous statistics about how many photos are uploaded online every second and videos on YouTube and all that sort of things, so yeah. I guess it is about looking at ways to cut through. For the show notes for this episode, head to hollyg.com.au. You can subscribe to this podcast on iTunes, Stitcher, or your preferred podcast service. Can we go into a little bit about maybe some tips that you can share with us around how we can take a better photo? Alfonso:                  Definitely, so it all … Initially, I guess it would help if I at least know if they are shooting with their smartphones or if they have a DSLR or a mirrorless camera. In other words, they can change the lenses. Of course, they have more manual control with the bigger cameras compared to the smartphone. There will be some pros and cons as to what capabilities each one can do. If it’s about your smartphone, and you’re in an event like you just mentioned, and you want to use it there, you may notice that it’s quite a struggle to try and get a nice photo in an indoor environment. It’s dark. There are all these really orangey-colored tungsten lights, and so it’s a challenge. People are moving around, and it’s tricky. Look. If you happen to have a camera that’s a DSLR or aside from your smartphone and you can at least consider learning how to tackle the manual settings, it won’t be a hit and miss, and it’s a lot easier than people think. Another I guess suggestion which wouldn’t matter what camera you have is composition. If you can master the elements and principles of composition, instinctively, I think most people know them like leading line, texture, looking for shapes, looking for the right tone. Those are some examples of composition. HollyG:                   I remember early on learning. What are you actually taking the photo of? Yeah. What part of that are you actually trying to communicate? Alfonso:                  Yeah, and I think the most common error is people want to say too much in the photo. They’re communicating maybe more than one message. I guess in marketing, it’s the same thing, people trying to say too much, and then the message gets muddled and unclear. I guess you’re almost like Robin Hood with the bow and arrow. You’re trying to hit a target or dominant point of focus in the shot, and you want the viewer’s eyes to lock in on that and not be distracted by any other elements around it. HollyG:                   Great description. That’s awesome. Where do you find inspiration for your photography? Alfonso:                  Everywhere all the time, but mainly, I gravitate around towards art, so I look at different periods of art. Mainly, paintings. Before photography started, these painters mastered light and composition, so they must be on the right track, and they definitely are. I’m always really excited by that. I use Pinterest a lot. HollyG:                   Oh, yeah. Alfonso:                  I have a lot of boards, mood boards. In the old days, before Pinterest, I used to cut clippings on and put them on my board in the studio, and I just look at those. Now, with Pinterest, yeah, it’s amazing how many boards I have because there’s so much inspiration from everything. HollyG:                   Oh my gosh, it’s addictive, isn’t it? Alfonso:                  Yeah, I love it. I love it, and you could share with people too, which is great, so they could see my boards. I could see theirs. We could give each other ideas. It definitely motivates you to go out there and create. HollyG:                   I’m going to check yours out now. Alfonso:                  Yeah. HollyG:                   You travel to a lot of different destinations because you take photography groups and things like that overseas. Alfonso:                  Yes. HollyG:                   Is that true? Do you have a favourite destination to photograph? Alfonso:                  Yeah, so I started this travel education tour company about 2008, and because I’m born … I was born in the Philippines, but I’m of Spanish descent, and I came to Australia when I was 15. I used to live in Japan, and my wife is Japanese. I focus on those four places. Australia, of course. HollyG:                   Yeah. Alfonso:                  The Philippines, Spain, and Japan. I only take up to four people, from two to four people, so they’re very private, custom-made itineraries, and we focus on enhancing their style and genres of photography every day for about five to 10 days. Again, the more I go back to the places I have a strong connection with because I know the local language, the culture. I have friends and family there. The more interesting it gets because my local knowledge is building it every time I go back, and I’m exploring new areas, and it’s so much fun. HollyG:                   Yeah. Cool. Is there any final sort of comments or tips you wanted to share? Also, let us know how people can find out a little bit more about you and connect with you. Alfonso:                  Sure. Look. If you haven’t bought yourself a larger camera aside from the smartphone, don’t hesitate to go out and use your smartphone. I teach a smartphone course in the Rocks almost every Saturday afternoon. That goes for about three hours, and more information can be found on photographytravel.net. My overseas tours or my Tasmanian tours are on alfonso.com.au. Yeah. Look. Feel free to drop me a line at any time if you just want to have a little chat, and also, I would love to help people think of ideas for any of their tourism campaigns that are coming up because it seems to be changing rapidly with the way people are viewing things online. HollyG:                   Yeah, great points, and we’ll put the links to those in our show notes, and I will give you a big thank you. Actually, we have our Women in Tourism Leadership Christmas Party coming up soon, and you have actually donated a prize for that, which is one of the tours and lessons down at the Rocks, so someone attending that event will be lucky enough to win that. Yeah. Thank you for that. Alfonso:                  No problem. Lovely, lovely to do that. HollyG:                   Now, it’s time for our thousand-dollar bonus question. Now, I have a bonus question if you’re up for it. Alfonso:                  Of course. HollyG:                   I ask all my guests the same question, and the question is, if you only had a $1,000 marketing budget, what would you spend it on? Alfonso:                  I would probably if I was going to market my photo tours … Yeah. A thousand probably won’t be enough, but I’d probably get a videographer that does a little bit of drone as well if possible. Yes. I’d probably get a videographer to do and I’d make some of my stills with the videography and do like a 30-second or one-minute video that can … and carefully-scripted with voiceover. That would really be useful, and I can throw that on any platform online, and I think it would gain traction. HollyG:                   Yeah, nice. I reckon you could do that for a thousand dollars. Alfonso:                  Yeah, yeah. I just bought a drone HollyG:                   Look. It’s been really good to talk with you, and I appreciate you sharing those tips and insights with us, and I will jump off here this call now, and then go on to your Pinterest and check it out I think. Alfonso:                  Yes. Please keep in touch, and if you have any questions, you can catch me on my websites. HollyG:                   Yeah. Awesome. Great. Thanks for your time. Alfonso:                  Thank you. HollyG:                   For the show notes for this episode, head to hollyg.com.au. You can subscribe to this podcast on iTunes, Stitcher, or your preferred podcast service.   The post Photography tips and inspiration with Alfonso Calero – episode 85 appeared first on Holly G.

<h2>Photography tips for tourism: podcast with photographer Alfonso Calero</h2> Tourism Upgrade the Podcast Episode 85 Welcome to Tourism Upgrade. The podcast unpacking marketing trends from travel, tourism and marketing leaders. I’m your host HollyG and today we welcome Sydney photographer <a href="http://www.alfonso.com.au" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Alfonso Calero</a> and we will we chatting about photography inspiration and creativity. <a href="http://www.alfonso.com.au" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">http://www.alfonso.com.au</a> <a href="https://www.photographytravel.net" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.photographytravel.net</a> HollyG:                   How did you get into photography in the first place, Alfonso? Alfonso:                  Professionally, I’m what’s considered in photography a late-starter because I decided to go to the Sydney Institute of Technology TAFE in Ultimo to study a diploma when I was 30 years old. I, of course, started photography when I was about 19, and I’ve been doing it ever since. HollyG:                   Wow. Yeah. Well, there’s a bit of a growing trend I’ve been reading about lately of this, making a career change in your 30’s and 40’s, and with so much of our work life still yet to go, I think yeah, it can be a good move to make. What are the things that you like to take photos of? Alfonso:                  Mainly people and places. HollyG:                   Because you travel so much by the looks of it. Alfonso:                  Yeah. I really enjoy stopping people on the street and asking their permission to do a street portrait, and also, I love to take photos of cityscapes at night or landscapes out in rural areas, so it’s that combination of being able to switch genres that makes it quite interesting. HollyG:                   What are people like when you ask them if you can take a photo of them? Are most people like open to that sort of thing? Alfonso:                  I’ve been lucky so far. You will have to accept that maybe 10% of the time, you will get people saying no, but I think it’s the people you approach and how you approach them that can either make or break the … getting the permission working [inaudible 00:02:26]. HollyG:                   Yeah. Alfonso:                  You look at the body language. You look at … If they’re walking in a hurry, they’re probably going to say no to get somewhere. HollyG:                   Yeah. Alfonso:                  If they seem to be floundering around or standing around and you don’t seem like you’re intimidating them … I don’t usually have a very long lens on my camera as well, so it doesn’t feel as scary for them, and explain what you’re doing, why you’re doing it. You take your sunglasses off. You give them a handshake if the culture allows for it. Just show a little bit of trust quickly. HollyG:                   Yeah. I like that because when I travel, I’m a very amateur photographer, but I actually just love taking photos of people, but I am often very, very shy about asking, so yes, I might try and practice that a little bit more. You’ve been obviously in photography for quite a while, and I guess I wanted to ask a little bit about how it’s changed over the time that you’ve been practicing. Alfonso:                  Massive shift. When digital photography started over 10 years ago, there was a massive drop in the work because everyone suddenly became a photographer, being able to have that access to digital photography. That’s a massive shift, a technology shift, but it’s exciting that we have that available to us now. I’m 52 years old, and the younger generation are much faster at learning because we used to shoot with film, so we have to spend the money, make the mistakes, wait for our results, and then look … Alfonso:                  With digital, you can learn from your mistakes immediately and the young are so tech-savvy, and they’re so fast. You’ve seen some people out there that are 19, 20, and they’re doing incredibly beautiful work. HollyG:                   I think you raise a really good point actually because one of the things that I find when I talk to people, tourism operators, or people in the industry who maybe have been in the industry for quite some time and they have … They’re not used to using a camera, and they’re quite scared to take photos, but really, today … I guess two points. One, in this world of social media or in social media marketing, business owners and people really need to know how to take a good photo in my view, and we can talk about that in a minute, but also, the learning curve can be a lot easier because it is digital, so you can practise and make mistakes, and it’s not a … Yeah, it’s not a costly exercise. Alfonso:                  Yeah, definitely. All those points are spot-on. I think that the immediacy is great, but the question is just because you can take photos and see them quickly, does it mean that you will probably be getting better? Yeah. Like you said, it’s down to your confidence. You come back from your holidays typically with thousands of photos and you’re overwhelmed by the amount, so you almost want to try and consider shooting less, but getting better quality instead of shooting a lot and hoping to hit the target. HollyG:                   Yeah, that is very true. That works in marketing as well actually. I guess is that some of the things that you teach people when you take people out on photography tours, and photography walks, and things like that? Alfonso:                  Yes. Yes, but every person learns differently and every person has a different form of visual communication, so I have to figure out what they’re like, what they like to photograph, but also how they like to photograph, and then try and guide them in that way to enhance that style of shooting. HollyG:                   Okay, so what are some of the different styles that you come across with that? Alfonso:                  Okay, so for example, you might have somebody who’s a very organised person, a very neat person, and they would prefer to shoot with less distortion of maybe architecture, so all the lines are really straight as opposed to someone who has more of a photojournalistic style where they shoot really wide angle. Let’s say, if you’re shooting architecture, the building might look a little bit more distorted. Either way is fine. It’s just that it communicates a different message. HollyG:                   Yeah. I love that. I have never thought about that before. Before we get into a few more tips because I’d love you to share some tips with us, I just wanted to talk a little bit about why is quality photography for those working in the tourism industry really important? Alfonso:                  Because we’re saturated with visuals and video, you really need to stand out with a quality shot. If you don’t, then you just get lost in the mix. HollyG:                   Yeah. There’s ridiculous statistics about how many photos are uploaded online every second and videos on YouTube and all that sort of things, so yeah. I guess it is about looking at ways to cut through. For the show notes for this episode, head to <a href="http://hollyg.com.au" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">hollyg.com.au</a>. You can subscribe to this podcast on iTunes, Stitcher, or your preferred podcast service. Can we go into a little bit about maybe some tips that you can share with us around how we can take a better photo? Alfonso:                  Definitely, so it all … Initially, I guess it would help if I at least know if they are shooting with their smartphones or if they have a DSLR or a mirrorless camera. In other words, they can change the lenses. Of course, they have more manual control with the bigger cameras compared to the smartphone. There will be some pros and cons as to what capabilities each one can do. If it’s about your smartphone, and you’re in an event like you just mentioned, and you want to use it there, you may notice that it’s quite a struggle to try and get a nice photo in an indoor environment. It’s dark. There are all these really orangey-colored tungsten lights, and so it’s a challenge. People are moving around, and it’s tricky. Look. If you happen to have a camera that’s a DSLR or aside from your smartphone and you can at least consider learning how to tackle the manual settings, it won’t be a hit and miss, and it’s a lot easier than people think. Another I guess suggestion which wouldn’t matter what camera you have is composition. If you can master the elements and principles of composition, instinctively, I think most people know them like leading line, texture, looking for shapes, looking for the right tone. Those are some examples of composition. HollyG:                   I remember early on learning. What are you actually taking the photo of? Yeah. What part of that are you actually trying to communicate? Alfonso:                  Yeah, and I think the most common error is people want to say too much in the photo. They’re communicating maybe more than one message. I guess in marketing, it’s the same thing, people trying to say too much, and then the message gets muddled and unclear. I guess you’re almost like Robin Hood with the bow and arrow. You’re trying to hit a target or dominant point of focus in the shot, and you want the viewer’s eyes to lock in on that and not be distracted by any other elements around it. HollyG:                   Great description. That’s awesome. Where do you find inspiration for your photography? Alfonso:                  Everywhere all the time, but mainly, I gravitate around towards art, so I look at different periods of art. Mainly, paintings. Before photography started, these painters mastered light and composition, so they must be on the right track, and they definitely are. I’m always really excited by that. I use Pinterest a lot. HollyG:                   Oh, yeah. Alfonso:                  I have a lot of boards, mood boards. In the old days, before Pinterest, I used to cut clippings on and put them on my board in the studio, and I just look at those. Now, with Pinterest, yeah, it’s amazing how many boards I have because there’s so much inspiration from everything. HollyG:                   Oh my gosh, it’s addictive, isn’t it? Alfonso:                  Yeah, I love it. I love it, and you could share with people too, which is great, so they could see my boards. I could see theirs. We could give each other ideas. It definitely motivates you to go out there and create. HollyG:                   I’m going to check yours out now. Alfonso:                  Yeah. HollyG:                   You travel to a lot of different destinations because you take photography groups and things like that overseas. Alfonso:                  Yes. HollyG:                   Is that true? Do you have a favourite destination to photograph? Alfonso:                  Yeah, so I started this travel education tour company about 2008, and because I’m born … I was born in the Philippines, but I’m of Spanish descent, and I came to Australia when I was 15. I used to live in Japan, and my wife is Japanese. I focus on those four places. Australia, of course. HollyG:                   Yeah. Alfonso:                  The Philippines, Spain, and Japan. I only take up to four people, from two to four people, so they’re very private, custom-made itineraries, and we focus on enhancing their style and genres of photography every day for about five to 10 days. Again, the more I go back to the places I have a strong connection with because I know the local language, the culture. I have friends and family there. The more interesting it gets because my local knowledge is building it every time I go back, and I’m exploring new areas, and it’s so much fun. HollyG:                   Yeah. Cool. Is there any final sort of comments or tips you wanted to share? Also, let us know how people can find out a little bit more about you and connect with you. Alfonso:                  Sure. Look. If you haven’t bought yourself a larger camera aside from the smartphone, don’t hesitate to go out and use your smartphone. I teach a smartphone course in the Rocks almost every Saturday afternoon. That goes for about three hours, and more information can be found on <a href="http://photographytravel.net" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">photographytravel.net</a>. My overseas tours or my Tasmanian tours are on <a href="http://alfonso.com.au" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">alfonso.com.au</a>. Yeah. Look. Feel free to drop me a line at any time if you just want to have a little chat, and also, I would love to help people think of ideas for any of their tourism campaigns that are coming up because it seems to be changing rapidly with the way people are viewing things online. HollyG:                   Yeah, great points, and we’ll put the links to those in our show notes, and I will give you a big thank you. Actually, we have our Women in Tourism Leadership Christmas Party coming up soon, and you have actually donated a prize for that, which is one of the tours and lessons down at the Rocks, so someone attending that event will be lucky enough to win that. Yeah. Thank you for that. Alfonso:                  No problem. Lovely, lovely to do that. HollyG:                   Now, it’s time for our thousand-dollar bonus question. Now, I have a bonus question if you’re up for it. Alfonso:                  Of course. HollyG:                   I ask all my guests the same question, and the question is, if you only had a $1,000 marketing budget, what would you spend it on? Alfonso:                  I would probably if I was going to market my photo tours … Yeah. A thousand probably won’t be enough, but I’d probably get a videographer that does a little bit of drone as well if possible. Yes. I’d probably get a videographer to do and I’d make some of my stills with the videography and do like a 30-second or one-minute video that can … and carefully-scripted with voiceover. That would really be useful, and I can throw that on any platform online, and I think it would gain traction. HollyG:                   Yeah, nice. I reckon you could do that for a thousand dollars. Alfonso:                  Yeah, yeah. I just bought a drone HollyG:                   Look. It’s been really good to talk with you, and I appreciate you sharing those tips and insights with us, and I will jump off here this call now, and then go on to your Pinterest and check it out I think. Alfonso:                  Yes. Please keep in touch, and if you have any questions, you can catch me on my websites. HollyG:                   Yeah. Awesome. Great. Thanks for your time. Alfonso:                  Thank you. HollyG:                   For the show notes for this episode, head to <a href="http://hollyg.com.au" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">hollyg.com.au</a>. You can subscribe to this podcast on iTunes, Stitcher, or your preferred podcast service. The post <a href="http://www.hollyg.com.au/tourismupgrade/photography-tips/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Photography tips and inspiration with Alfonso Calero – episode 85</a> appeared first on <a href="http://www.hollyg.com.au" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Holly G</a>.

Photography tips and inspiration with Alfonso Calero – episode 85

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Designing a social media strategy for tourism – episode 77

Kate Duffy

How small tourism destinations can use social media for success with Kate Duffy Welcome to Tourism Upgrade the podcast unpacking marketing trends from travel, tourism and marketing leaders. I’m your host Holly G and today we welcome Kate Duffy, Marketing Manager Consumer Engagement for Tourism &amp; Events Queensland. Today on the Podcast we will we drawing as much as possible from Kate on the topic of ‘How small destinations can use social media for success’.    HollyG: Although you work in a large destination now and you’ve had experience with even larger destinations when you work with the Canadian Tourism Commission, you also have had experience with smaller tourism destinations recently, and can you tell us a little bit about that? Kate: Yeah sure, I am definitely very passionate about working in destination marketing and have had the pleasure of working at the country level with the Canada and the state level with Queensland. For about 14 months quite recently I was working at the Regional Tourism Organization with Tourism Tropical North Queensland, so it’s based in Cairns, heading out their destination content team and it’s certainly interesting to work across all I guess three levels of destination marketing organizations and pretty quickly better understand the challenges and the opportunities that each of the different levels presents. Working regionally up with Tourism Tropical North Queensland, it was a smaller organization for me so there are about 25 people, and I’ve got to say I’ve never had less budget to work with or less resources in terms of staffs that I could tap into so the work was very hands on at the regional level but I guess to complement that as well, I would have to say it’s probably some of the most rewarding work that I’ve ever done. I just think being able to really see an immediate impact in terms of the work that I was doing was very rewarding. HollyG: I am sure a lot of people that do work in smaller organizations and at the regional level can really relate to the whole you know, getting very hands on and getting your hands dirty for sure. Kate: Yeah, it was a lot of fun. In that role, I had a lot of responsibility for all the digital so all about web presents, social media, and media relation so any of the journalists request to influence of visit, famil coordination as well and I also had our visitor information centre which is based in Downtown Cairns, underneath my responsibility as well. And thinking with that, we’ve distributed a lot of printed content through the visitor information centre so it was really broad that I was really responsible for and the other kind of interesting fact is it was the first time I worked where there was a Membership based, so part of our funding was coming through the actual tourism businesses to at the end of the day worked for, and they would pay a membership fee to be a part of Tourism Tropical North Queensland so we have about 450 organizations and I guess with that comes 450 different people who you’re really trying to please the work that you do so a lot of people were very interested in what you’re doing and very keen to see how they could were being represented into the work that I was doing. HollyG: Yeah and extremely vested in the activities that are happening. Kate: Very much, HollyG: Yeah it’s interesting because I think you’re title there was something like Director of Content and as you say, it’s looking at ALL content that was being produced or shared or out there not just sort of an online content but looking at content from a whole perspective. Kate: Yeah the way that I thought all about it was almost content that we created, content that we curated, and content that we inspired other people to create. So that was sort of how content played out across all of the channels i.e. digital and traditional and it was really good for me because I had more of social media background and it was kinda interesting to have a bit of a broad of view across all channels. HollyG: I love that! Because you can relate to the stuff that you create yourself that you curate and also I like that that you inspire especially as a destination.  Kate: Yeah definitely, and even with the Famils that we coordinating that was all about how do we coordinate a famil with someone that’s going to inspire the best content out of them.  HollyG: So, what is your view on social media for tourism destinations? Kate: Well, I am very bias because I am a social media geek and I am very passionate about this space but I certainly think it is really the biggest opportunity in my opinion for tourism marketing and that was just even more reinforced when I did start working at a smaller regional tourism organization. I pretty quickly realized, you know there’s only so much of the job I can do with one single person in a region, and there’s only so much I can do with an incredibly small budget and then incredibly team of small people that I was able to convince to be part of my team so the opportunity really with social media was around basically getting more people on board with my strategy to help me market the destination for me so that was really very focus and I really think that’s the biggest opportunity is if you can get your industry members trained and more engaged in helping you through social media, you can get visiting travelers who are coming to your region, out sharing photos having a great experience. If you can connect with locals living the region who are generally very passionate about where they live, if you can get all of those groups on board with helping you market the destinations and you just basically maximizing the opportunity for marketing and that to me is the paradox of social media. I think some people think it’s free – it isn’t. It does take time and effort but that was really I think you can do a lot through social media with very little and have a very big impact. HollyG: Yeah great! So I’d love to sort of dive into a couple of those things that you mentioned and see what if we can pull out practical advices about how small destinations can use social media. One of the first things, and somebody asked me recently what I saw is one of the opportunities in tourism and I was talking about that ability to connect locals and to really get them on board. What are some of the things that you experienced in that space or some practical advice around small destinations using social media? Kate: I think number one for me is it really start with having a very clear strategy and understanding why you are investing your time in social media – that was the first thing I did when I moved up to Tourism Tropical North Queensland, it was really getting clear and articulating a strategy; for me that strategy was an advocacy strategy that was all about getting other people to tell the story of the destination for me through content and I just hammered on about that and I didn’t waved that from that very simple strategy and I made sure I’ve got my CEO on board and then made sure I did got the whole organization on board then I rolled it out to some of the key big players in the region and then I rolled it out to the local tourism organization. I just sort of try to build a little group of people who were on board with the strategy – so that was first. HollyG: I like the idea just on that, it’s not just sitting there yourself from thinking Okay, this is what I wanted to do you’ve got to get support from within the organization and then be really clear about what you’re doing it for. Not having mixed ideas about why you are using social media. Kate: That was it was exactly. And I think being membership based, I did have people coming saying why you’re doing that, it sort of spending a bit of the time defending what I was doing but that’s really the key to get that in my own staff members, my own colleagues and my own CEO on board and just kept coming back to that and just kept it very simple. So that first and foremost was really the key. The next for me and another practical tip when I went up there, the organization have two Facebook pages, two twitter accounts, lots of numbers of hashtags that they were using, they also have presence on Google+ and Pinterest and sort of they have definitely got a lot of presence in a lot channels. So I just really took the time of encouraging people to look at where’s your target traveler online? And what are the key channels you should be on to try and connect with them and just try and do a few things really well. HollyG: I think that was such an important point. I was at travel expo this week and I had someone come up to me and say oh whatever you’re saying about content is great but I have this channel, and this channel, how can I doodle? And I am sort of like well, you can’t.  Kate: Yeah, maybe you shouldn’t! HollyG: Yeah that’s very true. Kate: That was never more clear to me when I did go up, they don’t have the budgets to be paying agencies, you know that was really just me so I actually had a little sign up printed up put on my wall,  “keep it simple, do it well” says @Kate_Duffy #TourismUpgradeClick To Tweet  and I would just look at that every day because I was getting after luck by different people saying why aren’t you doing this? Why aren’t you doing that? It was just really important to me to just come back to that mantra to keeping it simple and do it well.   Another thing that was the key for me was just around being consistent as well so once I did all the consolidate all the channel we’re on, I just committed to being very consistent with posting. Facebook and Instagram were probably the key two channels and I made the commitment that you know I was going to post 4 photos on Instagram and I was going to post at least once a day on Facebook and I stuck to that using scheduling tools. So obviously when I took a break or when I took on a holiday I still committed to that schedule. And then the next thing for me is connecting with those local content creators. So I was new to the city and I just made my mission to educate myself on the region and I personally connected with a lot of people out there, a lot of Instagramers and got to know them, got them using our hashtags, and just really build that group of local content creators, and bloggers and travel writers and just really tried to get them into my little family of people that were helping me market the destination and there’s no way I could have done it by myself. It was those people who really made a difference. HollyG: Yeah, that’s sort of team of other passionate people and there are so many talented content creators out there and it’s almost like in full trading that’s seen to a certain degree to sort of learn who they are and how they see things through their eyes. Kate: Hundred percent! You want a person sitting in one office and then if you can connect with lots of locals all around the area that you’re representing, you’re going to get all of those people out and I sort of saw them as an army of content creators who are helping me and that was sort of flow I into I guess another tip for me was really all about putting the profile on the advocates and putting the profile on their contents. There was sort of something I could do for them, they were helping me out by getting out and taking photos and using our hashtags but what I was able to do was feature their photos on our channels. One of the few things I did invest in was a blog for the region and the blog was quite strategic. I wanted to have a platform where I could profile these people so that they can be contributors to the blog, I could curate their photos and feature them on the blog, so that then they could say I am a contributor to the Tourism Tropical of North Queensland blog and a lot of them since have really gone onto become quite influential in the space because there was something that I could give them in return, it wasn’t monetary I couldn’t afford to pay them but I think that’s another key thing is thinking about how you can help them in return for how they’re helping you. HollyG: Yeah and it is interesting to think about a destination blog and not just putting content about “see this” or “do this” but about profiling these people and so they can showcase the destination through their eyes and tells so much more story about the destination.  They are some very super practical tips there, do you have any others for us? Kate: I have got some pretty much tasks on the things that I really focused on. Keep it simple and do it well – that’s probably my main mantra. Be consistent, engaged of locals, focus on featuring their content, make sure you credit them and I guess the final piece is then continue to use that content and promote it to new audiences. So use all that great generated content that you’re getting coming through and if you do have a bit of budget, then promote that with some paid budget and target that to new audiences who you’re trying to attract to come to your destination. HollyG: So how could you see, what were some of the signs of success I guess through these activities? Kate: I think the biggest one, you know I just remember my CEO saying that every member that he spoke to was just saying really positive things about the work that they were seeing – that was huge having your CEO say that. He’s certainly wasn’t on our Facebook page or Instagram account but he was certainly taking the phone calls for members who would let him know if they were happy or not happy, that was very good. And then just building people’s careers that you can literally see people start getting invitations from all the destinations – that was a pretty great sign. In terms of our own channels, Instagram was the key platform for me that I really focused on because that was the platform I was really seeing a lot of travels and locals sharing their photos so when I joined the organization we had 7K followers and then when I left for three months later we had 80K followers, so for 14 months, that was a pretty massive increase with the followers of that account. Building the blog and seeing people who at the beginning I was on hands and asking if they would contribute to the blog to 14 months later having people pitching us to say can I contribute to the blog so, they were some of the indicators that felt like it was moving at the right direction. HollyG: Yeah great, not that I wanted to get a hang up on this sort of thing, do you have any like “must do” or favorite tools that you use across all your social media activities now or then? Kate: We benchmark a lot, I do find a tool called Social Bakers, pretty handy for benchmarks and reporting, it’s probably a little bit of a more expensive tool that maybe a really small organization might not be able to afford and then in addition to Social Bakers and benchmarking, Hootsuite is a really great free tool for listening for conversation, we use that a whole lot at the regional level where we had a lot streams in key words say like, just landed in Cairns and we would regularly just jump into that stream and be able to jump into conversation and find travelers who were looking for help and looking for suggestions so Hootsuite is really a great one for that. And you know the Facebook scheduling capability, particularly for us when you are the only person, you still want to have a life. I encourage you to look at that scheduling capability within Facebook, it will save you a lot of time. HollyG: And because it’s important when you go to curating or creating an amazing content, you want to make sure that it’s delivered at the right time to add that extra level of context. Well it’s so great to talk to you, time goes super fast… what is the best way for people to connect with you? Kate: Best way for me probably on Twitter or Instagram @Kate_Duffy.  HollyG: Now, are you up for the Bonus Question? Kate: Always up for bonuses, yep! Now it’s time for our thousand dollar bonus question! Bonus Question: If you only have a thousand dollar marketing budget, what would you spend it on? Kate: I would spend it on training my industry, training my operators on a strategy and then potentially doing some really basic session on the tools, you know like how to use Instagram for example, I’d probably print some posters that have the destination hashtag on it and give them to the operators and encourage them to put that up at their business and then put it at the back of their toilet door, on their charter that’s going out every day and then probably run some Instameets with locals and there are few things there that are little bit of cost associates with those things that I think would really activate that advocacy on that would help you do the job or marketing the destination. HollyG: Awesome, now what if you only have a hundred dollars? Kate: There’s a lot you can do for free in social and I probably put my $100 towards training, getting out and convincing people even it that was just the cost for my petrol so that I could get around and meet with people. HollyG: Cool, thank you!    You can subscribe to this podcast on iTunes, Stitcher or your preferred podcast service. Tweet me with any comments or feedback @hollygalbraith or email is good too holly (at) hollyg.com.au We love to read reviews and reviews really make a difference to our ranking in iTunes. If you could take the time to add a review to iTunes this would be greatly appreciated and i’ll give you a shout out on an upcoming episode!   The post How small tourism destinations can use social media for success with Kate Duffy appeared first on Holly G.

<h2>How small tourism destinations can use social media for success with Kate Duffy</h2> <h3>Welcome to Tourism Upgrade the podcast unpacking marketing trends from travel, tourism and marketing leaders. I’m your host Holly G and today we welcome Kate Duffy, Marketing Manager Consumer Engagement for Tourism &amp; Events Queensland. Today on the Podcast we will we drawing as much as possible from Kate on the topic of ‘How small destinations can use social media for success’.</h3> HollyG: Although you work in a large destination now and you’ve had experience with even larger destinations when you work with the Canadian Tourism Commission, you also have had experience with smaller tourism destinations recently, and can you tell us a little bit about that? Kate: Yeah sure, I am definitely very passionate about working in destination marketing and have had the pleasure of working at the country level with the Canada and the state level with Queensland. For about 14 months quite recently I was working at the Regional Tourism Organization with Tourism Tropical North Queensland, so it’s based in Cairns, heading out their destination content team and it’s certainly interesting to work across all I guess three levels of destination marketing organizations and pretty quickly better understand the challenges and the opportunities that each of the different levels presents. Working regionally up with Tourism Tropical North Queensland, it was a smaller organization for me so there are about 25 people, and I’ve got to say I’ve never had less budget to work with or less resources in terms of staffs that I could tap into so the work was very hands on at the regional level but I guess to complement that as well, I would have to say it’s probably some of the most rewarding work that I’ve ever done. I just think being able to really see an immediate impact in terms of the work that I was doing was very rewarding. HollyG: I am sure a lot of people that do work in smaller organizations and at the regional level can really relate to the whole you know, getting very hands on and getting your hands dirty for sure. Kate: Yeah, it was a lot of fun. In that role, I had a lot of responsibility for all the digital so all about web presents, social media, and media relation so any of the journalists request to influence of visit, famil coordination as well and I also had our visitor information centre which is based in Downtown Cairns, underneath my responsibility as well. And thinking with that, we’ve distributed a lot of printed content through the visitor information centre so it was really broad that I was really responsible for and the other kind of interesting fact is it was the first time I worked where there was a Membership based, so part of our funding was coming through the actual tourism businesses to at the end of the day worked for, and they would pay a membership fee to be a part of Tourism Tropical North Queensland so we have about 450 organizations and I guess with that comes 450 different people who you’re really trying to please the work that you do so a lot of people were very interested in what you’re doing and very keen to see how they could were being represented into the work that I was doing. HollyG: Yeah and extremely vested in the activities that are happening. Kate: Very much, HollyG: Yeah it’s interesting because I think you’re title there was something like Director of Content and as you say, it’s looking at ALL content that was being produced or shared or out there not just sort of an online content but looking at content from a whole perspective. Kate: Yeah the way that I thought all about it was almost content that we created, content that we curated, and content that we inspired other people to create. So that was sort of how content played out across all of the channels i.e. digital and traditional and it was really good for me because I had more of social media background and it was kinda interesting to have a bit of a broad of view across all channels. HollyG: I love that! Because you can relate to the stuff that you create yourself that you curate and also I like that that you inspire especially as a destination. <a href="http://www.whitepapersource.com/cmd.php?Clk=5533051" rel="nofollow" target="_blank"></a> Kate: Yeah definitely, and even with the Famils that we coordinating that was all about how do we coordinate a famil with someone that’s going to inspire the best content out of them. HollyG: So, what is your view on social media for tourism destinations? Kate: Well, I am very bias because I am a social media geek and I am very passionate about this space but I certainly think it is really the biggest opportunity in my opinion for tourism marketing and that was just even more reinforced when I did start working at a smaller regional tourism organization. I pretty quickly realized, you know there’s only so much of the job I can do with one single person in a region, and there’s only so much I can do with an incredibly small budget and then incredibly team of small people that I was able to convince to be part of my team so the opportunity really with social media was around basically getting more people on board with my strategy to help me market the destination for me so that was really very focus and I really think that’s the biggest opportunity is if you can get your industry members trained and more engaged in helping you through social media, you can get visiting travelers who are coming to your region, out sharing photos having a great experience. If you can connect with locals living the region who are generally very passionate about where they live, if you can get all of those groups on board with helping you market the destinations and you just basically maximizing the opportunity for marketing and that to me is the paradox of social media. I think some people think it’s free – it isn’t. It does take time and effort but that was really I think you can do a lot through social media with very little and have a very big impact. HollyG: Yeah great! So I’d love to sort of dive into a couple of those things that you mentioned and see what if we can pull out practical advices about how small destinations can use social media. One of the first things, and somebody asked me recently what I saw is one of the opportunities in tourism and I was talking about that ability to connect locals and to really get them on board. What are some of the things that you experienced in that space or some practical advice around small destinations using social media? Kate: I think number one for me is it really start with having a very clear strategy and understanding why you are investing your time in social media – that was the first thing I did when I moved up to Tourism Tropical North Queensland, it was really getting clear and articulating a strategy; for me that strategy was an advocacy strategy that was all about getting other people to tell the story of the destination for me through content and I just hammered on about that and I didn’t waved that from that very simple strategy and I made sure I’ve got my CEO on board and then made sure I did got the whole organization on board then I rolled it out to some of the key big players in the region and then I rolled it out to the local tourism organization. I just sort of try to build a little group of people who were on board with the strategy – so that was first. HollyG: I like the idea just on that, it’s not just sitting there yourself from thinking Okay, this is what I wanted to do you’ve got to get support from within the organization and then be really clear about what you’re doing it for. Not having mixed ideas about why you are using social media. Kate: That was it was exactly. And I think being membership based, I did have people coming saying why you’re doing that, it sort of spending a bit of the time defending what I was doing but that’s really the key to get that in my own staff members, my own colleagues and my own CEO on board and just kept coming back to that and just kept it very simple. So that first and foremost was really the key. The next for me and another practical tip when I went up there, the organization have two Facebook pages, two twitter accounts, lots of numbers of hashtags that they were using, they also have presence on Google+ and Pinterest and sort of they have definitely got a lot of presence in a lot channels. So I just really took the time of encouraging people to look at where’s your target traveler online? And what are the key channels you should be on to try and connect with them and just try and do a few things really well. HollyG: I think that was such an important point. I was at travel expo this week and I had someone come up to me and say oh whatever you’re saying about content is great but I have this channel, and this channel, how can I doodle? And I am sort of like well, you can’t.  Kate: Yeah, maybe you shouldn’t! HollyG: Yeah that’s very true. Kate: That was never more clear to me when I did go up, they don’t have the budgets to be paying agencies, you know that was really just me so I actually had a little sign up printed up put on my wall, “keep it simple, do it well” says @Kate_Duffy #TourismUpgrade <a href="https://twitter.com/share?text=+%22keep+it+simple%2C+do+it+well%22+says+%40Kate_Duffy+%23TourismUpgrade&amp;via=hollygalbraith&amp;related=hollygalbraith&amp;url=http://www.hollyg.com.au/tourismupgrade/58/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Click To Tweet</a>  and I would just look at that every day because I was getting after luck by different people saying why aren’t you doing this? Why aren’t you doing that? It was just really important to me to just come back to that mantra to keeping it simple and do it well. Another thing that was the key for me was just around being consistent as well so once I did all the consolidate all the channel we’re on, I just committed to being very consistent with posting. Facebook and Instagram were probably the key two channels and I made the commitment that you know I was going to post 4 photos on Instagram and I was going to post at least once a day on Facebook and I stuck to that using scheduling tools. So obviously when I took a break or when I took on a holiday I still committed to that schedule. And then the next thing for me is connecting with those local content creators. So I was new to the city and I just made my mission to educate myself on the region and I personally connected with a lot of people out there, a lot of Instagramers and got to know them, got them using our hashtags, and just really build that group of local content creators, and bloggers and travel writers and just really tried to get them into my little family of people that were helping me market the destination and there’s no way I could have done it by myself. It was those people who really made a difference. HollyG: Yeah, that’s sort of team of other passionate people and there are so many talented content creators out there and it’s almost like in full trading that’s seen to a certain degree to sort of learn who they are and how they see things through their eyes. Kate: Hundred percent! You want a person sitting in one office and then if you can connect with lots of locals all around the area that you’re representing, you’re going to get all of those people out and I sort of saw them as an army of content creators who are helping me and that was sort of flow I into I guess another tip for me was really all about putting the profile on the advocates and putting the profile on their contents. There was sort of something I could do for them, they were helping me out by getting out and taking photos and using our hashtags but what I was able to do was feature their photos on our channels. One of the few things I did invest in was a blog for the region and the blog was quite strategic. I wanted to have a platform where I could profile these people so that they can be contributors to the blog, I could curate their photos and feature them on the blog, so that then they could say I am a contributor to the Tourism Tropical of North Queensland blog and a lot of them since have really gone onto become quite influential in the space because there was something that I could give them in return, it wasn’t monetary I couldn’t afford to pay them but I think that’s another key thing is thinking about how you can help them in return for how they’re helping you. HollyG: Yeah and it is interesting to think about a destination blog and not just putting content about “see this” or “do this” but about profiling these people and so they can showcase the destination through their eyes and tells so much more story about the destination. They are some very super practical tips there, do you have any others for us? Kate: I have got some pretty much tasks on the things that I really focused on. Keep it simple and do it well – that’s probably my main mantra. Be consistent, engaged of locals, focus on featuring their content, make sure you credit them and I guess the final piece is then continue to use that content and promote it to new audiences. So use all that great generated content that you’re getting coming through and if you do have a bit of budget, then promote that with some paid budget and target that to new audiences who you’re trying to attract to come to your destination. HollyG: So how could you see, what were some of the signs of success I guess through these activities? Kate: I think the biggest one, you know I just remember my CEO saying that every member that he spoke to was just saying really positive things about the work that they were seeing – that was huge having your CEO say that. He’s certainly wasn’t on our Facebook page or Instagram account but he was certainly taking the phone calls for members who would let him know if they were happy or not happy, that was very good. And then just building people’s careers that you can literally see people start getting invitations from all the destinations – that was a pretty great sign. In terms of our own channels, Instagram was the key platform for me that I really focused on because that was the platform I was really seeing a lot of travels and locals sharing their photos so when I joined the organization we had 7K followers and then when I left for three months later we had 80K followers, so for 14 months, that was a pretty massive increase with the followers of that account. Building the blog and seeing people who at the beginning I was on hands and asking if they would contribute to the blog to 14 months later having people pitching us to say can I contribute to the blog so, they were some of the indicators that felt like it was moving at the right direction. HollyG: Yeah great, not that I wanted to get a hang up on this sort of thing, do you have any like “must do” or favorite tools that you use across all your social media activities now or then? Kate: We benchmark a lot, I do find a tool called Social Bakers, pretty handy for benchmarks and reporting, it’s probably a little bit of a more expensive tool that maybe a really small organization might not be able to afford and then in addition to Social Bakers and benchmarking, Hootsuite is a really great free tool for listening for conversation, we use that a whole lot at the regional level where we had a lot streams in key words say like, just landed in Cairns and we would regularly just jump into that stream and be able to jump into conversation and find travelers who were looking for help and looking for suggestions so Hootsuite is really a great one for that. And you know the Facebook scheduling capability, particularly for us when you are the only person, you still want to have a life. I encourage you to look at that scheduling capability within Facebook, it will save you a lot of time. HollyG: And because it’s important when you go to curating or creating an amazing content, you want to make sure that it’s delivered at the right time to add that extra level of context. Well it’s so great to talk to you, time goes super fast… what is the best way for people to connect with you? Kate: Best way for me probably on <a href="https://twitter.com/kate_duffy" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Twitter</a> or Instagram <a href="http://www.instagram.com/kate_duffy" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">@Kate_Duffy</a>. HollyG: Now, are you up for the Bonus Question? Kate: Always up for bonuses, yep! <h3>Now it’s time for our thousand dollar bonus question!</h3> Bonus Question: If you only have a thousand dollar marketing budget, what would you spend it on? Kate: I would spend it on training my industry, training my operators on a strategy and then potentially doing some really basic session on the tools, you know like how to use Instagram for example, I’d probably print some posters that have the destination hashtag on it and give them to the operators and encourage them to put that up at their business and then put it at the back of their toilet door, on their charter that’s going out every day and then probably run some Instameets with locals and there are few things there that are little bit of cost associates with those things that I think would really activate that advocacy on that would help you do the job or marketing the destination. HollyG: Awesome, now what if you only have a hundred dollars? Kate: There’s a lot you can do for free in social and I probably put my $100 towards training, getting out and convincing people even it that was just the cost for my petrol so that I could get around and meet with people. HollyG: Cool, thank you! You can subscribe to this podcast on <a href="https://itunes.apple.com/au/podcast/tourism-upgrade-with-hollyg/id1132030357" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">iTunes</a>, <a href="http://stitcher.com/s?fid=94304&amp;refid=stpr" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Stitcher</a> or your preferred podcast service. Tweet me with any comments or feedback <a href="http://twitter.com/hollygalbraith" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">@hollygalbraith</a> or email is good too holly (at) <a href="http://hollyg.com.au" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">hollyg.com.au</a> We love to read reviews and reviews really make a difference to our ranking in iTunes. If you could take the time to <a href="https://itunes.apple.com/au/podcast/tourism-upgrade-with-hollyg/id1132030357" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">add a review to iTunes</a> this would be greatly appreciated and i’ll give you a shout out on an upcoming episode! The post <a href="http://www.hollyg.com.au/tourismupgrade/58/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">How small tourism destinations can use social media for success with Kate Duffy</a> appeared first on <a href="http://www.hollyg.com.au" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Holly G</a>.

How small tourism destinations can use social media for success with Kate Duffy

Food Tourism to attract visitors to your destination – episode 68

How Google ranks your website: and what you can do to improve your rankings in search tips from The Wired Agency. Welcome to Tourism Upgrade. The podcast unpacking marketing trends from travel, tourism and marketing leaders. I’m your host HollyG and today we welcome Angela Hampton from The Wired Agency and thrilled that we will be talking about ‘How Google Ranks your website, and what you can do to improve your rankings in search’.    Ange is the owner and digital marketing director of The Wired Agency and we have work together on a couple of projects of late. And I’ve realized that, she has so much knowledge and experience on all things SEO and Google. So I thought it would be really great to share some of that with our podcast listeners. As starting point can we start by talking about or explaining briefly what is SEO is and why we should care about it? Angela: For sure. SEO is Search Engine Optimisation. And within that we have both Onsite SEO and Offsite SEO (listen to the podcast for details on both of these). Today we’ll just be addressing Onsite SEO. “Search traffic through organic is one of the best quality traffic you can get to your site. They view more pages, spend more time on site and their conversion rate is higher.” Angela Hampton The Wired Agency Two points that I want to get across before we go into specific and I think it’s great for everybody. Before you start doing SEO campaign, keep these two key points in mind:  The first is that when you’re doing SEO it’s not about building search engine website. It’s about building a website that offers the best user experience to customers and as visitors. And if you can do that than most of the SEO principle will fall underneath that. So that’s point one, it’s really important to make sure that you offer the best user experience to people visit your website. And from Google search perspective all they want to do is deliver the possible service to people who are using their search engines. So you keep that in mind, they don’t want to send search traffic to your website unless it has good quality content, unless the website is up to speed, unless it has a positive user experience (listen in for more details on this).  “Search traffic through organic is one of the best quality traffic you can get to your site. They view more pages, spend more time on site and their conversion rate is higher.” Angela Hampton The Wired Agency Angela: We can talk more specifically how Google ranks your website. This is isn’t in any particular order, we try to base it on most important, but all we talk about here is actually important. The first thing that Google looks at is your site name and where that is located depends on what CMS you are using. People use word press as an example you can go into the CMS and name your site and what you really want to do there is obviously have your business name that’s the most important thing. But you also want to have a keyword or two keyword that explain what your business is or at least include keyword that is related to your business. So that’s the first thing. Have a look at your site name. Then Google looks at the url structure for your pages. Lot of people will do is create page on their website and they will just use the default Url option. thewiredagency.com/service. verses thewiredagency.com/digital_marketing_service. So all of a sudden you completely change your url structure for Google. So Google know when they come to the website it is digital marketing services, and they come to that specific page. They are actually looking at digital marketing searches rather than services. HollyG: So for example each time I do a podcast episode I do show notes on my blog on my website. Each episode has its own new page. But I say its hollyg.com/tourismupgrade/episode62 but really maybe I should actually say what the episode is like hollyg.com/tourismupgrade/SEO_Tips. Angela: That’s right it’s all about optimizing everything on your website that talks to Google so it is really clear about what that page is referring to. The third thing is (and again this is not in order) is page title. So for example  we’ll use digital_marketing_servcies as an example  you could just put services at the page title. But what you want to do is to start to include keyword in that. So again principle to the url structure its hold say, services/digital marketing/SEO and then the company name in the end. HollyG: Where is the page title of, or how do you control that? Angela: The page is what you update in the back end of the system so let use word press as an example. There is a plugin called SEO Yoast and that gives you option to add things like page title and descriptions and all those things. HollyG: Cool that a good tip. Because I always wonder that about page title. I do use SEO Yoast because I have a wordpress site, I’ll have to look at the page titles. Angela: And there is a format, there is lot of information online about what the appropriate format is for page title for SEO. In my opinion the best way to structure page title is by having your primary keyword, your secondary keyword and then /your company name. But that’s the  sort of ideal structure in my opinion. HollyG: Yeah cool. Continuing on that, what else is Google looking at? Angela: So another thing that Google looks or more specifically on, is actual content on your page. So we have looked at the website name, url structure, page titles and next thing is to look at the actual content that you have on your website. One really important thing is to make sure that you’ve got headings set up on your content. And what I mean by that is  if you look at your webpages you want to make sure that you’ve got a heading set up at the top of the page and you got sub headings that go down page. You need to make sure that your headings are set up with heading tags. All that means is that its ranking in your headings from 1 to 5. Heading number 1 is the heading that you used at the top, that’s what Google ranks most important. Because you told Google that is main heading of your website. And then you go down heading 2, heading 3, and heading 4 they are all sub headings. It’s the same structure word document. You would have topic, sub headings and underneath you might have a third headings. HollyG: Yeah and with something like WordPress they have a default headings set up automatically? Angela: It does if you’re using a template, if you are starting up from scratch you actually needs to just set up the headings. The next thing that Google looks at, page content and structure. So this is where  you really want to start to optimize the actual content on each of your pages. And this is making sure that you’re explaining and using keywords that you really want to rank for in search. In addition to that the other thing that is really important is to make sure that you’ve got inbound links. And what I mean by this is making sure that when they read content that there are links that take them to other pages of your website. And what that does from a usability point of view it offers a better user experience. Because they navigate it through your website without having to use your navigation bar. That really helps from a usability point of view and also helps in SEO point of view. Because you are actually linking some of those keywords in your content to other pages on your website. And what that also does, it increases the number of pages that the user is viewing. That comes under the use of behavior on your website and how that impacts your SEO. HollyG: Great okay. Angela: The next thing to talk about is the images. What a lot of people again do is just upload images without thinking about making sure that the images file name includes keyword that you’re trying to rank for. What you want to do is, okay I’ve got this image, and I want to put it on the tourism marketing page. First thing I want to make sure is that I save the file name so it has tourism marketing in there. Could just be tourism marketing-hollyg.jpg. That’s what you need to do. Then when you upload it, I’ll use wordpress as an example again. You can add whats called alt tags, and what the alt tags does, it does a couple of things, it tells Google what that image represents. Because otherwise how Google does knows what that image is. So when you look at the url, and then it will look at the alt tags. The other really important things to note here are that more and more people starting to use Google images. And if you add alt tags on your website and if you’re going to Google images and start to search for a particular keyword you are looking for or to rank for your images will start to appear in Google images. So alt tags has a really important role to play. HollyG: And I do that all the time. I often to search for something but I won’t click on the text, I will click on images so I know that will going to give me a better understanding of whets in the post. Angela: Exactly. The best way to visibility through Google media. Is to do exactly what I said to make sure that url has the keyword but also the alt-tags including keywords that you wanted to rank for. It’s a really important one. Another thing to mention is fresh content. What Google really like to see is where it has fresh content. Your website might be as optimize as it possibly could be but you haven’t updated it for years Google is not going to think that it’s a high value website.  And the best way to add fresh content is obviously to update all of your main content, add blogs. It’s a great way to add fresh content to website though blogging. HollyG: Gone on those days where you built a website that was sort of set and forget. Like you did a website like it’s done and dusted. Now consistently updating it is what needs to happen. Angela: Exactly and if we go back to this two points that I mentioned at the beginning. Obviously you get of SEO if you can’t get the content fresh but from  the  visibility point of view. People if they come to your website, they are interested. And they want to keep coming back. But if they’re not going to come back if you don’t have fresh content on you website or you don’t have engaging content. It’s about again offering the best user experience you can so people coming to your website. Then we go on to the User Behaviour and what people do on you website. Because again you might have your website optimize you have keywords, and structure and all those sort of things. But people come to you website and leave straight away. Google wants to know about that because it’s not offering a positive or the best use experience so it’s not going to rank you well. What am I referring to you when I talk about user behavior. I think that bounce rate and so what bounce rate means is that people will come to your website but they leave  straight away and they don’t do anything there. So if you really have high bounce straight Google is going to set a big red flag on not going to send traffic on your website through search.  The other element that we look at is that, time on site. If your user spending more time on the website it means generally speaking you’re offering a better user experience so you’ll going to get high rank from Google. Other things that it looks at are pages per view. Again if user comes to your website and they view one page and then leave you’re obviously not doing something right in terms of engaging your visitors. So if you got high pages per view – somebody visits to your site and they view for example 5 pages – that tells Google what your doing is right. So you’re capturing audience and engaging it your audience. Two other things that I want to mention is the responsiveness of your website. And what I mean by that is how mobile friendly your site is. The most recent update from Google is that they are starting to rewarding website that have made the effort to make their website responsive. If you don’t have a responsive website or mobile friendly site, it will be harder to recommend on the first page of Google. So it’s really important to make sure that your offering again the best user experience but on desktop and mobile. The last things I want to mention her is how the speed of your website. Again coming that to you offering the best user experience possible is somebody comes to your website and takes 30seconds to load that’s not offering good user experience.  Lots of people will just shut down the browser and search again. You need to make sure that your website is running as fast as it possibly can. HollyG: Is there ways that you can check how fast your site is loading? Like is there a tool or something? Angela: The best way to check is through Google Analytics. There is a section in there that will give you information about the page load speed and it actually, you can creates a report  and it actually shows you the list of all the pages for that loading minute adequate time. It’s really worth having a look and there are whole bunch of  different apps that you can use out there where you can use that says  page speeding and again choose if you don’t have Google Analytics account I would say definitely create one and even the mean time you can use Google search to have a look plus there are apps out there that will check your website speed. HollyG: Yeah. We are assuming that people who are listening to this podcast to this point we would think that they would absolutely have a Google Analytics account and if they don’t that needs to be something they do ASAP because really how do you know how you performing if you don’t have the insights into your website. Angela: That’s right. Last thing I want to talk about is whats called a meta description. And this is really important. Its doesn’t impact  on how your ranked in search but absolutely impacts your click through rate from search. Listen at the 24 minute mark about this, super interesting! HollyG: And incising them to actually click through? Angela: Exactly, what you want to do for meta description is add a call to action or if you are an e commerce website it’s presenting what that proactive they are searching for and some benefits. Free shipping, shop online now, lots of things. And many descriptions don’t actually impacts on how you rank in search but absolutely how many people lick on your website in search. HollyG: Great. Really good point. I do really think about it that way at all. And I mean I think with SEO your Yoast plug-in for wordpress you have the ability to easily change that meta description right? Angela: You do. With SEO your sit will add as default and  couple of sentence on the page and then you can just go in and create a description. SO those 9 points also that you made there. Super useful. So site name, url structure, page title, headings, page your actual content and the structure of content, making sure your tagging the images adding fresh contents consistently, Google is also looking at user behavior, and also the load or speed of your site how fast it loads. I think the main point we covered then? Angela: Yeah that’s right. HollyG: Now we understand what Google is doing and how it’s reading your site. What are some of the things we can do to go that next step? Angela: So firstly I would highly recommend downloading a guide called Beginners Guide to SEO. Great. There a normal guide and there is also a downloadable PDF. It gives you really good insight  and gives you more information, more details tricks and treats on what we have today. But it’s a bible for anyone that’s starting out on optimizing their website. Angela: So on going content and blogging. SEO is an ongoing thing and it like you said before it should be adapted on all your practices moving forwards. Every time you create a new content make that you got see in mind and make sure that you don’t stop so keep creating blogs, keep creating optimize content add more images to our website. And it’s a normal ongoing thing. So just make sure you have that on gong practice in place. And finally make sure you track, analyze and continue updating. So you use Google analytics. Start to have a look at which keyword is working for you and which keywords aren’t. Have a look at the behavior and the style. If it’s not going up do something about it. How it will be on your homepage, start with this wide people that [00:33:16]  on your website. HollyG: Yeah fantastic. There is so much there and so many thing I think that we can do and we could do ourselves. I guess it sort of starting and doing one thing then the next thing and  eventually sort of you know try to tap in tap in to those points that you’ve talked about. Angela: And if you are overwhelmed you can always contact a digital marketing agency to rescue you. HollyG: That is a great segway. SO how can people find out bit amore about you and connect with you? A: You can go to our website. Which is the thewiredgency.com.au we are also on Social Media Platforms, Twitter, Linked in and Instagram as The Wired Agency H: Cool and was there any final tips or comments you wanted to mention? A: I think wave pretty much everything covered. But again if anyone has any questions about SEO please contact me. H:Yeah we have covered a lot and yeah I think. I appreciate so much going in too this many details. An I certainly have s much work to do with my website. But I’m looking forward to it. Are you up with the bonus question? A: Yes absolutely. Now it’s time for our thousand dollars bonus question. So if you only have a thousand dollars marketing budget, what would you spend it on? A: That’s a tricky one. What I would of is spend that thousand dollar on a cheap offshore SO company. I’m sure lot of people  of local business will be getting approach by SEO companies offshore. You know [00:35:12]  will rank you in rest place in search it doesn’t happen and it’s a waste use of money. SO that’s I would do. One option you could think of is spending that through search advertising. And the reason why I said that is because if you are having look at all those keywords you going to list those keywords you want to rank for. Use that and roll out with advertising campaign and what that does is it will keep you lots of insight into which keywords are actually working better for you.  And then you can take that  information in that insight and use that to start roll out your SEO. So that’s what I’m going to do with some [00:35:52]. SO while we are working on a SEO on the background. We watch some digital marketing activity. Obviously that has lots of benefits your getting visibility straight away. But it’s all that insight that you can gain from this campaign theta re really valuable for SEO. H: Year that’s a good point. Now what if you one have a hundred dollars. A: I’ll probably buy a bottle of wine and think about other way to get more money. H: Yeah. That’s probably a good idea. Well thank you so much for your time. And it’s very really insightful and I’m sure people will get a lot from this episode. The post How Google ranks your website: and what you can do to improve your rankings in search appeared first on Holly G.

How Google ranks your website: and what you can do to improve your rankings in search

Consumer First Marketing Strategy

Airbnb Opportunities for Tourism Destinations

How Thailand Markets Itself Globally chatting with the Minister for Tourism, Thailand. Welcome to tourism upgrade the podcast unpacking marketing trends from travel, tourism and marketing leaders. I’m your host Holly G and today we welcome Thailand’s Minister for Tourism Mrs Kobkarn Wattanavrangkul.  Today on the podcast we’ll be chatting about how Thailand markets itself globally.  Holly G: Hello Miss Kobkarn and welcome to the podcast. Ms. Kobkarn: Sawasdee Ka. Hello. Holly G: What brings you to Australia on this particular trip? Ms. Kobkarn: Well, it is very important because Australian tourists, are what we call quality tourist to our country. And the number that you have visited us is a big amount but moreover the spending, the tourism receipt from Australian visitors to Thailand, actually you are number 1 in Asia Pacific and among Top 3 to Top 5 in the world. Meaning that you spend more, you stay longer in Thailand. Holly G: And that really is the goal when we’re working in tourism is to encourage visitors to stay longer and spend more. Ms. Kobkarn: Yes, but at the end of the day I have to say that revenue is one thing because no doubt every country is now considering tourism as a part of the economy. But for us, what is more important is the understanding between people to people and heart to heart of which tourism can bring about this. I believe unity and peace is maybe more important and tourism can bring more understanding. And so therefore, we would like to welcome more and more people to Thailand because with tourism there’s no politics, there’s only understanding from seeing the Thai. I think that people may still recall that we are the “Land of Smiles”. I think they’re repeating percentage of tourist to Thailand especially from Australia is about 70%. I do believe people do return to us because not of the number of destination that we have but I think the most important is the friendship that we have created. Holly G: Lovely! So, how many people do visit Thailand and what are the key markets? Ms. Kobkarn: Oh, about 800 thousand from Australia.  We believe that even though we are doing very well between each other but my intention to be here is to introduce more product, more things that we can do together in Thailand. For example, we are now introducing ladies journey to Thailand because from the statistics that we have studied, about 60% of the Australian tourist to Thailand are male. And we can do more for the female and we are now launching the package for the ladies travelers, female executives, you can come not just only to sightsee in Thailand that is too normal for us, you can come and rejuvenate. We understand the ladies after working throughout the year; you better come and make yourself more beautiful. We introduce boxing class, Muai Thai boxing class, 3 days, 5 days. You can come and have a weight loss with muscle building. We teach you how to cook Thai; we take you to the fresh market. And we also make sure that you look more beautiful, I think our spa and beauty package, we are very famous for that. But moreover, the ladies, you spend more, but it’s very meaningful when you spend more because now, this year we are emphasizing on local experience. We would like tourism to help to reduce the gap between the super-rich and the very poor. We would like to take you to see the village. We would like you to buy more of the local stuff and these will be the things that we can help the people from other sectors. For example, like agriculture and what not. So, the Thai textile, the Thai local handicraft, these are the things the ladies would have more interest to buy. And it will definitely help to give additional income to the poor people. Holly G: Yes! So, looking at how tourism can impact all parts of the country and all different sectors as you mentioned, textiles, agriculture, looking to be able to showcase those assets that Thailand has on offer. Ms. Kobkarn: Especially the textile is very important not only in Thailand, I think throughout many countries in Asian because the textile; the weaving actually you can find everywhere in the village. Almost every house, the young ladies, they have to weave their own textile that is why it gives additional income to many local people not only to the main cities but to the secondary cities and the communities. I had mentioned about Asian, this is also another new package, new product that we are now introducing to countries when destination among the Asian countries especially CLMV and T, meaning Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Vietnam and Thailand. So, any country that you’re thinking of, if you have interest to visit Myanmar, Cambodia, Vietnam and what not. Two countries, meaning that all of us have some strong points,  in Thailand we have very good connectivity, we have airlines that connect not only from capital to capital but capital to the 2nd tier cities or 2nd tier to 2nd tier or 2nd tier to 3rd tiers. We already introduced this kind of connectivity since last year. So for example, if you want to go to Myanmar, we take you to Chiang Mai which is the northern part of Thailand. We have the airlines that directly fly from Chiang Mai to Mandalay, the old capital old capital of Myanmar, and from Mandalay you can enjoy Pagan to Nepidor and back to Bangkok, so all of these “Two country, One destination” already possible. So, we connect Thailand-Myanmar, Thailand-Laos, Thailand-Cambodia, and now Thailand-Vietnam. Holly G: So, what are the key marketing activities that you’re engaging to promote these new activities? I mean, tourism is so competitive now; there are so many more destinations even small countries like Bhutan and Iceland marketing themselves. What sort of activities is Thailand doing? Ms. Kobkarn: Oh, very true! Everyone is now into tourism as the 2nd tier for the economy. I do believe that the main strength of Thailand tourism at the end of the day is about discovering Thainese, it’s the way of the Thai life. We interview and we make research on why people do return to Thailand. As I have said, 70%, which is quite high. The answer that we receive, they said we have beautiful beach like Phuket and Samui and what not. We have beautiful mountain like Chiang Mai. We have great shopping, we definitely have great food but at the end of the day is the friendship that they have discovered with the Thai people. People do return to eat with their friend, to stay at the same hotel maybe same room, to use the same taxi, to see friends. At the core, we know that it’s the Land of Smiles, the smiling face, the friendship that we have created and this is a thing that we should not forget. But then at the same time, we also should be competitive enough that a friendship is one thing but we do need to find new product and that is why we introduce new destinations. Since last year we have 12 Hidden Gems introduced to the world, meaning the secondary town not so far from the main cities. For example, if you know Chiang Mai very well, last year we introduce Lampang which is only one hour from Chiang Mai and now Lampang is doing well. And this year we introduced Lamphun which is only half an hour from Lampang. So, if you still returning to Chiang Mai, you still have a chance to visit Lampang horse carriage, chicken noodles bowl and one of the most beautiful northern architecture and Lamphun also is the same thing. So, it’s the local experience that we are now trying to introduce with the new destinations.  Holly G: So, it’s about making sure that the experience people are having on the ground is fantastic and then, also introducing new experiences so people will return again. Ms. Kobkarn: So, your Thai friend will take you there. But those new local experience are authentic. Not something that we just created out of nowhere. Definitely, it’s the authentic city of the multicultural that we have over there. And this is quite new even to a lot of Thai, some people might not know of this, so this is a discover Thainese. But another product that we also start to emphasize more is Sport Tourism. I do believe that Australian loves sports, outdoor very much and we are now introducing many sports that we have. For example, Dream Run in Amazing Thailand, I mean, you love to do marathon, triathlon and what not. You have a choice, every Bangkok marathon, Chiang Mai marathon, Phuket marathon, midnight marathon, we have choice for you. We also have bicycle route throughout the country and a new one coming up. For the bicycle race, we have almost every weekend. Golfing also, we are very big in Australia and also very big Thailand. We have more than 250 golf courses throughout the land. So, you can select and be there. Holly G: Are you using social media incorporating into your marketing plans? Ms. Kobkarn: Social Media is definitely important. The increased number of F.I.T. to Thailand and from around the world is very important. So, we touch on social media of every country where we have the offices but then at the same time the social media in Thailand we encourage bloggers, we encourage anything to do with this because that is the trend. And in Thailand now, the government of Prime Minister General Prayut, he’s now promoting Thailand to be ready for Thailand 4.0. Meaning, we are entering the age of the digital economy but we have to make sure that even though we should be ready for Tourism 4.0, but then at the same time we will not forget the core of us. I mean, digital is only the tool but at the end of the day it’s about the people that we need to bring up and it’s about heart to heart and friendship to friendship. Holly G: Yeah, fantastic! Thank you! So, just the final question, I know we’re a bit short for time. I visited Thailand, I’ve been a couple of times but my last visit was in 2014 when I came over for the “Best friend’s Forever Famil”. And the reason for that, famil was really for Thailand to grow relationship with media and the travel industry after some political issues had happened. What is the political situation like now in Thailand? Ms. Kobkarn: We are now returning to stability and safetiness and peace are already in place. And I think the figures prove because the number of travelers to Thailand has increased from around the world, from most of the country that I have to say, but that is the figures. More than that, we can see that people enjoy more places as I have said new product, new place and what not. People travel to the little towns; people do more of the activities with the communities and what not. Meaning, they have trust but then at the same time on another side we are working closely with great collaboration with other ministries to make sure that safetiness and the communions should be developed alongside with the growth of the tourism in Thailand. Therefore, the safety in the water, the safety on land and all various aspects, we are developing non-stop. Whatever happen, not only in Thailand, any place around the world we learn and trying to figure out what we should do more, what we should be more ready. Risk management, this kind of thing is the key that we are developing together with tourism because we believe that people should travel, this is according to you and the WTO. And maybe that’s why you and the WTO have already decided to have World Tourism Day celebration and conference in Thailand, September 27 of this year. And next year we are going to be the host for the Global Summit of both Travel and Tourism Council in April. And also in May, we will be the host country for the Wedding Planner Congress, they have decided because they have confidence. And we are working with that confidence to give the best out of amazing Thailand to everyone.     Holly G: I really appreciate your time. It is a great honor to talk to you and meet too. Any final comments before we wrap up? Ms. Kobkarn: Well, at the end of the day I just would like to tell you Holly that I’m very much impressed with your leadership and the work with Women in Tourism. Because in Thailand we see that the next step that we should look for is tourism for all. Everyone should have equal rights, equal opportunities to do everything including tourism. So, with the World Tourism Day, that will be the main theme that we will create, tourism for all, for everyone. They should have chance and accessibility to travel and because we believe that with tourism we can bring the world together. Holly G: Thank you very much! Ms. Kobkarn: Thank you. You can subscribe to this podcast on iTunes, Stitcher or your preferred podcast service. Tweet me with any comments or feedback @hollygalbraith or email is good too holly (at) hollyg.com.au We love to read reviews and reviews really make a difference to our ranking in iTunes. If you could take the time to add a review to iTunes this would be greatly appreciated and i’ll give you a shout out on an upcoming episode! The post How Thailand Markets Itself Globally appeared first on Holly G.

<h2>How Thailand Markets Itself Globally chatting with the Minister for Tourism, Thailand.</h2> <h3>Welcome to tourism upgrade the podcast unpacking marketing trends from travel, tourism and marketing leaders. I’m your host Holly G and today we welcome Thailand’s Minister for Tourism Mrs Kobkarn Wattanavrangkul.  Today on the podcast we’ll be chatting about how Thailand markets itself globally.</h3> Holly G: Hello Miss Kobkarn and welcome to the podcast. Ms. Kobkarn: Sawasdee Ka. Hello. Holly G: What brings you to Australia on this particular trip? Ms. Kobkarn: Well, it is very important because Australian tourists, are what we call quality tourist to our country. And the number that you have visited us is a big amount but moreover the spending, the tourism receipt from Australian visitors to Thailand, actually you are number 1 in Asia Pacific and among Top 3 to Top 5 in the world. Meaning that you spend more, you stay longer in Thailand. Holly G: And that really is the goal when we’re working in tourism is to encourage visitors to stay longer and spend more. Ms. Kobkarn: Yes, but at the end of the day I have to say that revenue is one thing because no doubt every country is now considering tourism as a part of the economy. But for us, what is more important is the understanding between people to people and heart to heart of which tourism can bring about this. I believe unity and peace is maybe more important and tourism can bring more understanding. And so therefore, we would like to welcome more and more people to Thailand because with tourism there’s no politics, there’s only understanding from seeing the Thai. I think that people may still recall that we are the “Land of Smiles”. I think they’re repeating percentage of tourist to Thailand especially from Australia is about 70%. I do believe people do return to us because not of the number of destination that we have but I think the most important is the friendship that we have created. Holly G: Lovely! So, how many people do visit Thailand and what are the key markets? Ms. Kobkarn: Oh, about 800 thousand from Australia.  We believe that even though we are doing very well between each other but my intention to be here is to introduce more product, more things that we can do together in Thailand. For example, we are now introducing ladies journey to Thailand because from the statistics that we have studied, about 60% of the Australian tourist to Thailand are male. And we can do more for the female and we are now launching the package for the ladies travelers, female executives, you can come not just only to sightsee in Thailand that is too normal for us, you can come and rejuvenate. We understand the ladies after working throughout the year; you better come and make yourself more beautiful. We introduce boxing class, Muai Thai boxing class, 3 days, 5 days. You can come and have a weight loss with muscle building. We teach you how to cook Thai; we take you to the fresh market. And we also make sure that you look more beautiful, I think our spa and beauty package, we are very famous for that. But moreover, the ladies, you spend more, but it’s very meaningful when you spend more because now, this year we are emphasizing on local experience. We would like tourism to help to reduce the gap between the super-rich and the very poor. We would like to take you to see the village. We would like you to buy more of the local stuff and these will be the things that we can help the people from other sectors. For example, like agriculture and what not. So, the Thai textile, the Thai local handicraft, these are the things the ladies would have more interest to buy. And it will definitely help to give additional income to the poor people. Holly G: Yes! So, looking at how tourism can impact all parts of the country and all different sectors as you mentioned, textiles, agriculture, looking to be able to showcase those assets that Thailand has on offer. Ms. Kobkarn: Especially the textile is very important not only in Thailand, I think throughout many countries in Asian because the textile; the weaving actually you can find everywhere in the village. Almost every house, the young ladies, they have to weave their own textile that is why it gives additional income to many local people not only to the main cities but to the secondary cities and the communities. I had mentioned about Asian, this is also another new package, new product that we are now introducing to countries when destination among the Asian countries especially CLMV and T, meaning Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Vietnam and Thailand. So, any country that you’re thinking of, if you have interest to visit Myanmar, Cambodia, Vietnam and what not. Two countries, meaning that all of us have some strong points,  in Thailand we have very good connectivity, we have airlines that connect not only from capital to capital but capital to the 2nd tier cities or 2nd tier to 2nd tier or 2nd tier to 3rd tiers. We already introduced this kind of connectivity since last year. So for example, if you want to go to Myanmar, we take you to Chiang Mai which is the northern part of Thailand. We have the airlines that directly fly from Chiang Mai to Mandalay, the old capital old capital of Myanmar, and from Mandalay you can enjoy Pagan to Nepidor and back to Bangkok, so all of these “Two country, One destination” already possible. So, we connect Thailand-Myanmar, Thailand-Laos, Thailand-Cambodia, and now Thailand-Vietnam. Holly G: So, what are the key marketing activities that you’re engaging to promote these new activities? I mean, tourism is so competitive now; there are so many more destinations even small countries like Bhutan and Iceland marketing themselves. What sort of activities is Thailand doing? Ms. Kobkarn: Oh, very true! Everyone is now into tourism as the 2nd tier for the economy. I do believe that the main strength of Thailand tourism at the end of the day is about discovering Thainese, it’s the way of the Thai life. We interview and we make research on why people do return to Thailand. As I have said, 70%, which is quite high. The answer that we receive, they said we have beautiful beach like Phuket and Samui and what not. We have beautiful mountain like Chiang Mai. We have great shopping, we definitely have great food but at the end of the day is the friendship that they have discovered with the Thai people. People do return to eat with their friend, to stay at the same hotel maybe same room, to use the same taxi, to see friends. At the core, we know that it’s the Land of Smiles, the smiling face, the friendship that we have created and this is a thing that we should not forget. But then at the same time, we also should be competitive enough that a friendship is one thing but we do need to find new product and that is why we introduce new destinations. Since last year we have 12 Hidden Gems introduced to the world, meaning the secondary town not so far from the main cities. For example, if you know Chiang Mai very well, last year we introduce Lampang which is only one hour from Chiang Mai and now Lampang is doing well. And this year we introduced Lamphun which is only half an hour from Lampang. So, if you still returning to Chiang Mai, you still have a chance to visit Lampang horse carriage, chicken noodles bowl and one of the most beautiful northern architecture and Lamphun also is the same thing. So, it’s the local experience that we are now trying to introduce with the new destinations. Holly G: So, it’s about making sure that the experience people are having on the ground is fantastic and then, also introducing new experiences so people will return again. Ms. Kobkarn: So, your Thai friend will take you there. But those new local experience are authentic. Not something that we just created out of nowhere. Definitely, it’s the authentic city of the multicultural that we have over there. And this is quite new even to a lot of Thai, some people might not know of this, so this is a discover Thainese. But another product that we also start to emphasize more is Sport Tourism. I do believe that Australian loves sports, outdoor very much and we are now introducing many sports that we have. For example, Dream Run in Amazing Thailand, I mean, you love to do marathon, triathlon and what not. You have a choice, every Bangkok marathon, Chiang Mai marathon, Phuket marathon, midnight marathon, we have choice for you. We also have bicycle route throughout the country and a new one coming up. For the bicycle race, we have almost every weekend. Golfing also, we are very big in Australia and also very big Thailand. We have more than 250 golf courses throughout the land. So, you can select and be there. Holly G: Are you using social media incorporating into your marketing plans? Ms. Kobkarn: Social Media is definitely important. The increased number of F.I.T. to Thailand and from around the world is very important. So, we touch on social media of every country where we have the offices but then at the same time the social media in Thailand we encourage bloggers, we encourage anything to do with this because that is the trend. And in Thailand now, the government of Prime Minister General Prayut, he’s now promoting Thailand to be ready for Thailand 4.0. Meaning, we are entering the age of the digital economy but we have to make sure that even though we should be ready for Tourism 4.0, but then at the same time we will not forget the core of us. I mean, digital is only the tool but at the end of the day it’s about the people that we need to bring up and it’s about heart to heart and friendship to friendship. Holly G: Yeah, fantastic! Thank you! So, just the final question, I know we’re a bit short for time. I visited Thailand, I’ve been a couple of times but my last visit was in 2014 when I came over for the “Best friend’s Forever Famil”. And the reason for that, famil was really for Thailand to grow relationship with media and the travel industry after some political issues had happened. What is the political situation like now in Thailand? Ms. Kobkarn: We are now returning to stability and safetiness and peace are already in place. And I think the figures prove because the number of travelers to Thailand has increased from around the world, from most of the country that I have to say, but that is the figures. More than that, we can see that people enjoy more places as I have said new product, new place and what not. People travel to the little towns; people do more of the activities with the communities and what not. Meaning, they have trust but then at the same time on another side we are working closely with great collaboration with other ministries to make sure that safetiness and the communions should be developed alongside with the growth of the tourism in Thailand. Therefore, the safety in the water, the safety on land and all various aspects, we are developing non-stop. Whatever happen, not only in Thailand, any place around the world we learn and trying to figure out what we should do more, what we should be more ready. Risk management, this kind of thing is the key that we are developing together with tourism because we believe that people should travel, this is according to you and the WTO. And maybe that’s why you and the WTO have already decided to have World Tourism Day celebration and conference in Thailand, September 27 of this year. And next year we are going to be the host for the Global Summit of both Travel and Tourism Council in April. And also in May, we will be the host country for the Wedding Planner Congress, they have decided because they have confidence. And we are working with that confidence to give the best out of amazing Thailand to everyone. <a href="http://www.hollyg.com.au/tourismupgrade/56/attachment/1469167888691/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank"></a> <a href="http://www.hollyg.com.au/tourismupgrade/56/attachment/1469167891498/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank"></a> Holly G: I really appreciate your time. It is a great honor to talk to you and meet too. Any final comments before we wrap up? Ms. Kobkarn: Well, at the end of the day I just would like to tell you Holly that I’m very much impressed with your leadership and the work with <a href="http://www.womenintourismevents.com" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Women in Tourism</a>. Because in Thailand we see that the next step that we should look for is tourism for all. Everyone should have equal rights, equal opportunities to do everything including tourism. So, with the World Tourism Day, that will be the main theme that we will create, tourism for all, for everyone. They should have chance and accessibility to travel and because we believe that with tourism we can bring the world together. Holly G: Thank you very much! Ms. Kobkarn: Thank you. You can subscribe to this podcast on <a href="https://itunes.apple.com/au/podcast/tourism-upgrade-with-hollyg/id1132030357" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">iTunes</a>, <a href="http://stitcher.com/s?fid=94304&amp;refid=stpr" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Stitcher</a> or your preferred podcast service. Tweet me with any comments or feedback <a href="http://twitter.com/hollygalbraith" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">@hollygalbraith</a> or email is good too holly (at) <a href="http://hollyg.com.au" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">hollyg.com.au</a> We love to read reviews and reviews really make a difference to our ranking in iTunes. If you could take the time to <a href="https://itunes.apple.com/au/podcast/tourism-upgrade-with-hollyg/id1132030357" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">add a review to iTunes</a> this would be greatly appreciated and i’ll give you a shout out on an upcoming episode! The post <a href="http://www.hollyg.com.au/tourismupgrade/56/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">How Thailand Markets Itself Globally</a> appeared first on <a href="http://www.hollyg.com.au" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Holly G</a>.

How Thailand Markets Itself Globally

Tips for creating awesome media famils – episode 76

The Changing Face of Family Travel with Janeece Keller from Bound Round Welcome to tourism upgrade the podcast unpacking marketing trends from travel, tourism and marketing leaders. I’m your host Holly G. and today we welcome Janeece Keller, founder and CEO of Bound Round, a family travel platform.  Today on the podcast with Janeece, we’ll be chatting about the changing face of family travel.      Holly G: Those listening to the podcast, work in travel and tourism all over the world, we’ve have listeners from everywhere. Can you tell us a little bit about what is Bound Round and how did it come about?  Janeece K: Yeah sure! Bound Round is a family travel platform. We started three and a half years ago as a series of apps for kids. So, it’s showing a destination and activities through the eyes of children in that age of 6 to 12 year old, so that kids could participate in family travel making decisions. And late last year what we realized from our user base was actually that sixty percent of our users are parents. And so, over the last six months, what we’ve done is we’ve transitioned just from being an information portal for kids about travel and destination to becoming a platform that engages the whole family. So, parents can find out the information that’s relevant to them, things like opening hours deals, because what we found for family travel as is that deals actually drive a lot of the decision making for the parents in terms of where they’re going to go, where they can get a really good deal to. And then they engage the kids in what are we going to do when we get there. So, we started from that part but we’ve now extended forward to include the whole family.   Holly G: Wow excellent! So, through the last, I think it’s been three or four years of developing and growing Bound Round. What have you learned about family travel?   Janeece K: Far more than I ever thought I could to be perfectly honest. Look, family travel is a significant segment globally. It’s not as sexy as weddings and honeymoons and yet you know high-end glam. And it’s not as hip and cool as your backpackers but it is foundationally a core of the travel industry globally. You know, 33% of all leisure travel is done with families. So, realistically what we’re saying is that, it’s got significant scale, significant relevance, but it’s been that overlooked poor cousin. I think for us, what I found most surprising is the influence of the PANKS/PUNKS group. So, this demographic that has come about in the last 18 months or so, it’s your professional Aunts, no kids or your PANKS/PUNKS – Professional Uncles, no kids, which I fall into.  This group spends globally 4.5 billion on travel and activities with other people’s children. So, that’s a significant factor in the family travel market that I think has previously been overlooked. You see, most of your family marketing collateral, two parents, two kids, blonde hair, blue eyes, if you’re talking to the Western world. Two super cute kids often with their selfie sticks, if you’re talking to the Asian market. And really the face of family travel is not necessarily that traditional view of family and I don’t think as a segment we’ve kept up particularly well with marketing either and the positioning of that. So, PANKS and PUNKS and the other one that has surprised me are Dad’s. Typically you think you’re talking to the Mom’s but in actual fact; the Dads want to know what are we going to do when we get there and single Dads traveling with their kids. So, I think it’s the changing face of family’s changes the way that parents are interacting with their kids and what they want to do.  Holly G: And so, how does that impact the way that we market to these segments in practical terms? Janeece K: The stuff that we’re dabbling with is trying to answer the questions that are relevant to them. So, just positioning a family package as two adults and two kids, doesn’t really work all the time anymore. We’ve been running a series of competitions with family packages in their traditional style and yes, they have a level of uptake but if you get the parent that says, “I’ve got six kids” or you get that single Dad that’s like, “It’s just me and my three kids, can I make that work”, it’s actually quite different. So, I think we need to look at some flexibility in packages to meet the changing face of family travel. I think also, we need to really look at collateral, that’s the one thing that I have found the most disappointing as we look to share things to do with families from our partners and the industry more broadly. That collateral is very much position in the traditional 2 parents, 2 kids family model and I just don’t think that’s right anymore. Holly G: And that can be across like Airlines or Hotels as well as to as an attractions and all those. Janeece K: 100%! Yes, across all the segments, I think no longer is it just okay to say that we expect your family to look like mom, dad and two kids because a family can very easily look like my mom and 4 kids or grandma, grandpa, mom, dad and three kids or dad and his two kids or whatever. So, I think we need to be a society. We’re getting much better at doing that generally I just think as an industry we need to keep pace with that and deliver what people are expecting and what they get from the other channels. Holly G: And something that they can feel like they can relate to. I guess that what we want to do in our marketing is we want it to feel like, “Oh yeah, that relates to me.” Janeece K: Yeah, exactly! And so, the way that we do that at BoundRound is we position through the eyes of the kids. So, it is very much about, “Do you have Mad scientists in your family?” Are your kids crazy about crocodiles? Do your kids want to constantly chase adrenaline? Are your kids the outdoorsy type that just want to go and play in the mountain climb go on rocks? So, we position it that way so it’s really irrespective of what that family makeup looks like. You can identify with what’s going to be of interest to those kids in your family. Because I think that’s the other thing, MasterCard did some research two years ago, about what families find most difficult when planning a family holiday. And the biggest concern for parents and grandparents or Aunts or whoever is that they want to find something that everybody in the family is going to enjoy. So, whatever it is and wherever they’re going has to appeal to everybody. And so, we’ve kind of said, “Well, let’s take that as our lens for positioning destinations and attractions and tours and all of that stuff. So, let’s take that as a lens of what’s going to appeal to the kids, is it a six-year old who wants to be in a playground for a point of time and a 12 year old who’s like, “A playground is lame and I need something that’s going to be a bit more adrenaline.” Well, let’s help whoever the responsible adult is planning that. Find something that’s going to appeal to both of those. And then it takes away, “Are you a single parent?” – Like it takes away those decision-making criteria. Holly G: And I lovely the idea of positioning things to the eyes of the children because it takes away some of those typical stereotype, you’re really trying to tap into their interests and not a stereotype I guess. Janeece K: Yeah, and look to be honest it’s one of those things that’s evolved for us over the time because when we first started my very first draft of what Bound Ground was going to look like was based for stereotypes of the types of kid. You’ve got the kid that just wants to learn and go to the museums and galleries and then you’ve got the one that, “Don’t put me inside because I only want to be running around and I’ve got more energy.” And then you’ve got the kid that’s kind of not sure that they love the theme parks because that’s what all their makes think is really cool. And so, that’s the premise that we started from and we’ve learned over the years that it just, it doesn’t resonate as well as trying to say here’s the interest point; you choose. And you might have a family that’s got three very different kids. So, how are you going to find that and you might be traveling – for me, if I was to travel with my niece and nephew, they’re different ages and stages. And those two kids couldn’t be more different if they tried, kind of like me and my brother, like we couldn’t be more different if we tried either. And so, you got to find something that’s going to be fun for both of them so that everybody has a good time. Holly G: Yeah, that’s really interesting. So, how are you seeing the role of Technology in travel as you go through developing Bound Round and being really involved in the industry? Because essentially that’s plays a big role in what you’ve been doing. Janeece K: Look, absolutely! We are a completely digital play. So, technology for us is of utmost importance. I think the role that it plays in family travel is things like, “Do you have free Wi-Fi?” That is the single biggest question that kids from the age of 10 to 14 ask. If there is Wi-Fi there so I can share what I’m doing on Instagram. So, if a hotel or destination and attraction can promote that they’ve got accessible Wi-Fi then the kids are going to find that. So, its things like that, that I think is important. I think “Last Minute” is really important which is mobile. So, 80% of our usage is on mobile, which is unsurprising. It’s where we started but I think also particularly into is an activities “Last Minute” and mobile are inseparable, absolutely inseparable, so what are we going to do tomorrow because the weather is not what we originally thought it was going to be. the single biggest question that kids from the age of 10 to 14 ask #familytravel Click To Tweet Holly G: And that’s interesting when you’re looking at activity sector because traditionally they don’t necessarily think of themselves as mobile first. Janeece K: No, and I think you can say with the rise of booking platforms and software, things like your “Booking Boss” and your “Rezdy” and those sorts of platforms that enable an activity providers to go digital and to have that availability for last minute booking capability. I think that’s really important and it’s something that for someone like us who is a distributor of a broad range advice, different activities is important and has made our jobs a lot easier. I think from an industry perspective, I think the aggregation of those and making API connectivity and real-time data connectivity and bringing the tour and activity segment pretty much in line with accommodation and airlines in terms of accessibility to that data, that’s something that we’ve got a lot of work to do on as an industry and will only improve the ability for consumers to make those last-minute decisions and book online, on mobile effectively in the way that they want to. Holly G: Yeah, and that’s really what it comes down to, isn’t it? It’s the way that the person wants to interact and engage and book and all those different touch points. Janeece K: Yeah, exactly! And I think there’s probably a little bit of concern from your hotel concierges and you’re booking desks and your visitor information centers about what’s the relevance for them. I think their ability to have access to those sorts of portals that has the digitally distributed inventory, gives them absolutely irrelevance. Because what we found in our research is that families in particular want recommendations. So, if you’re at the hotel you want to have the conversation with the concierge. It just means that the concierge has a much easier way of fulfilling that client requests and understanding availability. So, I think that definitely still has relevance and the same with the visitors’ information centers. Because what we found in our research is that families in particular want recommendations @boundroundClick To Tweet Holly G: Yeah, we all love that multiple touch points. We want to hear it, we don’t just want to hear at once, we want to hear it maybe from someone and then see it in a few other places to give us that confidence that, “Yes, that really is for me.” Janeece K: Yeah, exactly! So, I think from a technology perspective that distribution of information and inventory more broadly is the key. I think the other thing from a tech perspective is delivery, like executing really well. So, I think our most successful product and iteration of Bound Round has been our iOS app which has this, I have to say super cool, actually still is super cool, navigation on a three day globe. So, kids get to navigate the world on a three-day globe and when people download it they’re like, “Oh, that’s super cool!” Now, we tried to do that on desktop and because the desktop technology is quite different to the mobile technology it just didn’t work and it was a much poorer user experience. So, what we’ve had to do is redesign. So, I think you need to apply the cutting edge tech in a way that’s going to resonate with your users that do it at a pace that makes sense and not just off for something that’s super cool because it’s the new shiny thing, but it actually has to deliver on what you’re trying to achieve. Holly G: Yeah, great! So, does social media play much of a role in marketing Bound Round? Janeece K: Oh, massively! Social Media for us is really important in particular Facebook. Facebook is where the parents and the grandparents and the aunts and uncles are. It’s my generation, it’s the generation above and that’s where they’re looking for information and recommendations. I think harnessing that as a way of getting your message out there is invaluable. And for the brands that don’t have the budgets of your Expedia’s and your Priceline groups and your TripAdvisor’s. Then Google Ad-words is often beyond, actually often beyond the affordability of many small businesses other than them targeting their own brand words, in which case they kind of going to rank for that anyway because if they’ve done their content well. So, to me Facebook is the key and YouTube is also another really important social channel for us, video is the way we get our message out most strongly, the videos through the eyes of kids. So, YouTube is important for us. Twitter, we use for industry information. So, Twitter for us is not about talking to the parents and the kids, but it’s for us staying on top of industry trends, industry conversations, that sort of thing. And Instagram is where the kids are. So, we use Instagram to interact with the kids. A lot of our followers on Instagram that sort of twin/teen set and so that’s what we use Instagram for. I think social is massively important but you’ve got to understand what you’re using each social channel for. Holly G: Yeah, great! Are you using user generated content across your Instagram platform? Janeece: We use user generated content on our website and on Instagram. Yes, so we actively welcome kids and parents to share their content with us that we then used to push out through the channels. And if I’m being really honest, I don’t think we do enough with user-generated content on social. It’s definitely something we do but we could be doing it a lot that better. HollyG: Well, I think that’s one of the things that everybody across the industry is experimenting with this year and learning how that they can encourage that a lot more. I have just absolutely loved talking to you and getting my head around the eyes of the aunties and uncles the PANKS and – Janeece: Yeah, the PANKS and the PUNKS. HollyG: PANKS and the PUNKS, especially as I fall into that category. And yeah, I think it’s just a great way to think about family travel beyond the typical mom, dad and two kids. So yeah, now I really appreciate chatting with you today. Do you have any final tips or comments that you wanted to make? Janeece: Look, I think the thing that I’m most passionate about is family travel being seen as important and actually getting the air time that it should get because it is a significant revenue driver. It’s a multi-person trip that is typically multiple nights. And so, I’m really passionate about getting family travel and making it accessible and easy for families to plan. I think that’s the thing that I want to share mostly. Holly G: Yeah, great! I guess, do you think there’s been that reluctance to put your hand up and say we are involved in family travel because people are worried that they’re going to think that they’re going to turn off other parts of their customer base? Janeece: Look, I think there’s been a little bit of that and I think part of that is because if you’re a really family centric product and that’s all your focuses. I think there’s been some reticence for people to say – we are family but we’re not just family – because they’re not sure how to position it or how to reach families without putting off their business or their miles business or without putting off their high end honeymooners. I don’t know that brands have figured out how to segment by psycho-graphic as well as they should and I think that’s part of the challenge. And families, let’s face it right, it’s not as sexy as you know, are there changing facilities. Those sorts of things don’t make it as appealing but if you look at it through that lens, if you look at it from a financial perspective, it is a really appealing sector. And I think ___ I’m here trying to do with Bound Round is to make it more accessible and make that easier for businesses that genuinely have a product that appeals to people traveling with kids. HollyG: Yeah, fantastic! So, where can people find out more about you or connect with you? Janeece: So, boundround.com is the best place to start. I am also on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. So, everything Bound Round on anyone of those channels, you can reach me there. You can get my email address off any of those channels as well. I’m very open to receiving questions, comments, feedback. And if you’ve got a family product that you want to push out there, please let me know we’re happy to include it in boundround.com HollyG: Fantastic, great! Thanks so much for your time Janeece! Janeece: Thanks Holly, really appreciate it! Now it’s time for our thousand dollar bonus question! HollyG: If you only had a thousand dollar marketing budget, what would you spend it on? Janeece: A thousand dollars is not a lot, I would spend it on video content promotion either on YouTube or on Facebook, is what I would do. It’s an innately accessible form of content that has multiple platforms it can be distributed on. So, I would do video boosted on Facebook and YouTube. HollyG: And what if you only had a hundred dollars? Janeece: Oh, that’s super tough! A hundred dollars, I would probably do a boost on Facebook post driving engagement to my own website. You can subscribe to this podcast on iTunes, Stitcher or your preferred podcast service.  The post Changing Face of Family Travel appeared first on Holly G.

Changing Face of Family Travel

Bloggers, Influencers & Travel Brands at Tourism Upgrade – LIVE

Andrew Griffiths

Storytelling. How to tell your great tourism business story with Andrew Griffiths

Instameets for Tourism We welcome Digital Marketer Jared Mendham to chat with us in episode 65 of Tourism Upgrade and we will we chatting about Instameets, are they really worth it for tourism destinations?    Please see the show notes below. There is more detail in the audio recording and we urge you to press play and enjoy or head over to iTunes and check it out there. Jared Mendham is former marketer at Destination Southern Tasmania, welcome to Tourism Upgrade the Podcast. HollyG: Instameets have been a pretty hot thing to do over the past couple of years and in your role with Destination Southern Tasmania you ran quite a lot of Instameets, can you start off by telling us what an Instameet is? Jared: At its most basic, an instameet is where a bunch of people get together, take photos of things, then upload those photos to Instagram. It’s more than that though, and it’s really the spirit of the Instagram social network that comes to life  and comes out at these events. It can be anything from 2 – 3 people through to 60 plus, all there to take pictures. You get people from all walks of life coming to a single destination, all competing to get the best shot, the best angle, the best edits. You get people with old phones (even Nokias!), new phones, SLRs and everything in between. I’ve not been on Instameet where people didn’t have a great time, even some of the more odd ones. Its funny the friendships that happen on Instagram. It’s a pretty friendly and happy network. What is an Instameet? An Instameet an is where a bunch of people get together, take photos of things, then upload those photos to Instagram. An Instameet an is where a bunch of people get together, take photos of things, then upload those photos to Instagram.Click To Tweet HollyG: Comparing your first Instameet to say the last one, what are some tips you have learnt for setting up &amp; running Instameets? Jared: My first Instameet was back when I was working at a University, and I partnered up with a local group – Instatassie – to get it rolling. That gave me a good taste for running an Instameet and I ended up working with them to put on a few more Instameets, then speared off on my own as they became a little more commercial. I wanted to feature tourism operators and their experiences, while Instatassie was more about the natural environment. HollyG: Are Instameets free or do they require budget? Jared: The sky is the limit! I usually try and organise a behind the scenes experience, or a little free food or something as a minimum, but really if you’ve got a strong enough following (or can tap into one) you can make it pretty much about anything. At the other end of the scale I was partnering up with Tourism Tasmania to put on some absolutely mad Instameets, including hiring a large catamaran and driving that from Hobart to Port Arthur (via some amazing scenery – #tasmanmeet!) then we stopped in at three or four tourism operators on the way back – so that meet had a fairly large budget in comparison to others. Check out https://www.instagram.com/hobartandbeyond/ HollyG: How do you measure the success of an Instameet? Jared: They’re a bit fuzzy, but it depends on what you really want out of it. Local engagement? Giving something back? Awareness? I figured that we were increasing the awareness of Southern Tasmanian tourism destinations by leveraging social networks – small and large, online and offline, and it just happened that I could measure some of that action on Instagram, which is where many of the pictures end up. HollyG: So from your experience are Instameets worth it? Jared: Absolutely. I was on the fence about the Instameets I’d run, but then decided to run some numbers a month or so back on the Instameets we held last financial year. We held 11, and probably invested about $15,000 of actual money into the running, plus 11 days of supervising the actual running. Other than that, the remainder was pretty much side of desk organisation and leveraging a good audience. The results? The meets reached 2.37 million people, which saw 5.7 million impressions, and received 215,000 likes and comments. As we know, reporting on Instagram based reach and impressions has been persnickety till recently, so focusing on the engagement, that’s about $0.069 per engagement. Not bad!  “I actually think Instameets are more than just figures as its a way of engaging with an audience that’s not shoving a product down their throat – and you are leveraging other peoples audiences to tell your story – it adds validity to it as its not you banging on about the same stories its other people exploring that story for themselves.”  HollyG: What would be your key dos &amp; don’t for other destinations or brands running Instameets? Jared: Do:  be organised! use Eventbrite to manage bookings/registrations get food requirements collect email addresses and phone numbers from there you can print out name tags make sure you come up with a hashtag for the event, a unique one, so then you can track it track using using my favourite dirty little app, Hashtracking.com. also, make sure you print the hashtags for the day on the name tags so everyone remembers them… even if they’re upside down!  HollyG: Where can people find out more about you and connect? Jared: LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram if you want to see pictures of my kids and my dog – #fauxgreyhound  Now it’s time for our thousand dollar bonus question! HollyG:  If you only had a $1000 marketing budget what would you spent it on? Jared: Really depends on the product and the market, but basically you want to look big! Get a website through Squarespace, and spend time on making it look good. Get a logo on fiverr.com or something similar, or get a mate to do it if they can do an excellent job. Start Facebook, Tripadvisor and Instagram accounts, but don’t worry about any other social networks at this stage. Facebook will be a good point of reference for people checking you out, TripAdvisor is where you’ll be asking people to review you, and Instagram is a great way of reaching out to people. I actually think that Instagram can be one of the cheapest, easy to leverage marketing pieces out there. Say you’re focused on a specific market, like Tasmania for example – jump on #tasmania and like every single damn picture from the last few days. Do that every couple of days – it’ll take you an hour or two, but do it in front of the TV. That’s shoving your brand in front of every single person who uses that hashtag. Make sure you work out how to use your phone camera properly and take good images that tell your story – they don’t need to be professional quality, but just something that the audience can understand and engage with, that tell a single element of a story in each shot. After that, I’d try and get as many people along to experience my tourism business as possible – free rides, open days, whatever it takes. Focus on your local audience first, as they’ll be your biggest advocates if you can get them on board. HollyG: Now what if you only had $100? Jared: Similar to the $1k deal, but I’d focus on logo, website and Instagram, then giving away free rides… get your name out there! You can subscribe to this podcast on iTunes, Stitcher or your preferred podcast service. Tweet me with any comments or feedback @hollygalbraith or email is good too holly (at) hollyg.com.au We love to read reviews and reviews really make a difference to our ranking in iTunes. If you could take the time to add a review to iTunes this would be greatly appreciated and i’ll give you a shout out on an upcoming episode! The post Instameets, are they really worth it for tourism destinations? appeared first on Holly G.

<h1>Instameets for Tourism</h1> <h2>We welcome Digital Marketer Jared Mendham to chat with us in episode 65 of Tourism Upgrade and we will we chatting about Instameets, are they really worth it for tourism destinations?</h2> Please see the show notes below. There is more detail in the audio recording and we urge you to press play and enjoy or <a href="https://itunes.apple.com/au/podcast/tourism-upgrade-with-hollyg/id1132030357?mt=2" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">head over to iTunes</a> and check it out there. Jared Mendham is former marketer at Destination Southern Tasmania, welcome to Tourism Upgrade the Podcast. HollyG: Instameets have been a pretty hot thing to do over the past couple of years and in your role with Destination Southern Tasmania you ran quite a lot of Instameets, can you start off by telling us what an Instameet is? Jared: At its most basic, an instameet is where a bunch of people get together, take photos of things, then upload those photos to Instagram. It’s more than that though, and it’s really the spirit of the Instagram social network that comes to life  and comes out at these events. It can be anything from 2 – 3 people through to 60 plus, all there to take pictures. You get people from all walks of life coming to a single destination, all competing to get the best shot, the best angle, the best edits. You get people with old phones (even Nokias!), new phones, SLRs and everything in between. I’ve not been on Instameet where people didn’t have a great time, even some of the more odd ones. Its funny the friendships that happen on Instagram. It’s a pretty friendly and happy network. <h3>What is an Instameet?</h3> An Instameet an is where a bunch of people get together, take photos of things, then upload those photos to Instagram. An Instameet an is where a bunch of people get together, take photos of things, then upload those photos to Instagram. <a href="https://twitter.com/share?text=An+Instameet+an+is+where+a+bunch+of+people+get+together%2C+take+photos+of+things%2C+then+upload+those+photos+to+Instagram.&amp;via=hollygalbraith&amp;related=hollygalbraith&amp;url=http://www.hollyg.com.au/tourismupgrade/instameets/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Click To Tweet</a> HollyG: Comparing your first Instameet to say the last one, what are some tips you have learnt for setting up &amp; running Instameets? Jared: My first Instameet was back when I was working at a University, and I partnered up with a local group – Instatassie – to get it rolling. That gave me a good taste for running an Instameet and I ended up working with them to put on a few more Instameets, then speared off on my own as they became a little more commercial. I wanted to feature tourism operators and their experiences, while Instatassie was more about the natural environment. HollyG: Are Instameets free or do they require budget? Jared: The sky is the limit! I usually try and organise a behind the scenes experience, or a little free food or something as a minimum, but really if you’ve got a strong enough following (or can tap into one) you can make it pretty much about anything. At the other end of the scale I was partnering up with Tourism Tasmania to put on some absolutely mad Instameets, including hiring a large catamaran and driving that from Hobart to Port Arthur (via some amazing scenery – <a href="https://www.instagram.com/explore/tags/tasmanmeet/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">#tasmanmeet</a>!) then we stopped in at three or four tourism operators on the way back – so that meet had a fairly large budget in comparison to others. Check out <a href="https://www.instagram.com/hobartandbeyond/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.instagram.com/hobartandbeyond/</a> HollyG: How do you measure the success of an Instameet? Jared: They’re a bit fuzzy, but it depends on what you really want out of it. Local engagement? Giving something back? Awareness? I figured that we were increasing the awareness of Southern Tasmanian tourism destinations by leveraging social networks – small and large, online and offline, and it just happened that I could measure some of that action on Instagram, which is where many of the pictures end up. HollyG: So from your experience are Instameets worth it? Jared: Absolutely. I was on the fence about the Instameets I’d run, but then decided to run some numbers a month or so back on the Instameets we held last financial year. We held 11, and probably invested about $15,000 of actual money into the running, plus 11 days of supervising the actual running. Other than that, the remainder was pretty much side of desk organisation and leveraging a good audience. The results? The meets reached 2.37 million people, which saw 5.7 million impressions, and received 215,000 likes and comments. As we know, reporting on Instagram based reach and impressions has been persnickety till recently, so focusing on the engagement, that’s about $0.069 per engagement. Not bad! <blockquote> “I actually think Instameets are more than just figures as its a way of engaging with an audience that’s not shoving a product down their throat – and you are leveraging other peoples audiences to tell your story – it adds validity to it as its not you banging on about the same stories its other people exploring that story for themselves.” </blockquote> HollyG: What would be your key dos &amp; don’t for other destinations or brands running Instameets? Jared: Do: <ul> <li>be organised!</li> <li>use Eventbrite to manage bookings/registrations</li> <li>get food requirements</li> <li>collect email addresses and phone numbers</li> <li>from there you can print out name tags</li> <li>make sure you come up with a hashtag for the event, a unique one, so then you can track it</li> <li>track using using my favourite dirty little app, <a href="http://hashtracking.com/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Hashtracking.com.</a></li> <li>also, make sure you print the hashtags for the day on the name tags so everyone remembers them… even if they’re upside down!</li> </ul> HollyG: Where can people find out more about you and connect? Jared: <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/jared-mendham-03aa046?authType=NAME_SEARCH&amp;authToken=VojA&amp;locale=en_US&amp;trk=tyah&amp;trkInfo=clickedVertical%3Amynetwork%2CclickedEntityId%3A20411182%2CauthType%3ANAME_SEARCH%2Cidx%3A1-1-1%2CtarId%3A1475113304547%2Ctas%3Ajared" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">LinkedIn</a>, <a href="https://www.facebook.com/mendham" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Facebook</a>, <a href="https://www.instagram.com/jaredmendham/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Instagram</a> if you want to see pictures of my kids and my dog –<a href="https://www.instagram.com/explore/tags/fauxgreyhound/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank"> #fauxgreyhound</a> <h3>Now it’s time for our thousand dollar bonus question!</h3> HollyG:  If you only had a $1000 marketing budget what would you spent it on? Jared: Really depends on the product and the market, but basically you want to look big! Get a website through Squarespace, and spend time on making it look good. Get a logo on <a href="http://fiverr.com/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">fiverr.com</a> or something similar, or get a mate to do it if they can do an excellent job. Start Facebook, Tripadvisor and Instagram accounts, but don’t worry about any other social networks at this stage. Facebook will be a good point of reference for people checking you out, TripAdvisor is where you’ll be asking people to review you, and Instagram is a great way of reaching out to people. I actually think that Instagram can be one of the cheapest, easy to leverage marketing pieces out there. Say you’re focused on a specific market, like Tasmania for example – jump on #tasmania and like every single damn picture from the last few days. Do that every couple of days – it’ll take you an hour or two, but do it in front of the TV. That’s shoving your brand in front of every single person who uses that hashtag. Make sure you work out how to use your phone camera properly and take good images that tell your story – they don’t need to be professional quality, but just something that the audience can understand and engage with, that tell a single element of a story in each shot. After that, I’d try and get as many people along to experience my tourism business as possible – free rides, open days, whatever it takes. Focus on your local audience first, as they’ll be your biggest advocates if you can get them on board. HollyG: Now what if you only had $100? Jared: Similar to the $1k deal, but I’d focus on logo, website and Instagram, then giving away free rides… get your name out there! You can subscribe to this podcast on <a href="https://itunes.apple.com/au/podcast/tourism-upgrade-with-hollyg/id1132030357" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">iTunes</a>, <a href="http://stitcher.com/s?fid=94304&amp;refid=stpr" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Stitcher</a> or your preferred podcast service. Tweet me with any comments or feedback <a href="http://twitter.com/hollygalbraith" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">@hollygalbraith</a> or email is good too holly (at) <a href="http://hollyg.com.au" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">hollyg.com.au</a> We love to read reviews and reviews really make a difference to our ranking in iTunes. If you could take the time to <a href="https://itunes.apple.com/au/podcast/tourism-upgrade-with-hollyg/id1132030357" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">add a review to iTunes</a> this would be greatly appreciated and i’ll give you a shout out on an upcoming episode! The post <a href="http://www.hollyg.com.au/tourismupgrade/instameets/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Instameets, are they really worth it for tourism destinations?</a> appeared first on <a href="http://www.hollyg.com.au" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Holly G</a>.

Instameets, are they really worth it for tourism destinations?

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