Tourism Technology - NB

From the Archives...

2012-01-24T14:20:00.000-04:00

I've really hit a road block this month. I've put "blog something" in my day planner practically since my last post. It's also an Outlook reminder and I've kept my blog site open in a Chrome tab hoping for some inspiration.

Truth is, I'm not really commenting or creating on any platforms lately. Sure I repost, reshare, and retweet content at least twice a day on Twitter, Facebook and G+ but if you check my feeds, there's very little original content... Of course everything I post is first vetted to make sure it's not drivel and that the link is working.

So the quality is there, but not the original content.

Hmm.

When I figure out why, I'll let you know.

So let's delve into the years gone by and see what I can "reblog" :)

Jack Rabbit - this is still a good primer / basic description of how Jack Rabbit indexer works in NB. Also note that the department of Tourism and Parks is currently investigating how to feature festivals, events and attractions in the same way. If you have ideas or want to share, please contact Carol Alderdice

And that reminds me Tourism and Parks in NB recently released this document on Partnerships and Programs Opportunities for Operators. Very informative, in terms of knowing who is responsible for what in the dept, and a list of their consumer facing social media outlets.

If you're running a Bed and Breakfast or Inn - please check out this post from September with lots of links to resources specifically for that interest group.

Here's a nice post where I lecture you (from August).

And let's talk a bit about what's coming up in the next few months ...

HNL annual conference in Gander in February - TT.com will be there
Online Revealed/ Tourism Summit in Toronto in March - TT.com going to the T.dot :)
TIAPEI annual conf in Charlottetown in March - going to this as well

Later in March and April, TourismTechnology.com will be offering a series of workshops. Day long in various locations throughout Atlantic Canada. For the bargain basement price of $100 plus HST. Each year we ferret out a spectacular presenter and follow them around as they help educate Operators on Social Media, Marketing, Communication, Tech and other issues.

And then Spring will be here.

And I might be more inspirational.

We'll see.

Your Community will stand up for you

2012-01-09T13:02:00.000-04:00

Welcome to 2012

Certainly not a great start to the new year for one local restaurant. I won't name it, but it was recently closed for having inappropriate items in a food cooler. They dealt with the matter, got reinspected, approved and reopened.

The problem is no one is coming back, and business is slow. Because of the nature of the closure and publicity in the local paper, it is become a running joke and akin to an urban legend.

Firstly, if you're going to manage / own a restaurant you need to take a Food Safety course. Just for your own peace of mind. Maybe you don't have to maintain a certification but at least take it once, so you know what is allowed. TIANB offers the NFSTP program, check it out here

And also Responsible Beverage, check that out here , you can do this course online in a couple of hours.

Secondly, if you had a social media community of patrons already built before something like this happens to you, then they would have stood up and defended you.

That's one of the hidden bonuses of Social Media - people don't like to see other people bashing stuff they like, and they will rise up and defend you. If you become a real person to them via online interaction as well as interaction in your establishment, people will start to feel like you're family and want to protect the things they like.

I'm sure this particular restaurant has many loyal patrons who would be vocal about their love of the restaurant but they do not have a venue. In fact I'm sure there have been a few tweets here and there, and maybe some facebook posts but without a standard hashtag or a business page, these one off voices are lost in a crowd.

I see a couple of people have recently posted positive reviews on Urban Spoon and Trip Advisor, which is great but still not focused enough.

Also if you had an online community you could offer them a special discount code or coupon to entice them to return.

Thirdly, though it's just as important as Social Media, you should have an optimized website. I don't believe this particular restaurant has a website, so all the bad press is rising to the top of the Google ranks and they don't have a snowball's chance in heck of pushing those out of the top ten unless they have their own website and are continually refreshing content

Regrettably I read the owner quoted as saying "they didn't know how to make customers return" and I knew they were automatically thinking expensive old school methods like radio and newsprint.

This incident might inevitably lead to the closure of this restaurant and in my head I know the outcome could have been different if they had a social media community they could reach out to. Start building yours today.

Good Bye 2011

2011-12-19T14:42:00.000-04:00

OK, minus points for totally unoriginal title, but bonus points for blogging more in 2011 than in 2010!

I think that makes me even, points wise.

Which in this economy is a good place to be.

To wrap up the year, I thought I might pass along some general technology tidbits, in no particular order...

1. Never leave your electronics in a car in the cold.

You run the risk of condensation on the inside and condensation leads to rust. Always bring your laptop and cell phone in from the car.

2. Please put a password on your cell phone.

It can be as simple as 3 letters, anything to discourage would be thieves. YOU are responsible for charges on your cell phone. When someone steals it and starts calling Nigeria, it's your responsibility to pay for that. It's not the phone carrier's fault. You see this same story countless times on the news websites - unsuspecting consumers owing thousands of dollars to the phone carrier. This is true for ALL phones on your account. Try and get long distance calling disabled on your children's phones.

3. Organize your files in folders

The end of the year is the perfect time to Archive old files into folders. In today's digital age, if you don't have a folder structure, you're wasting a lot of your time hunting for things. Use the features of the operating system to sort files by date, or type instead of name.

Create folders inside of folders for years - move everything into place

Especially pictures. My personal pictures folder has main folders for all holidays, and then inside each is a folder for each year. Christmas -- 2008 --- 2009 --- 2010 etc.
You can also do it by year if you wanted 2010 - Easter --- Summer vacation --- Fall -- Ski trip ---Christmas etc.

4. Cull old files and emails

Now is the time to clear out that clutter from your inbox. Permanently delete Deleted Items. You'll feel better starting the year with only the emails you need in front of you.

If you are using Outlook and have old email addresses in your auto complete, you can take some time to clear those out as well. Highlight them and hit the delete key - simple.

Hotmail, Gmail, whatever mail - clear out, clean up!

5. Drink more lattes - they are one of life's simple pleasures if you like milk with your coffee.

6. Use your laptop battery!

If you have a laptop the best way to extend the life of the battery is to USE it. Even if it sits at a desk for 90% of its life, unplug it and run it on battery until it's beeping like mad. It annoys me when people have a new laptop and the battery only lasts 5 minutes - it's not a manufacturing defect, it's because you never used it.

Also unplug it and let it discharge over the weekends. Power it off every once in a while and unplug the cable from the laptop AND the outlet (or power bar). Laptops are a little different from desktops in that they can build up static inside. You don't need to know the details, just unplug it and let it rest every once in a while.

7. The internet is your one stop shop

We're coming into an era of no excuses. There is literally nothing that you cannot find on the internet. And almost nothing the internet cannot help you with.

For example, if you don't know how to do number 3 and 4 - find out on the internet.

Start with "creating folders in windows 7" in a google search bar. If video is your preferred learning method, try You Tube.

If you don't know your version of Windows, start with "Find my windows version"

Start with learning about Google. Google help: http://support.google.com/websearch/?hl=en

7.5 Have a latte while you're learning (see number 5 above) or whatever makes you calm

8. Improve your typing skills.

Really the only thing for this is practice. Google "learn to type". Retype your recipe cards. Whatever it is you're typing doesn't matter, practice on something. If you can get to 20-30 wpm your online life will be more enjoyable.

9. If you have several containers of Christmas decorations, mark on the outside which one you put the ornament hangers in.

And then put a note to yourself inside the other containers about which one you put the ornament hangers in. Then when the Ornament Hanger Goblin comes at some point during the year, you'll know which container to dust for incriminating fingerprints and DNA evidence.

That bugger belongs in jail.

Hmm...digressing a bit there.

Probably time to sign off on 2011 and we'll meet up in 2012.

I'll be available for one-on-one website mentoring in the new year, at the super low rate of $125, just give me a shout.

xo
Beth

TourismTechnology.com project survey

2011-12-05T14:29:00.001-04:00

Greetings Operator,

During the past three years, the TourismTechnology.com project has offered one-on-one mentoring sessions, and professional workshops in the spring.

The TourismTechnology.com project, in preparation for renewal in October 2012, is looking for feedback and suggestions regarding what technology tools operators would like to learn more about and how operators would prefer to learn about technologies in general.

Please take a few moments to answer our survey. The survey has 14 questions, and will help direct the next three years of the TourismTechnology.com project.

Click here for the survey

Thank you,

Réal Robichaud

Executive Director, TIANB

Bonjour chers exploitants,

Au cours des trois dernières années, le projet TechnologieTourisme.com a offert des séances de mentorat individuelles, ainsi que des ateliers professionnels au printemps.

Le projet TechnologieTourisme.com, en préparation pour le renouvellement en Octobre 2012, souhaite recueillir vos commentaires et suggestions quant aux outils que vous souhaiteriez mieux connaître et aux moyens par lesquels vous aimeriez vous familiariser avec les technologies de l'information en général.

Veuillez svp prendre quelques minutes pour compléter notre sondage. Le questionnaire comportant 14 questions contribuera à donner les orientations des trois prochaines années du projet TechnologieTourisme.com.

Cliquer ici pour le sondage

Merci,

Réal Robichaud

Directeur général, AITNB

Hop like a Jack Rabbit

2011-11-28T10:09:00.001-04:00

EXCLUSIVE - for my NB readers

Let's dispel some of the myths and confusion around Jack Rabbit and online booking :)

Jack Rabbit is first and foremost an INDEXER.

A few times a day the Jack Rabbit "widget" - that white box on the TAP (tourism and parks) consumer facing website (tourismnewbrunswick.ca) hops over to each operators online booking system and asks how many rooms are available.

It doesn't hold anything or take a portion of your rooms, it just asks "how many rooms do you have not booked?" Then later in the day it asks "OK now how many rooms do you have that are not booked?"

It then holds on to this information and so when a consumer puts date ranges into the white box, it searches its information that it is holding on to and returns results

From there the consumer sees what operators have rooms available, and can choose to book, view the operator's website, start again, etc.

To actually book a room, the consumer must go to the operator's online booking system.

And here's where some people are confused

The operator can run ANY online booking system s/he wants to. The Jack Rabbit will hop over and "talk" to any online booking system.

There are many many many types of online booking engines and they range from online web based engines to full property management systems. Some which interface with online merchant accounts and some that don't (ie take credit card deposits, hold credit card information)

It's up to the operator to choose which online booking system s/he wants to use.

They also range in pricing from a percentage to a flat monthly fee.

AS AN OPTIONAL BONUS - the people who developed Jack Rabbit will provide any operator who wants it a free online booking system. This is SEPARATE to the Indexer the Jack Rabbit team runs on the TAP website.

The free online system is basic but they, the Jack Rabbit program team, are also making some improvements to it. Neither TAP or TIANB can make any improvements to the free portion online booking system.

There are many ways a consumer can find an operators website:

Rack card at a VIC
Google search
www.tourismnewbrunswick.ca (TAP)
You Tube video search
RTA or DMO site listing
a direct link from a previous customer / friends / family
a facebook ad
etc etc etc

Being in the TAP check availability widget is not the be all and end all of people finding your accommodation. It's just one route to it.

The cost for showing up in that widget is $125 a year

PLUS the cost of an online booking system. OR you can choose the free one from the Jack Rabbit company.

You must do your RESEARCH on what online booking option is going to work for your operation!!!

Implementing this technology and making the change from that notebook or calendar to online is a BIG one.

It takes planning and commitment and knowledge and money.

Remember when you wanted to build that garden for your guests to enjoy. So you plotted it out, bought the tiny plants and voila ... your guests sat in front of 5 inch tall hostas and said, "ah, that's cute"

Now it's a few years later, the hostas, which you moved to get more sun, are 2 feet tall and the bistro table set you purchased on clearance is a perfect spot for guests to relax.

The point being, the garden didn't start out as a magical place, and neither will your online booking engine.

Because you didn't understand flowers that well, you might have lost some, and had to replant others. Same with online booking - make sure you understand your options.

However in time, your online booking engine will be a magical place and as you sit in your garden, sipping a cup of tea while it takes reservations for you, you'll wonder how you ever got along without it.

As always, anyone from the TourismTechnology.com team would be happy to help explain how online reservations works (the other Atlantic Provincial portals are different) and we also have reviewed at least 12 online booking software engines and can dispel some of the myths.

beth@tourismtechnology.com

To Tool or not to Tool ...

2011-11-07T14:43:00.000-04:00

Greetings,

While at the Altantic Internet Marketing conference last month in Halifax, I attended a great panel session called the Internet Marketer's Toolkit. Each panelist shared their top four or five internet / social media / business tools. Some are free, some are not. But here's the list for your education.

Salesforce - a contact manager software for sales or other applications

Constant Contact - an online email marketing solution. Let's you create mass emails and send them to your stored contact lists

Forrester Research - internet / social media stats for gurus

Social Media sharing buttons - not a tool per se but make sure you have social media sharing on your website and that you use social media buttons on other websites to share interesting content with your followers

Timely.is - analyzes your past tweets and finds the best time slots for you to send new ones

Namechk - if you're starting a new business, or signing up for social media use namechk to see what user names and domains are available so you can have the most consistent online presence

Hootsuite - an online application that lets you manage your social media like twitter and facebook with one application and one log in

Tweetdeck - same as Hootsuite but different (most people like either Hootsuite or Tweetdeck)

Seesmic - same as Tweetdeck and Hootsuite

Google Blogsearch - (found under the more button) narrow down your google search to just what is happening in the blog sphere

Ice rocket - real time search of Twitter and Facebook and others

Social Mention - same as ice rocket

Radian 6 - a brand monitoring platform, mainly for larger companies with a lot of people talking about them

bit.ly - a URL shortening service, you can track clicks once you set up an account, then you'll know how many people clicked on a link in your tweet etc.

klout score - mostly for geeks to measure how important they are on the internet - my klout is 11.

Friend or follow - see who you are following but who is not following you and vice versa

Mail Chimp - same as Constant Contact

Survey Monkey - a low cost survey program, with monthly options, sign up for a few months, run a survey, close your account

Google Analytics - analyzes the traffic to your website - you need this.

Google Link Builder - Google has lots of free tools like this one, Google keyword, and Google Local Business listing - check them all out

Hope you find these helpful !

Beth

Content is my current passion

2011-10-18T12:19:00.000-03:00

In my last few mentoring sessions I've focused on website content and how it can make or break your site.

Why?

Because clients are having a social media backlash at me, and so I trick them into working on their content, which in turn will lead them happily down the path of social media. Watch out, I'm delightfully deceptive.

Review my posts from September 20, August 2 and way back in July 2009

And I found this great article - 10 simple ways to reduce friction

While it's not tourism focused, it's still relevant. I'm talking to all you operators with black backgrounds and white text. Please let's move on from the 90's.

All words on your website should inform the consumer about property details and entice them to contact you immediately. And make sure some of those words are your keywords. Win win.

Don't talk about you, talk about me... or don't talk about me, talk about you? Stop using the words We and Us, and use You and You're and You will.

When designing keep in mind colours, fonts and eye path. The easiest method is to find a comparable site and tell your developer you like that one. In the tourism market, people are browsing 10-30 different options and their eyes are starting to glaze over. You want them to feel like your site is a calm, organized, coherent oasis in a sea of internet sludge.

Images - make sure your images relate to your target market. If you're looking to attract more seniors, then have more seniors in your images.

So what have we done?

Not only have we reviewed and refreshed all our website content, we've pared it down to some tweetable sentences. Sneaky. Plus we can tweet some of the content that we pulled -> re-purposing.

Not only do we have new great relevant images on our website but we can also use some for our facebook and tweets -> re-purposing. And the outtakes are totally awesome for this purpose. Be fun and silly for a minute.

Yes, it's digital magic.

Internet Resources for Bed and Breakfasts

2011-09-26T13:05:00.001-03:00

While browsing through the internet I found this great listing of websites for B&B and Inn owners

Check out the original article for the full list and read the comments for some more great tips from readers

I've copied and pasted a few of them below:

There's the B&B Coach, Susan, who is sharing her B&B tips via her paid services and a free blog. Hmmm sounds familiar, like someone close to me does the same thing ... oh right that's me :)

http://www.bandbcoach.com/blog-on-how-to-run-a-bed-and-breakfast/

The Quantum Hospitality group, which doesn't seem to be online at the moment but has a lot of great archives

http://blog.quantumhospitality.com/2009/11/best-practices-for-reaching-your-guests-on-social-media/

Also don't forget, LinkedIn also has groups for B&B owners. LinkedIn is the more professional version of Facebook. You wouldn't sell your product here but can find others like you in the forums and groups and share problems and experiences.

http://www.linkedin.com/groups/Bed-Breakfast-BLOGGERS-1786380

I'm sure you'll find something educational in the above resources.

How to combine social media and analytics and marketing

2011-09-21T10:45:00.001-03:00

You should really read the whole article located HERE

But I really enjoyed the case studies. Use your trip adviser reviews and guest feedback to mold your marketing message - interesting concept that everyone can utilize.

It's about what THEY SEE AND DO and not about what YOU think they are seeing and doing.

Actual hotel case studies:

Case study

We recently worked with a client that was a historical monument. The hotel had been home of many historical celebrities that had written books, poems, symphonies there – even famous paintings worth millions were painted from the window at the hotel.

Logically this was a tremendous marketing advantage for the hotel. It was all over their brochures, site and advertising. But the hotel was failing despite all this marketing.

After a careful study of all the online reviews of the hotel, it was obvious that their potential future guests didn’t much care about what their other guests did in the past. They came to the hotel for the same reasons that the celebrities came to the hotel – a unique setting and view.

All marketing elements were re-done for the hotel. We scrapped absolutely everything and started from scratch. All of the focus was placed on the setting and view. The results were immediate.

Another example

Another hotel had just renovated their property with some of the most exquisite materials available. Each tile or piece of furniture was of the finest quality, and this was a luxury boutique hotel destined to be great success. Obviously everybody knew that “luxury” was going to be a unique selling point for the hotel. So the marketing efforts, press releases, and communications material were all focused on the fine materials and luxury offered.

Not so quick… we studied the hotel’s reviews to find out what people were saying about the hotel. To everyone’s surprise nobody mentioned any of these great products and fine brands but they were all commenting on the hotel’s close proximity to several monuments.

It surprised us because the hotel wasn’t that close to those monuments from a local viewpoint. But in the eyes of the consumer that was the hotel’s biggest advantage. So we changed the site, the marketing and everything to reflect what the guests were saying. The results were almost immediate, and sales through the hotel’s website took off in ways nobody had imagined.

And one more

Apex Hotels is one of the most successful urban hotel brands in the UK, and has made semantic analysis a fundamental part of determining their marketing strategy. “It enables us to instantly understand our unique selling propositions – from the guests’ perspective,” says ecommerce executive Amy Spark.

For example, the team realized their location is much more important to guests than their food offerings, so they played this aspect up in their collateral. The results were impressive. “Semantic analysis ensures we are connecting with our audience, and communicates what they are looking for.”

Finally…

There is more to review analytics than reputation management. Review analytics are a vital tool for guiding marketing messages to reflect what guests appreciate most about your hotels, and avoid topics that guests don’t care about or aren’t interested in.

Make an effort to understand what your guests are saying about you, combine that with your marketing research, and you’ll have a formula for powerful promotions.

Landing pages and Photos

2011-09-20T11:03:00.000-03:00

Let's talk a bit about web design and layout

Starting with the "fold". In web design as in newsprint, the most important information should be above the "fold" or before the user has to scroll. Now in newsprint you know that this is a specific number of inches but online it's not so cut and dry. So use your best judgement, have your web designer help you, and choose content, titles and images that are going to make people want to stay on your site and read more. FYI this is called "stickiness" - but who needs more jargon.

Don't be afraid to have multiple copies of important buttons or navigation items - above and below the fold.

Colour has a strong emotional impact and can affect moods and feelings of your viewers. In the age of online travel searching, it might be time to rethink your logo and entire marketing strategy for something that will translate online

It's important that all your marketing material match or coordinate. If I pick up your rack card and it's green and I go to your site and it's blue, I'm going to think I'm in the wrong place. (Super extreme colour examples but you get the drift)

Use a white background for text and do not use coloured text, unless it's a hyperlink.

Images can be a two edged sword, they can support your theme or they can be a major distraction.

Make sure they are all the same quality and resolution
That they relate to the content on the page and your marketing message
That they show real people enjoying your product

For SEO purposes make sure they have ALT text, and Captions - your developer can show you how to do this the first few times.

In some situations showing only the top of the image above the fold will encourage visitors to scroll and see the remaining content and messaging on your landing page.

So I hope these relatively generic tips help you get more stickiness - like flies on fly paper

Friday

2011-09-09T12:01:00.000-03:00

Why is it that short weeks are sometimes not worth the holiday that caused the week to be short in the first place?

And when it's been a looong short week, don't bring salad for lunch on a Friday- that's just a waste of vegetables.

I had an interesting light bulb moment in our staff meeting this morning.

We were talking about whether emails were still relevant, and were people still reading attachments. By people we are referring to busy hotel managers and restaurant employees and other types of employment where you don't spend eight hours in front of a computer.

Here at TIANB most of the staff are all online for eight hours of the day, either via blackberry or sitting in the office. And we sometimes find it difficult to contact operators because they are only online at 3 am or 5 am or 12:15 pm etc.

My expert opinion was solicited and I didn't really have a definite answer - I think it's case by case. Some younger managers may be on their iPhones more frequently during the day and some old schoolers are setting aside 30 minutes to handle email and snail mail and other office paperwork

So for the person who sets aside the same amount of time each day, it may take 3 days to have an email conversation.

And it so it seems slower then the Manager who replies from his blackberry

I'm sure this translates into the consumer market as well. What kind of consumer are you looking for?

Once you know that, find out what kinds of technology they are using?

Then use that medium to communicate with them.

Social media is about being Social - we're all looking for that one place where we walk in and someone shouts "Norm!". We're tired of 1-800 numbers with press options. In a world of 7 billion faces, we're striving to be seen. By anyone. For even just a minute.

As we conquer barriers and reach new heights and as the population soars, it's hard to have your 15 minutes of fame promised to us by Andy Warhol. We might have to get it one tweet at a time

Remember if you need help with your technology plan check out the TourismTechnology.com program

Have a great day,
Beth

Tweetpeat

2011-08-31T10:33:00.000-03:00

Greetings gang,

For today's content we're going to tweetpeat. In other words, I'm going to blog everything I've tweeted in the past few days/ week. See how you can reuse content at least once more. Even if someone is following your twitter account AND reading your blog - they might be wary of links, reading it on a mobile and forget to go back to it. They could be at a conference, exceptionally busy, or on vacation.

Plus you should be so lucky as to have people following you on multiple platforms :)

First up a cute video about how Twitter is faster than an earthquake

Next a nice Retweet about an interesting article on how DMOs should organize Travel Media FAMs

RT @benvadasz: The future of Travel Media blog post by @wilhelmus, pls read and pass on to your travel media team. Link

An article on how Teachers in America are embracing social media as a way to interact with their students instead of banning it

Social media go from school ban to teacher's tool Link

Tomtom GPS adding social networking features to it's next generation of devices

Tomtom adds social networking to satnav Link #socialnetworking

The dates for the Atlantic Internet Marketing (AIM) conference was announced - mark your calendars

RT @aimconference: AIM Conference: Halifax, Harbourview Holiday Inn, October 27-28. New format: 1 Day of Workshops, 1 Day of Strategy.

A little bit of Friday trivia ...
Friday tidbit - "Sexting" & "Retweet" have been added to the dictionary. (via @TIMENewsFeed)

An article that sums up 18 great hospitality facebook pages and why they are great
RT @meetDMAI: 18 awesome hospitality #Facebook welcome pages Link #travel #socialmedia

Congratulations to Montana for their awesome award winning campaign, There's nothing here.
Link

Also, somewhat related TIANB is always looking for participants to help CTHRC update National Occupational Standards and training. It's a way for your employees feel helpful and it only takes a few minutes of their time

Seeking Nite Auditors for a ntl research project! Night Auditors are asked to participate in a short survey Link

Kitchen Helpers needed for a National Project! You are invited to participate in the following survey: Link

And since I only post once a week (or so) a Friday funny cat video. Remember it's something funny or unusual that will go viral, not just videos of your property

Til next time,
Beth

Putting the SOCIAL in Social Media

2011-08-16T14:14:00.000-03:00

Greetings,

Sometimes I think, yes I have been known to think, that in the rush for businesses to get on board the social media bandwagon, we forgot about the meaning of the word "social"

Clear evidence of this is the fact that we continually have to tell businesses social media is NOT a place to SELL product. Somewhere at the very beginning Businesses got the wrong end of the stick regarding social media.

Social media is not a replacement communication tool but an additional one. And notice I didn't say marketing tool, I said communication tool.

Social media is the extension of email, which was the extension of your 1-800 number, which was the extension of calls from the VIC or pay phones on location, which is the extension of driving til you see the "vacancy" sign.

We're talking about the difference between 60% or 70% occupancy - 80% or 90% guest satisfaction. It's that little bit extra.

Choose a social media platform that suits You as the operator and your output will shine / stand out.

Social media provides an outlet for post purchase perks such as getting retweeted or being tagged in a business Facebook album. Making that one customer feel special - leading to awesome guest reviews, referrals and repeat business.

It's about telling the World you are looking forward to your guests.

It's one on one but like that Vidal Sassoon commercial - she tells two friends, they tell two friends and so on and so on.

So go out there and be social! It's a fun journey and you never know where you're going to end up or who you are going to connect with.

Beth

Google Places - it's where to be on the web

2011-08-09T11:15:00.000-03:00

Google, google and more google.

If you've taken the TourismTechnology.com mentoring session then you've heard of Google Places - because we've told you to set up an account there.

Told you, told you and told you.

Liberally copied from Daniel Craig please click through to read the whole article, but here are some highlights

To enhance searchability, ensure that your business’s name, address and phone number are listed in a consistent format across the web. The Company/Organization field acts as the title of your listing and should include the word “Hotel” and your destination if they are part of your official business name—Google doesn’t permit descriptors or keywords in titles. For example, “The Manderley Chicago Hotel” is more searchable than “The Manderley”.

Businesses can upload a maximum of 10 photos and five videos, so make sure they are high quality, authentic and functional. Adding captions and descriptions is presently not an option.

Google, already a dominant force in travel marketing, has reared its head as a formidable force in social networking. By optimizing your Places listing now you’ll be positioned to take advantage of new opportunities down the road.

Also check out my Google+ widget on the left - Google Plus is a new social network, I'll be talking about that in future posts

I'm also bringing in @tourismtech tweets - please follow us on Twitter and let us know if you're running a Twitter account, we love to see what operators are doing :)

I'm always looking for new widgets to keep my blog up to date and interesting. You should be doing the same. Please find an online champion somewhere in your organization.

If you need help with websites, social media, email, the Tourism Technology team is available across Atlantic Canada. We dispense wisdom and make the internet less scary. Promise.

Hoping you're having a great tourism season!

Beth

Your neglected website

2011-08-02T14:24:00.000-03:00

Greetings,

So you've decided that social media is not for you, not right now - fair enough.

However don't think I'm going to let you allow your website to slide as well!

People are moving away from traditional information sources like phone books, paper based travel guides, and atlases!

They expect to find your contact details online - somewhere. And if you're not offering an online social media presence, then you had better have it on your website.

Simple things like ...

Opening date, closing date
Telephone
Hours
Methods of payment
Contact names
Directions
Prices
Amenities
Specials
Packages
Travel tips

Stop what you're doing, run to your website right now and check all those things. Otherwise you'll end up being the target of someones blog.

Someone like this...

http://manleymannmedia.com/2011/08/01/your-website-is-a-big-fat-waste-of-space/

Twitter

2011-07-21T14:26:00.006-03:00

Some twitter basics today.

It's come a long way from only 140 characters in a tweet and Teens tweeting that they're currently in the bathroom.

Celebrities are using it. Causes are using it. It even comes in handy during political upheaval.

Few people are using www.twitter.com = though if you're a true beginner, it's a great place to start.

Twitter tools like Hootsuite and Tweetdeck have evolved to help humans use the Twitter concept better and more effectively. Also Twitter for mobile is another handy tool for your smart phone

You're also going to need a URL shortener (is that a word?). Something like www.bitly.com
In order to drive people to your website or to other interesting websites, you need to use as many characters as you can to write witty content and use a URL shortener to make those long website addresses as short as possible.

In order to find out if people are clicking on your URLs you need an account with your preferred URL shortener. AND you need to tie it into your Twitter tool.

For example

You find a super awesome website you want to share

You open Hootsuite, which you've tied into your bitly account (using the options inside Hootsuite)

You write "check out this awesome site http: short link !"

You wait

Pretty soon, one of your followers will retweet you, you'll know via Hootsuite

And you'll open your bitly account and it will tell you how many people clicked on your link to your awesome website

You can compare that to the number of followers you have to see whether the percentage is high enough for you to say "I got some good ROI on that"

If not, then go back to the drawing board and try for better content in your next tweet.

Also try hashtags - putting a # in front of keywords

Example Tweet: I love #nb #potatoes fresh from the #garden smothered in real butter

This kind of tweet can be found by people doing searches on the words NB, potatoes and garden

For more on hashtags check out www.tagdef.com

Again this is just an overview on twitter, I didn't even talk about sharing photos or finding followers, or what to do when a spambot signs up to follow you.

I'm saving that for later.

Til next time,

Beth

Think like a customer

2011-07-08T14:58:00.011-03:00

Liberally copied from Dear Radian6 - but it totally sounds like something I would say, and since I haven't said anything in a while, it's a good place to start again :) So many times I've read articles and thought, I should write something similiar for my peeps but never get to it. My new strategy is I'm going to start quoting more - we'll see how it goes.

If you are thinking like a customer, you can better appreciate what your customers may like. So keep this in mind when you share content, advice or just reach out in a friendly tone. Make what you say count. Infrequent, compelling interactions will mean more to your customers than a whirlwind of pokes and hellos that only fill a social site up with too much talking.

It is likely a rare occurrence that a customer taps you on your social-web-shoulder, pokes you and giggles then waves frantically in excitement just for the opportunity to be your friend. Customers want to know what’s in it for me? – known in marketing circles as WIIFM. So if you’re waiting for customers to cheerfully connect with you online just because, you may be waiting a long time.

Do you remember the excitement you felt when you were given a wrapped gift and the contents of the box were entirely a mystery? Surprises can be exciting, so why not surprise your customers by friending them first and joining in on the conversations they are having about you, about travel in general and their love/need for flying? Customers who experience an interaction from behind a social profile tend to turn their ear towards that brand and actually listen.

Perhaps one of the greatest examples of surprising customers is the KLM Surprises campaign. KLM really took flight using social media to demonstrate just how eager they were to soar above customer’s expectations.

The video is a little slow in the middle but hang with it.

If you need help with your social media strategy, contact me, the TourismTechnology.com program can help

Til next time
Beth

Deadlines!

2011-03-29T16:04:00.007-03:00

1. Tourism Technology Award - deadline to nominate yourself or another operator is March 31 March 31 is also the deadline for the TIANB Pioneer Award, and Parks Canada Sustainable Tourism Get your nominations in today!

2. Social Media Workshops - register now for the second year of TT.com presents Social Media Workshops for Tourism Operators. We've found a great expert, and we're going to take it to the next level. Last year was more of an introduction to the tools. This year, we're focusing on SMART objectives, developing key messages, researching your online status, and measuring impact. Saint John, April 26 Fredericton, April 27 Edmundston, April 29 Register now!

3. It's never too early to register for TIANB Annual Conference, May 25-27 in Miramichi Excellent speakers including Chef Lynn Crawford Social Media guru Amber McArthur Festival Genius Michel Gauthier HR Whiz Pierre Battah Register now!

The Social Ostrich reappears

2011-03-23T11:24:00.003-03:00

I know I'm supposed to be writing about Online Revealed but I haven't downloaded the presentations and put it altogether in a report yet - patience

What I am going to write about it the continued existence and appearances of the Social Ostrich.

I first noted the Social Ostrich in my post of June 4, 2010

Back then he was cute, perhaps charming, a little out of touch but bearable.

I recently ran into another one just last week at the Fredericton Tourism Launch / Tourism and Parks JackRabbit presentation.

Today in 2011, he is not cute, not charming, but overbearing and down right bad for other people's business.

The Social Ostrich spouts things like:

"if it ain't broke, don't fix it",

"I like to talk to people on the phone",

"I still use my paper based day planner for reservations"

The Social Ostrich has his head in the sand, and he'll keep you down there with him if he can.

DON'T LET HIM

All business operators need to PLAN FOR CHANGE. Using Social Media and moving to online reservations is simply

PLANNING FOR CHANGE!

Someday soon, that Social Ostrich is going to finally pull his head out of the sand and there's not going to be a customer in sight. He'll be starting from scratch trying to find customers and build an online brand. His business that was once going to provide his retirement in Arizona is now worthless. He has no future bookings, and no online customer fan club to fall back on.

If you're smart you'll be the one with all his customers, they are out there for the taking and keeping.

If you think you are a Social Ostrich, email me. The TourismTechnology.com program can rehabilitate you.

If you see one in the wild, let me know, I'd like to take the Social Ostrich and wring it's neck (humanely). I hear Ostrich is the new Turkey ...

Beth
beth at tianb dot com

Trip Advisor / Trip Advisory

2011-03-04T15:35:00.005-04:00

Some astonishing travel tales both coming and going to NF a couple of weeks ago. I won't bore you with the details but NB should be thankful that most of our tourist don't fly here. I hear even in the summer, landing in St John's can be iffy - and that's your Trip Advisory :)

Jim Brody from Trip Advisor was a speaker at HNL, he had some things to say - namely that Social Media and Travel were made for each other. I agree. If there is one thing that Travel is it's social and interactive.

He also touched on User Testing, User Studies - every person's online experience is unique. No two people visit a website in exactly the same way. The way your eyes scan across the screen (left to right, right to left), the clicks you take, how you use the browser tools. Make sure you're trying to view your own website through fresh eyes. Ask friends and family for honest opinions.

Check out Trip Advisor on Facebook, apparently they have a new game that's highly addictive.

He also mentioned some interesting statistics, they always have statistics.

4800 Brazilians viewed information on NF. That's a little more then one might think isn't it? Now it doesn't mean they are all coming, they could just be displace Newfs viewing images of home. But either way, people all over the world are viewing things all the time.

75% of people use Trip Advisor as a research tool
25% of people write the reviews

So do what you can to promote yourself on Trip Advisor, ask clients to write reviews, respond to reviews. Post new images. Cross link between your site and Trip Advisor. Use the internet to break down barriers

The internet, and I think he means your website really, is the only medium where someone from Boston and someone from New Zealand can view your marketing with the same download speed and delivery time. It's instant.

No waiting for it to arrive in the mail
No attachment errors
No email bouncing

It's available at 3 am or 3 pm

When they want it

What message are you putting out there? Is it good enough?

Using your EQ types, it's about WHAT they are looking for, not where they are or who they are

Later gators,
I'm off to Toronto for a week to learn even more wisdom to pass along

Beth
Tourismtechnology.com

TIA Conferences

2011-02-15T10:09:00.002-04:00

Greetings

I'm off this week to Hospitality Newfoundland & Labrador's (HNL) Annual Conference. Each Atlantic provincial Tourism Industry Association (TIA) has its own annual conference. The Tourism Technology.com project attends each one to increase visibility for the project and encourage more operators to sign up for the mentoring session.

Since each TIA has only a handful of staff, one of the Tourism Technology.com coordinators travels to the others conference to work the trade show.

I'm going to NF, NS rep is going to PE, NF rep is going to NB etc.

The point is you might want to consider attending one of these conferences, just to get some different perspective. Consider their speakers. View their provincial presentations.

NF is in February,
PE is in March,
NB is in May,
NS is in November,

Food for thought, it doesn't hurt to know what everyone else is doing.

Have a great week,
Beth

About Me

2011-02-09T14:06:00.003-04:00

How many times have you seen the About Us tab on a website (Contact Us also counts)?

How many online contact places do you have (email, blog, linked in, facebook, website)?

Wouldn't it be great to store all those in one place?

And fancy it up with fonts and pictures?

Check out About Me

It's a great one page "dashboard" to post your details for all your online places

Check out mine Beth A

There are probably more free online apps like this, but this is the one I found and I like it. It was simple to create and now it's a one stop shop for all my contact info.
You can email me from there, read my blog, connect on FaceBook and Linked In.

And the URL is super easy to remember about.me/bethashton

You could create one for your business and use it on your business cards. Or just use it for personal use.

If you meet a friend on the street, you can say "Hey connect with me at about.me/bethashton" and then they can choose the connection options they prefer - email, facebook, linkedin, twitter etc.

Check it out and let me know what you think.

Beth

Musings

2011-01-18T09:31:00.005-04:00

This week I want to share with you the blog of my friend Margaret -

Margaret's blog

Through no influence of mine, Margaret embodies everything I tell you you should be doing:

She's doesn't have a technical background.

She sets a writing schedule.

She's real, in the sense that she writes in a language people can understand and relate with.

She cross promotes with her facebook page.

While I wish I could take some credit, I can't. Margaret is organically the poster child for how I want you to start blogging and/or facebooking, and/or updating your website.

Reach inside you and find your inner Margaret.

And if you need some help, I'm still offering the TourismTechnology.com mentoring sessions

Contact me,

Beth

Canadian eTourism Awards

2011-01-12T11:07:00.003-04:00

Just wanted to let everyone know about the Canadian eTourism awards program.

Now accepting nominations until January 30th

To be awarded in conjunction with Online Revealed in Toronto, March 8 and 9

Best website

Best user generated content

Best online campaign

Best innovative use of technology / media

Check out their home page

And nominate yourself today !!

Conferences 2011

2011-01-11T13:28:00.005-04:00

Greetings

Already the new year is looking better then last year. In fact, excluding that sentence, let's not mention 2010 again.

If you're interested in learning more about Social Media and tourism, there are a couple of conferences coming up that you might be interested in attending.

Canada e-Connect, February 2-4 in Toronto

I've attended e-Connect the past two years, and it's not in the budget to go again this year. Organized by TIAC, it has a tourism / social media focus. Sometimes I find the content more directed at DMOs or someone with a larger marketing reach but overall it gets the brain cells going.

Check out their speaker list

PS If you're not going to e-Connect, you can still see Amber MacArthur at TIANB's Annual Conference, May 25-27 in Miramichi :)

Online Revealed , March 8-9 in Toronto

My first online revealed was last year... OK 2010 had one good thing in it! This conference is also tourism and social media focused. Produced by A Couple of Chicks Marketing.

The Chicks bring in loads of talented speakers from all price points and vantages.

I'll be attending again this year, and it's jammed packed with sessions , they've combined with a one day Canadian Tourism Marketing summit

So it's a great opportunity to join me, as I won't be able to take it all in !

Some of you may remember the Chicks from TIANB's Annual Conference last year in Edmundston. They talked about the usage of social media and bringing it into your ecosystem. How social media can drive sales... now's the time to dig out those notes you took and review your 2011 strategy.

Also TIANB, Tourism and Parks, and Tourism Atlantic (ACOA) are doing FREE presentations on a variety of topics around NB over the next couple of weeks.

Be sure and attend to learn all about EQ and more!

Check out the date and times here

Stay tuned,
Beth

Blog in review

2010-12-02T14:18:00.006-04:00

So I've been blogging for a couple of years now - how time has flown by.

I'm fairly sure no one is reading it but I persist.

If only so I don't have to update my email signature. That's such a pain...

Depending on your business, blogs still have their place, though probably not as separate entities like this one, probably some page on your website that you update a lot during your peak season and periodically the rest of the time.

A lot of the purpose behind the blog has moved to social media. The conversations and interactions take place on Facebook. However Facebook hides behind a user account system, don't just assume all your followers have Facebook accounts. While a blog is out there for all to see and read.

Until we reach the realm of one username and one password for all, we'll always be multiplatform.

Unlike traditional media, there aren't blog or Facebook salespeople who call you up to renew like there are for your radio ads, or print materials or newspaper ads. Internet marketing is all about you; your time, your memory, or a trusted employee.

Here's a couple of posts from 2009 that I thought would be good to read again, or for the first time:

The 12 days of Website Best Practices

Just get the job done

I guess I didn't have anything earth shattering to share in 2010, doesn't surprise me, it was crappy year personally, not professionally

Professionally, I did 24 mentoring sessions, finally meeting project targets. Operators are starting to seek me out, rather then me pestering them. Awesome.

Some really great new tourism sites went up this year.

NB Trails

Auberge Les Jardins

Discover the passage

Festival Western

and I'm sure there's many more. I'm hearing from mentoring session clients every day who are in the process of developing a new site or new social media strategies.

Bring on 2011 !

Happy Holidays :)

Beth

beth@@tianb.com

How your website is like your car...

2010-12-02T13:59:00.005-04:00

I drive a 2006 Hyundai. I bought it new, off the lot. Yes, I probably over paid but that's not the point.

Every month I pay a little on that car.

Every three months, I take it for oil changes or something and pay some more.

And every now and then I look at the new scratches, or a rock hits it and I witness its slow death.

As soon as a car leaves the confines of the auto plant, it's starting on its slow death. Even a car that never gets driven will eventually succumb to rust and elements.

And so does your website. You just don't realize it.

Every month that you don't look at your website and update content, it's dying.

Every season that goes by and you don't post new pictures, it's dying.

Testimonials that don't get posted, are like arrows through its heart.

Sure you can rebuild the engine, but the exterior will still rust out on you.

Eventually you have to stop and admit defeat.

And get a new car.

Or a new website.

Unless you're a mechanic - cars and their repairs are expenses that you just have to accept in order to get on with your life. (Besides public transit options etc)

So unless you're a web developer - technology costs of running a tourism operation is something you have to accept in order to market your business.

Website code that you bought in 2006 doesn't run as well as website code you can buy now.
Was Vista or Windows 7 out when that code was written? Nope.
Was Firefox and Google Chrome and IE 7 / 8 out? Nope.
Was the iPad and the iPhone out? Nope.

You need code for all these applications and devices.

Does my iPod sync with my old car? Nope.
Does my car talk to me or recognize my voice? Nope.
Is my car a hybrid? Nope.

These are all the improvements I must weigh against the cost of a higher monthly payment or being payment free - does that even exist anymore?

So find the money, find the will, find the determination and put out some bytes that the internet can be proud of!

I'll get off my soap box now.

If you need any help with any of that, you know where I am

Beth

Vancouver - it really is the other coast

2010-11-09T15:18:00.007-04:00

Hi All,

Just back from a week in Vancouver visiting friends and I knew, I just knew, that you would want to hear all about it.

Background - Vicki and I went to University together. She now lives in Vancouver (Burnaby) with her husband, her daughter who is eight and her son who is two and their dog Horton. She runs a daycare in her home. She and her kids are active, busy, and fun! I only get to see her every three years or so, and I miss her already.

The first thing I noticed on the ride in from the airport was the lack of billboards. Vicki says they are working on the highways and the ads should be back soon. Whew.

The next thing is the guest room, cause it's like 2 AM AST and I'm not as young as I used to be.

Running a daycare from your home means early starts, lots of activity and sometimes late evenings. There's no time to check things out on a desktop / laptop in the office upstairs. She relies a lot on her mobile phone. Everything from finding contact numbers, to directions, to Elmo's official last name :)

Snack hints, quick game solutions, and other kid related tidbits are accessed via her mobile.

At night, recipes for cookies and breads are on the laptop in the kitchen while we bake for the next day.

She facebooks while we're at the amusement park and uploads photos of my green face after the last ride.

(note - she's not obnoxious about it, mostly while we're in line)

When we go out for the day and leave her assistant in charge, they text every now and then to make sure everything is OK

She doesn't have a GPS device in the car

And another thing I notice is that the cars are like 99% BC license plates. Which makes me realize not a lot of people drive to Vancouver / Victoria. They fly in. And maybe rent cars, which would also have BC plates.

So there probably is more reliance on mobile directions then GPS devices

In the end, the big take away is that every corner of this country is different. The method visitors use to arrive, tour, and interact varies a lot with geography.

But I think, and this is just me thinking out loud, that Mobile is finally here, there and everywhere.

Fright nite at the PNE - goulish

Print Ads - their time has come

2010-10-13T16:04:00.005-03:00

So I was thinking the other day - I know you could smell the smoke from your house !

Be serious for a minute

Let me lay something out for you, and if I'm wrong then feel free to enlighten me

A print Ad in a newspaper costs at least $600 - at least

If we took 600 and divided by 12 months we get 50

A monthly social media budget of $50

At $10 per hour, I know that's probably low but we're just using round numbers here, at $10 per hour you could get 5 hours of someones time

A whole morning

How many tweets, facebook updates, blog posts, and you tube clips do you think one talented, computer literate, enthusiastic person could create, write, post, and edit in 5 hours?

The secret to making Social Media painless is to write it in advance and post it when it's relevant!

Where does your print ad end up?

The recycle bin.

Where do your tweets, blog posts, videos uploads end up?

GOOGLE SEARCH RESULTS!

Where would you rather have your marketing messages?

In the recycle bin or in cyber space for all eternity?

Just asking.

Social Media Examiner

2010-09-30T12:51:00.005-03:00

Greetings,

I've recently come across Social Media Examiner - not only is a super knowledge base, it's cute to look at :)

I think that a recent article on How to Turbo Boost your facebook page is super relevent and easy to understand.

What I want you to take away from here is that Facebook business pages can be exciting and interactive spaces, and it's high time you learned how it works.

Check out the video, the 8 minutes goes by quick, and there is a bit at the end about facebook contests - super important to us in the Tourism industry.

Also - check out this gent talking about content.

Joe Pulizzi Interview from Michael A. Stelzner on Vimeo.

Full interview and links HERE

In Summary:

1. Social Media examiner is a great resource that's fun to use

2. Sign up NOW for facebook and learn how to use it

3. Create your content - you all have interesting stories and tidbits and insider info to share

4. Launch your social media campaign

And as always I'm here to help

beth@@tianb.com

Update on the new computer

2010-09-17T15:12:00.003-03:00

So it's been a solid 10 days with the new computer and both my parents and myself have learned a few things

I copied off several gigs of pictures onto CD from the old computer. I didn't bother to put them on the new computer, however as Mom points out, "How am I supposed to send them to people now?"

Which is a valid point. While I assumed that all the pictures on the old computer had already been sent or facebooked or emailed, there will always be someone who is "new" and hasn't seen the latest pictures of my nephew. Perhaps she/he just got online (we are talking about my parents friends here) or perhaps she/he rarely goes online. Perhaps they had a computer failure and lost all their pictures (heaven forbid) and are wanting to recreate some of that.

Needless to say, there is always someone new online somewhere looking for something that you thought everyone already had.

Next, it was like pulling teeth getting my Mom to Google everything. In fact she point blank said she was "tired of Googling". Like it was some kind of torture I was making her complete.

I next resorted to "did you check their literature" when she asked for the 100th time "Where was the TD banking site?"

I was teaching her see, teaching her to read all that marketing crap that is on every TD ad, every TD statement, and every TD calendar in the house!

She didn't appreciate my teaching method.

And frankly I don't know what the heck she was doing that she couldn't google TD bank...

So I left it at that and added it to her favorites when she wasn't looking.

We also had a few days of fun because I forgot to install flash, shockwave, and java for their favorite game sites, and I also created the desktop icon for IE 64bit instead of IE 32 bit, apparently the world is not ready for IE 64 bit. My bad.

And they haven't mentioned the Aero effect or smooth scrolling, start bar quirks or any of the other fantastic changes that come with Windows 7 - frankly I don't think they ever have more then one window open at a time.

I think we're pretty much over the hump now, but if things change I'll keep you posted.

PS We also use Royal Bank but she didn't seem to have near the trouble with that one...

I won't mention it

2010-09-07T10:50:00.004-03:00

I'm not going to mention how remiss I've been in my blogging, and I don't expect you to either.

Nuff said.

I just wanted to bring to your attention that in November 2009, facebook did some changes to its contesting policy - check the lastest version out at:

http://www.facebook.com/promotions_guidelines.php

I'm not sure that you're allowed to run contests on facebook anymore ... and I wouldn't want them to freeze your page because that's a night mare you'll never get out of - Facebook doesn't seem to care about the individual business or person for that matter - ironically enough

I believe that you can have a retweet contest on twitter but not a member contest on facebook. So I'm not sure how to get out of that public relations mess if you happen to be mid contest, other then to maybe drop references to it and hope no one notices

Or you'll have to turn it around and have them send you an email as well.

Also make sure that you have more then one admin on your facebook fan page, if for some reason your account gets frozen no one will have admin access to your fan page.

Facebook is putting in new security every day and I've heard about people trying to log on from another country and / or from their mobile and their account gets locked because Facebook may deem it as hacking. Once your account is locked, again it's a night mare you might not get out of

Facebook doesn't seem to have any sense of customer service or a procedure for things like that.

So best practice is to have at least two admins, even if one is an account you create for your fictional grandmother and only log into once a month !

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

On another note, I bought my parents (age 65+) a new computer for back to school ... well it was on sale because it's back to school.

It's an upgrade from their Win XP to Windows 7 - essentially skipping over Vista for them, not on purpose, Vista was/is a great operating system, it just worked out that way.

And I just left them to it. It's my own social/blogging experiment. No instructions, no introductory session while they hovered over my shoulder.

So we'll see how they make out.

Already they asked where one of their favorite websites was and while I did copy their favorites to a CD and could potentially put them back on the new computer, I responded with Google it.

Thus getting them in the mindset of googling things, and hopefully reshowing them how to create new favorites.

We'll see how it goes.

Later
Beth

The Mind Set

2010-07-09T14:02:00.005-03:00

Why should I invest in a better website?

Why should I invest in online booking?

Why should I spend time on social media?

It's all about the mind set of a certain segment of consumer. I happen to be in that segment so let me share with you a story about my mind set.

It's hot, we're having a heat wave. My mom isn't feeling well, and the elderly don't fair well in the heat anyways --> Mindset: low tolerance

I ask my parents to buy an Air Conditioner ages ago, and they didn't --> Mindset: little patience

Now I'm at work, barely time for lunch and must source and purchase an air conditioner -- > Mindset: Frustration

So putting together my mind sets of low tolerance, little patience and frustration, I started with Google

Firstly I learn what an air conditioner is all about, and what specs I should be looking for based on how I expect to use it

Secondly I start visiting the websites of local retailers.

Futureshop --> low prices, no instore stock, only ground shipping

WalMart --> great prices, no online inventory checking system

Canadian Tire --> Ok prices, online inventory checking, unit in stock - SOLD

things we can learn from my experience:
1. I only visited three stores online and ONE store in person, I'm not in the mood to mess around
2. I spent more money just to save myself some hassle

While some vacations are thought out and planned in the greatest detail, some are last minute and born from frustration. The easier you make it for that consumer to stay with you, the more likely you are to complete the sale.

Here's another episode from the saga that is my life :)

Today while browsing facebook, I see that one of my friends status says that she's expecting a food basket from a local organic farm to be delivered today....sounds intriguing, and she's included the link to the farm's like page (fan page).

Fredericton is still having a heat wave. And although cooler in the house, I'm still low on patience and tolerance. So I check it out, this could save me time at the grocery store... if I stock up on dry goods, I may not have to even set foot there again til FALL ! Sounds like utter bliss to me.

Because this organic farm takes a few minutes a day to engage in social media, and because my friend likes them and engages with them, I may have found the route to a grocery store free summer!

Thus illustrating the power of social media.

And ending today's rant.

I hope it was educational :)

Stay cool,
Beth

Friday things to think about...

2010-06-25T13:55:00.009-03:00

I'm sure you've all seen some form of this video over the past couple of years, but like all things technology, there's always the latest and greatest version

So for your viewing pleasure, the latest from May 2010

So you don't have to keep rewinding and reviewing, cause the music can be a bit annoying:

Over 50% of the world's popluation is under 30 years old.
96% of these people have already joined a social network

In 2010 Facebook topped Google in the rankings of weekly traffic in the US

One out of eight couples married in the US met on social media

Facebook added over 200 million users in less then a year

80% of companies use social media for recruitment

Generation Y and Z consider email something from the past, and many Universities have stopped distributing email addresses

The number TWO search engine in the world is You Tube ( I told you this one )

25% of search results for the world's top 20 largest brands are links to user generated content!

34% of bloggers post opinions about products and brands

78% of consumers trust peer recommendations

Social Ostrich!

2010-06-04T14:35:00.003-03:00

I've got a new term of the week - Social Ostrich - referring to those who still have their head in the sand regarding the uses and benefits of social media in driving brand recognition and sales.

Ha, awesome isn't it?

No I didn't think of it myself, I found it somewhere on the internet.

Whew,
What a great annual conference last week ! You should have been there.

TIANB launched their new website - it's also awesome - check it out here.

And A Couple of Chicks did a great social media boot camp ... yeah there were other speakers but I'm only interested in the technology related ones :)

I brought back a terrible nasty cold and so this week has been almost a complete write off but before it ended I did want to share one great tip - Google Local Business or Google Places or whatever name they give it this week ;-) Point is, create your account now and get a free detailed listing in Google search results that is mobile friendly !

www.google.ca/lbc

Excellent for those who can't afford a mobile website, excellent for helping customers find your phone number, physical address, quick photo, and other details without having to load up your website.

It's like as amazing as the Yellow pages were when they first came out. Remember??? Does anyone remember life before the Yellow pages? Well I'm sure folks were amazed to have all that information at their fingertips and in one location.

Remember party lines ... my mom had a party line growing up, she used to say that the lady across the street would listen in on her and her boyfriend. And now all kids have their own phone, and a cellular phone at that !

When I was a kid - I WAS the TV remote !

I'm starting to ramble now, must be the cold medicine.

Anyways your homework til next post is to create a Google Place for your business.

Welcome June,
Beth

For my followers

2010-05-19T10:49:00.003-03:00

Greetings,

Well I've been remiss in my blogging yet again! Don't worry I'm rapping my own knuckles about it. Truth is I've been run off my feet.

I completed 10 mentoring sessions in April alone. I have people calling me wanting to know when I can come to their area. I attended the Atlantic Internet Marketing conference, where TT.com was a sponsor. I am right now in the midst of preparing for the TIANB annual conference (if the other staff knew I had time to blog, they'd be sending more tasks my way!).

I know my last post said I was going to talk about Google Analytics, but I've given that more thought and really it's too broad a topic for this little blog. There are whole blogs devoted to that one subject. Basically it's the best free website statistical package out there, and you should definitely sign up for it. If only for the automatic emails that you can set up. Our account sends me the dashboard view once a week via email so I never even log into the application.

The AIM conference in Halifax was great. Two jam packed days of speakers and networking. I have lots of information to share about that, and will start that after we get back from TIANB conference.

The TIANB conference is next week in Edmundston. Roger Brooks is back to talk about product development. And A Couple of Chicks, social media gurus for tourism, are coming as well. I'm excited about bringing the Chicks to the conference and I know everyone is going to go home with lots of social media tips and tricks.

One thing I will share with you ... or anyone who's reading ...

A speaker at the AIM conference said that the Saskatchewan Hospital Home Lottery sent out a text message to all previous home lottery ticket buyers at the start of their annual campaign. The result....

They sold 35,000 of 40,000 tickets!

Imagine selling 90% of your tickets by just letting previous buyers know they are available. The lottery sold out early, everyone got their prizes earlier, they could cancel some TV and radio buys so they made more money. It's a win win.

Technology, it's time to give it serious consideration.

Getting Noticed on Google

2010-04-15T14:30:00.004-03:00

As promised, I'm going to start to share new tips. Credit for the content ideas goes to the book "Getting Noticed on Google - in easy steps" by Ben Norman. Probably not the latest and greatest but it's the book that is sitting in front of me and was my inspiration.

And we're going to start with basics.

Why is Google so important? Because it is. Practically no one refers to "search engines" anymore they just "Google It". Because Google presents unbiased and trustworthy results, Joe Public has come to rely on them.

Google uses an algorithm to rank websites. This algorithm is constantly improving, changing, evolving and most importantly SECRET. Which is why there is always going to be conflicting advice on how best to googlize your website.

And I think by now we all know what we mean when we use the term spiders or crawlers. If not, then you need to give me a call.

Google will penalize you for breaking it's rules and using what we in the biz call "black hat SEO". So always stick to white hat SEO. You can find the official Google rules on their home page under About Us (where else would it be).

We'll only talk about white hat stuff anyways.

And the first item up is the Google Toolbar. So take a minute and install it, if you don't have it yet. And you'd have to be diligent like me not to have it yet, because the darn thing comes bundled with every free Adobe product.

Did you know that you can do a quick one button check to find out who is linking back to you. For example, if you know a certain restaurant or members of your local RTA are supposed to be linking to you, a quick click of the Google toolbar button will let you know who actually followed through with that.

Under Page ranking, click Backwards links.

And it doesn't have to be your website either, you can do your competitors websites and find out which local businesses are linking to them. Then you can approach them for links to your own business.

Perhaps you're a new restaurant in the area, and you want to find out which businesses are open to linking to local establishments. Let the Google toolbar do the researching for you.

Perhaps you're a local DMO consumer facing website and you want to know which local companies are promoting your site. the Google toolbar will tell you. Awesome.

What's next.... The Google cache page checker (also under Page Ranking).

This little feature shows you how your page looks on Google and therefore when was the last time the Spiders came around. And it tells you the date Google took the snapshot. And so you get a feel for how often and when the spiders do come around.

Another button that hides under page rank is similar pages. Find out similar pages to your business page, or just use it to improve your searching.

The next parts about Google Analytics and Google site maps require a Google Account -so go get one and we delve into more next week.

Fast facts

2010-04-15T13:51:00.003-03:00

Every month I read an online version of Website Magazine, the subscription is free if you're interested. Here are a few tidbits from the March issue.

Cisco has disclosed that it will release new routing equipment within this calendar year that will be able to stream every motion picture ever made in four minutes! As well enable every person in China to simultaneously make a video call!

We'll have to wait and see if they deliver on that promise but the announcement or even the thought of such a goal is proof of the influence of video on the Internet.

Cyber crime costs Americans more then $560 million in 2009. The most susceptible cities were Seattle, Boston, Washington, and San Francisco

You Tube is adding a captions feature. Great news for those posting to You Tube and taking advantage of being able to then have it embedded into your product page on the TAP website.

Lots of content about the new Google Android phone, the Apple apps store, and Palm losing market share, if you're interested.

Page 28 (a mildly interesting article about SEO) gives a shout out to local company Radian6 for their social media monitoring software :)

Eeek - where does the time go

2010-04-08T10:55:00.003-03:00

Greetings,

Just a short note to say, I'm still here.

I've been all around NB talking to operators about how to increase their presence online, and believe me even though the province seems small, with 2000 tourism products it takes a long while and a lot of driving to see even a quarter of the operators!

I've got a lot of tips on Google Toolbar tips and tricks to share over the next few weeks, so stay tuned.

Also I'd like to announce that the Tourism Technology project is putting on day long Social Media workshops specifically geared towards tourism operators. I'm excited about this, and hope that you'll take advantage of this great opportunity. The other techies and I have worked closely with the presenter to customize the content and make sure it's relevant!

Moncton, April 30
Fredericton, May 3
Bathurst, May 4 (in french)

Check your email for more details or drop me a line at beth @ tianb . com

5 Hot Tips

2010-03-12T14:42:00.004-04:00

As you can tell from the title, today's post is generously borrowed from Susan Rice Lincoln's e-newsletter, Social Media Matters. You can read all of Susan's posts at her blog, Mastering the New Net.

I would never use the word "hot" in my own titles ;-)

I really enjoyed tip number four, with the house/garden/social media metaphor. Readers of my blog will know I love metaphors.

Don’t try to do too much. The people/companies that have the best success in social media are using a maximum of three tools. You don’t need to use every single social media tool known to mankind. What you need to figure out is which tools match your strategy.

Create editorial calendars. Editorial calendars on a monthly basis are a great way of keeping your social media program on track. Otherwise, your social media engine is just run on disorganized spontaneity and you will eventually run out of steam. (Regrettably, I think this is happening to my blog)

Repurpose everything. If you are creating a photo stream on Flickr, you should make sure that will be seen in Facebook or on your website. When you post a blog, it should automatically be posted everywhere you are active on the social media space. Maximize your social media presence by making sure everything you do is repurposed in an automatic fashion. (And I don't do this)

Commit at least 1 hour a day to social media. A website is like a house. You construct it. You keep an eye on it to make sure the roof isn’t caving in. But you don’t have to be looking at it every single day. Your social media, however, is like the garden around the house. It needs to be tended to every single day. You need to water and weed all the time. So make social media an integral part of your daily schedule. Or you will fall way behind. And your garden will never bear any fruit.

Have a purpose. The number one most important thing you need to do to be on top of your social media game is to have a well-defined strategy. You need to know what you want to achieve. You need to know where you are going. Without that, it will just be a frustrating exercise of fragmented conversations and dead-end streets. Know what you want to do.

March Madness

2010-03-02T16:31:00.003-04:00

Greetings All,

Not much new to post, just wanted to let you know that the "Achieve your best presence online" training sessions with Tourism and Parks are being very well received.

So I'm on the road a lot and not much time to ferret out good content for my blog :(

However I'm meeting a lot of operators and I'm encouraged because a lot of them are finally seeing the need for a GREAT online presence.

It took a while but I think they are coming around.

Online booking did not turn out to be a fad or flash in the pan, it's here to stay. And it's becoming the booking option of choice for more and more travellers.

If you haven't registered for the training session, there are still sessions available all across NB.

And if you're one of those operators whose finally turned the corner, there's loads of valuable and relevant information in my previous posts.

So browse around.

Beth

CTC and Social Media

2010-02-18T14:22:00.004-04:00

The CTC (Canadian Tourism Commission) is doing great things.

A 2009 campaign consisting of 15 sec user generated videos aired for nine weeks. Results showed the campaign had a higher recall then print. The videos achieved a higher click through then banner ads alone. The success of the campaign was also the fact that it was backed up with relevant web content.

350 of social media content were created and seeded during the campaign. Demand for the material was overwhelming, and reaction to the content in social media spaces was positive.

A viral facebook quiz was created as well as a Twitter delivery schedule so that tweets would be consistent, timely and useful.

Through the national asset development program 10-15 experiences from each province were highlighted via video.

I learned all this at a CTC presentation at Canada eConnect. I urge you to check out the CTC site and browse around. Follow them on facebook and learn from their example.

Check out their You Tube channel

Maximize your DMO/ PMO presence

2010-02-10T09:49:00.006-04:00

One of the sessions at the conferences was called Leveraging Partnerships and Maximizing Marketing Dollars.

One of the best tidbits from this panel of experts was this fact:

Operators who take full advantage of DMO/PMO websites

have higher click through rates to their own website

It is in that spirit that TIANB has teamed up with TAP to deliver training on everything you need to know about maximizing your presence on the the TAP consumer facing website. Sessions start on Monday and continue throughout February and March around the province.

Visit the TIANB news item for more details and the link to register.

Make this your first step to a better online presence.

The very first keynote

2010-02-01T16:30:00.003-04:00

Greetings,

I have returned from a week of learning in Montreal. Online Revealed and Canada e-Connect proved enjoyable, insightful, and illuminating.

Right off the bat I'd like to share some high points from the very first keynote, Geoff Ramsey from eMarketer

In the year 2009 there was negative media spending growth, companies spent almost 15% less then previous years.

In the year 2009 there was 1.8 billion dollars spent in online marketing in Canada. That's 89$ per internet user.

So how did they spend so much online with out spending more?

Companies pulled money from their traditional media budgets. Which is something I recommend to clients to finance websites. Pull money from your print budget. Print less, be better online.

If you're interested in a myriad of statistical information visit the eMarketer website and sign up for their free daily newsletter or subscribe.

Stay tuned for more conference tidbits
Beth

Conferences

2010-01-20T10:30:00.004-04:00

Greetings,

Just a short note to let you know that next week I'll be attending two premier conferences in Montreal.

Online Revealed Canada is one of the best Online Marketing conferences with a Tourism focus. Produced by A Couple of Chicks e-marketers, I'm looking forward to learning lots of new ideas to share.

Canada e-Connect , Canada's Tourism Online Strategy conference organized by the Tourism Industry Association of Canada (TIAC) is also shaping up to be a great two days of exciting speakers and presentations.

The organizers of the conferences have placed themselves back to back to bring a full week of learning to tourism operators, DMOs, governments and folks like myself. My aim is to bring back and share the best of ideas with you.

Take care, and I'll have my first post conference post in February!
Beth

What I learned from watching TV marathons

2010-01-06T10:39:00.003-04:00

Greetings,

I hope you enjoyed your holiday, whether you only had the mandatory days or extra days, I hope you made the most of it like I did - watching TV show marathons!

Holiday programming consists of marathons and seasonal movies. Frankly after four weeks of this, I've forgotten all the "regular" season shows I used to watch.

The more you watch a show, the more involved you become in the characters, plot, outcomes. To the point where after watching 5 hours of Mad Men, I really wanted a drink of scotch and a cigarette, and I don't smoke.

Compelling TV almost made me want to start smoking.

And that's what I want from your website. Compelling content and imagery that makes me WANT to book a vacation immediately.

At the very least short list the destination and come back to revisit it.

This is why fresh content is important from month to month, and for repeat visitors from year to year. While I enjoyed those 5 hours of Mad Men, I can't imagine myself doing that every weekend...but in a few months... I may watch 5 different episodes.

I'm not talking vastly different changes. I mean it wouldn't be Mad Men without Don Draper :) The characters would be the same but the plots would be different. Like those locations working on being four season destinations. I should notice a subtle change up in the content for each season. Varying photos.

Seasonal activities should be highlighted and move to the top of the list as they become applicable.

Engaging video

Local personalities

Content that conveys first hand knowledge

Just little things like that will make your website more appropriate, engaging, relevant, enticing and make me CRAVE to visit you :)

Beth

I love my new faucet

2009-12-14T10:26:00.004-04:00

Greetings,

I hadn't planned on posting again til the new year but I as I was washing my face this morning, I had one of those light bulb moments - I LOVE my new faucet. I love it.

And it struck me how relevant my new faucet story was to the path of getting a new website.
So pay attention.

My Mom loves to home improve. And I like it... to a certain degree. Certainly not as much as my Mom. Some people like technology, others LOVE it.

So my bathroom looks the same as it did 10 years ago. And while everything was functional, the tops of the faucets...those H and C plastic things, would fly off each time I turned them on, and it was one of those models with a lot of detailing and would therefore collect a lot of soapy "crud" on it that I hated to clean off.

Frankly I didn't spend a lot of time looking at it because it wasn't pretty.

Anyway, I saw a nice one with clean lines in the Home Hardware flyer on sale, a really really good sale. So I bought it - in August.

And then I went on with my life, and it sat in it's box on the counter judging me. And lingering in the back of my mind as basically a $50 investment in a box of parts.

Finally last week, I used Facebook to find a friend willing to help me install it, so I could move it from faucet investment to faucet usage.

And I loved it from the first time I turned it on.

It's fantastic. It turns on with one finger. And the aerator is saving me water. And it looks so shiny and new. And it came with a sink stopper mechanism! (Before I just had a hole and a rubber stopper plug - which I never used because who knows where the plug is hiding)

So the new faucet needed a new mirror to go with it, and so I installed that this weekend.

Lessons I've learned from this:

1. It feels so GOOD to finally complete a task that is sitting in the back of your mind. So if you're contemplating a new site or updates or changes, just DO THEM! It's so refreshing to take steps forward.

2. Improvements are great. There is always a new technology, even in faucets, that will make your life easier and save you time (or water). While there was no learning curve involved with my faucet, there will be with a new website. As you learn to use it, the joy and time saving will come and you'll wonder why you ever stuck with that old technology for so long :)

3. You don't need a Cadillac. I mean my shower is another story, and the bathroom floor ... terrible. But I made a small stride, and am reaping the benefits of the improvement. Get your game plan set and make a few improvements to your site this year, with targets set for the following years. Ask for the basic model website and add a feature each year. It can be really overwhelming to add too many new technologies at once. Add them one at a time, when you are ready to fully commit to them.

4. Reach out to others. Find other operators who have a website you like and ask for a reference for their developer. Take the Tourism Technology mentoring session. It's the best $125 you'll every spend. We can help you find the focus and develop the game plan you need to succeed online.

5. Try it, you might like it. So where my Mom would have gutted the bathroom, I started with the faucet. And while there were no frantic trips to the hardware store during the installation, I know that like website development, some improvement jobs hit snags and you just have to have the determination to keep going!

6. BE OPEN TO CHANGE - it's so easy to stay the same. Change is scary. But once I had taken that first step, I found the courage to hammer up a new mirror! And I'm internet educating my self on installing a new floor. My spring project. If you're open to it, it's so much easier to learn new things.

Have a Happy Holiday

Take care,
Beth

The 12 Days of Website Best Practices

2009-12-09T11:03:00.002-04:00

Today's content created by ... ME. Seems like everyone is doing a variation on the seasonal carol the 12 days of Christmas so I've joined the bandwagon! Plunked on my elf thinking cap and came up with

The 12 Days of Website Best Practices

12 premium photo galleries
Have at least 12 photo galleries on your site. Include pictures of all seasons, and include pictures with PEOPLE in them - be sure and get photo releases or use your family.

11 minimum updates to home page content per year
Update your home page ONCE a month. Even in the off season. So 12 is the optimal number but I gave you one month off :)

10 pages of content and description
Content is king. Include history of the area, and other delightful content to maintain search engine ranking and improve website visitor experience

9 or more rotating images in your flash banner
If you must have a rotating flash banner or images, make sure you have enough so that they don't get stale. A potential customer will visit your site at least 10 times.

8 or more Frequently Asked Questions and answers
Make your FAQ page extensive. If you're referring clients to it, make sure it's useful.

7 or less menu tabs
Keep your main menu selections to 7 or less. Yes you can do this and still have 10 or more pages of content. They're called sub menus. The less clutter on your site the better.

6 testimonials, guest reviews
I cannot stress the importance of guest reviews, the ability for guests to make their own feedback posts to your site, the ability of guests to reconnect with other guests via your site. It's invaluable to you as a tourism operator

5 videos of the property
If you're going to do videos, have at least 5. Videos should be short, under 2 minutes each, and so you will not be able to showcase the whole establishment in 2 minutes. And some clients will be looking to see just a specific area.

4 featured staff members and bios
Feature your staff, yourself as owners, community characters... someone. Add some local personality into your website

3 latest news stories
If you're operating the kind of establishment where you post a lot of news items etc, have only the last three showing on the home page and the rest in an archive. Be wary, the last thing you need on a website is a stale "latest news" item. So this one is also cautionary, if you can't have at least 3 current news items on at all times, then you shouldn't have any news items at all.

2 languages whenever possible
Whenever possible have at least a portion of your website in a second language, and it doesn't have to be French. Dutch, Mic Mac, German, Polish...anything that shows off your values and culture OR caters to the market you are trying to attract. People will stay on a site longer and absorb more information from a site if it is written in their native language

1 go to source for information
Make sure your website is your clients goto source for information. It should answer almost every question so that when they call to book, they are a pre-qualified caller. When you can't answer the phone, refer the caller to the website and let the site lead them on the same journey as you would over the phone.

Your website is your 24 hour sales person !

I hope you've enjoyed today's tourism tech edition of the 12 days of websites.

Contact me for a one-on-one website critique, mentoring session, helpful tips, and MORE!
Beth @@ tianb.com

Your cousin is a web guy?

2009-12-02T09:53:00.003-04:00

Today's content borrowed from Digital Daisy

Or your neighbour knows someone who can "do you a web page"?

Or even luckier - your daughter's latest beau can set you up with a Facebook page and a Twitter account. How lucky can you get!

Or not. In this issue - why is this a bad idea?

If there is one particular story that breaks my heart, it is this one. Clients talk to me about a friend or relative who developed their website and then ended up being disappointed.

A second relates scenario that plays out when a web designer fails to deliver, drags his or her feet or is not available for further support.

In both cases the root cause of the problem may be similar.

Was the Scope Clear?
Ask yourself whether the scope of work was clearly defined. Did both parties know EXACTLY what was agreed to and at what cost? Scope creep (like colouring outside the lines) eats into profit - in terms of time and money, leaving two unhappy parties.

In the first scenario you have the added complication of personal relationships that get in the way of making tough business decisions or speaking your truth.

Quacks Don't Cure
You take your health problems to your doctor. Web development and Internet marketing are professional services too - don't take them to a quack - the pain is not going to go away. Pay fair value for fair service. It is investment you make in the health of your marketing.

Here are some suggested questions to ask a web developer before moving forward:

How long have you been in business?
What do you know about my industry? (Super important in Tourism !)
What's included in the design - how many pages, what features, etc.
How much will it cost?
Is hosting included?
How much is it per month - is there a discount if I pay annually?
Is setup included?
I don't have a domain name; can you recommend one and register it for me? How much will it be?
Will the domain be registered in my name? (Insist on this!) How is that billed? How can I register the domain name myself?
How do you like to communicate? By e-mail, phone or in person?
What can I expect in the design process?
How many designs and revisions are allowed for?
How long will all of this take?
What are your terms?
What happens if the scope of the project changes?
What happens if we cannot seem to work together?
At what point is the site considered "done"?
What happens when the work is completed?
Do you have a guarantee?
How will the site be maintained? Do you have a service contract? What is included?
Will there be a construction page posted while the site is being built?
What do you need from me?
How should the content be delivered (via email, disk, hard copy)?
Do you take credit cards?

Get your answers in writing
Ask for and check client references

Programmers are not always people friendly, don't let that deter you from hiring one, just keep it in the back of your mind while going through the interview process.

Twitter and Travel Industry

2009-11-25T11:58:00.003-04:00

Note: Content borrowed from and references made to Project Wander as well as Dead Mouse Sandwich

Many operators are asking me about Twitter, what is it? Should I be tweeting?

And the answer is not straight forward.

Twitter is the ability to talk to all your followers with one "text message". Messages in twitter can only be 124 characters. Frankly there's not much you can do on the twitter page itself, twitter requires you install Tweet Deck or some other third party "tweet organizer".

In a nutshell:

It will take some creativity to come up with new and useful 124 character tweets

You have to gain followers (and keep their trust)

And you need to install Tweet Deck

Twitter is not a place where you can just tweet out your specials one right after the other. All your followers will drop you. Applying the dead mouse sandwich principle, you need to wrap tweets about your business with tweets that are interesting and meaningful or retweets.

Twitter is working best in a customer service capacity to some degree for companies like Comcast, or Dell. Celebrities are having fun with Twitter.

It's definitely a time consuming venture.

For our market in Atlantic Canada, your best online bet is still your website, and perhaps a facebook fan page. But definitely your website. It's still your best online impression and close to 50% of Atlantic Canadian travel operations are making a terrible online impression.

Twitter, I wouldn't get my feather ruffled over it.

Women and Information Forwarding

2009-11-16T13:01:00.006-04:00

Recently came across these interesting graphs on another blog. The graphs are from PopSugar Media and Radian research and show some relevent information on how Women share information they find on the internet.

Sorted by Gen X and Gen Y, but I want to focus in on what method came in first, second and third.

As I tell all my clients, it's the women in the family who are reseraching holiday travel.
And so what are the top three methods used to discover new products (products would include travel destinations and attractions):

referral from an article or newspaper online
search engines
online ads, whether directly clicked or not

And how do they share this new product or vacation spot with friends:

they call them
they email them
and fairly close together are writing a review and posting on facebook

How can this help us create a better website for Women researching new products and destinations?

never underestimate the value of the press, having your establishment reviewed in any online forum will result in natural search engine ranking and hits
never stop updating or refreshing your website content and working on maintaining that natural search engine ranking
direct clicks are not always the best measure of your online ad campaigns, impressions count
nothing will ever replace girl chat
email is not dead, and having the "email to a friend feature" on your packages page will come in handy - as well as share this on facebook feature
always provide a way for your clients to write a review or provide feedback directly on your website. Women will read other's comments and value that information.

When you're ready to make your site the best it can be, ask your developer about these features and how to incorporate them into your new website.

For more information, just drop me a line beth@@tianb.com

What's your story?

2009-11-09T12:33:00.003-04:00

Been in the biz a while - what better way to let folks know than by sharing that history on your website

Operating your own Bed and Breakfast? Well tell me why and for how long? You're going to tell me when I get there anyways? Why not give me just a little taste on your website?

Did your jam win 1st place at the local agricultural fair?

Got pets? I want to know their names and quirks.

Anything special you do or have MUST be showcased on your website.

Who lived in the house before you
Knitted mittens for sale
Home made soap
Antique furniture collections
Dessert of the week, collection of mouth watering photos
Heated mineral pool and it's benefits
Ghosts
Bicycles
Tire swing

Same philosophy applies if your business is motel, inn, attraction or restaurant.
Call me for the tourism technology one on one mentoring session, I can find your website's hidden potential.

506 451 0173
Beth

Email - still going strong

2009-10-29T13:51:00.004-03:00

Today, let's focus on our old pal the email campaign.

Regardless of your industry or size, email marketing should still be playing important roles in your overall marketing strategy. When embracing Facebook and Twitter, let us not forget our friend the monthly email newsletter.

While some social networking sites come and go, email shows no signs of slowing down or becoming obsolete. Email is not a fad. Email, dare I say it, could be here to stay.

What makes email so appealing?

Well if you use a company like Constant Contact or another email manager software then email is completely trackable. You can find out how many of your emails were opened, who clicked on which links, and other useful information.

Email is thusly more accountable then social media.

Consumers more and more are relying on their emails. Even the older generation have emails to keep in touch with Grandchildren who are living at a distance. For the user, it's fairly easy to learn and manage.

Email vendors (such as Constant Contact) are getting better and their software options and tracking are improving. It's low cost, based either on the size of your list, or the number of emails you will be sending in a 30 day period.

Email software programs can personalize your email, Dear Beth Ashton.

You can include basic html and logos

And always include a call to action.

To get you started check out the free version of MailChimp. Upto 300 email addresses, and send up to 10 emails per month.

Email - don't start marketing without it.

What's new with me

2009-10-20T14:06:00.006-03:00

Today's post is all about how blogging can be seen as simply talking to friends about what's new in your life.

For some tourism operators in Atlantic Canada, what's new in your life IS what's new in your business.

Take myself in this example... Have I been putting forward the best blogging content over the past two months? Not really and here's the inside scoop. While during the Day I work tirelessly on tourism issues and technologies, at Night I become the Volunteer Director in charge of putting together all the details for the Fredericton edition of the Canadian Breast Cancer Foundation CIBC Run for the Cure. The event is the first Sunday in October and gets more time consuming as it gets closer to event date.

Day and Night become blurred, technology posts slide, what I think is more critical work comes first.

Dilemmas? Most certainly.

Should I have been upfront with my followers (all three of you) ?
Should I have even confessed to it today?

My exact situation is a little different from yours... my Day and Night job areas were quite far apart. However if I was organizing the "Giant Tourism Festival", then I should definitely have been blogging about every little detail !! That would be an ideal condition for making time to blog.

But I was doing something unrelated to Tourism. My dilemma being, if I mention upfront that posts are going to be sparser, does that incline you to stop coming by? (oops now down to two followers) Or do you take the break for what it is, a break, and take one yourself?

On the other hand, if I just start posting lame content without any rationale, some might think that I've run out of material and stop following me because they have learned all I have to teach (now down to a single follower, and I think that's my mom...)

Something to think about, and there's no right answer. You have to do what's best for you and your blog.

On a work related note, the Tourism Technology.com program just got it's renewal so I'll be here until 2012 doling out that personal advice. So drop me a line and let me know what technology questions you want to see featured here. beth @@tianb.com

Acutally by 2012 blogs will be so 2009 and we'll just have our memories of these bits and bytes.

Brand properties, Digital spending

2009-10-09T11:32:00.004-03:00

Good heavens has it been a month since my last post? Where does the time go?

Today I have a couple of random thoughts for you...

First for the Brand hotel property managers - Internet sales will be key in 2010, and every day your property is being sold on Brand sites and others like travelocity etc. It is YOUR responsibility to check your part of the Brand site. Check it for key words, relevence, images, and attractions. If your brand site says you're next to the Skydome - you're actually next to the Rogers Center - keep your details updated.

Most Brand sites don't allow for a lot of editing but do what you can with the tools you have and make your voice heard at the Corporate level about those changes you can't make on your own.

Second, according to eMarketer, Digital spending is expected to be 17% of total US Ad spending in 2010 creating a tempting slice of pie for Traditional Ad Agencies.

In addtion to these figures, a compelling study is just announced - Internet overtakes television to become the biggest advertising sector in the UK. A record 1.75 billions pounds online spend makes UK the first major economy to spend more on web ads then on TV

Death bells are tolling for traditional media...

Some random thoughts to mull over this Thanksgiving weekend.

Proof is in the numbers

2009-09-11T15:32:00.003-03:00

Content stolen/borrowed from http://tourismvc.wordpress.com/ but I don't think Tom will mind :)

Two of Cape Breton’s favorite fall festivals are Hike the Highlands, Sept. 11-20 and Celtic Colours – October 9-17. What makes them unique is they are the forefront with Online marketing and social media. They are starting small and learning along the way..

Dan Coffin, Marketing Co-ordinator, for Celtic Colours, has seen a change in demographics and found social media, e-mail newletter and new media have helped increased visits (20% plus) this year to their website.

Celtic Colours now has over 400 twitter followers, 1100 plus fans on facebook, a promotional video on youtube, a great venue google map and an e-mail marketing newsletter with a goal of 1,500 subscribers.

Coffin states online tickets sales are at 58%, up 4% from last year.

Last year, Hike the Highlands Festival had over 40% of hikers register online and expects this number will increase in 2009.

Facebook ads, Google adwords and e-mail newsletter along with online press releases & regular posts on our blog have keep us busy with new content on the web and attracting hikers to this annual September hiking festival.

“Our website visits in August are up 29% from last year,” says Tom Wilson, Chair, Hike the Highlands Festival. Wilson states we have hikers already registered from British Columbia, Ontario, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Newfoundland & Labrador and USA.

Both Wilson and Coffin agree that online marketing and social media has helped their festivals grow each year with more communication, online marketing, and user generated content.

Online booking and payment system has made it easier for people to purchase tickets and festival passes

Linked IN

2009-09-10T13:50:00.006-03:00

Are you on Link IN? If you are you should friend me, if you're not you should consider it. Linked IN has been around longer then Facebook (I think). It's the business version of Facebook. I've joined up with collegues from work, from past works, and from conferences. I've also joined in some tourism groups and social media groups. Each week Linked In emails me snippets of postings from each group I've joined and I can click to read more or save the email for later. I can also login direct and check out my groups, join new ones, find new business connections.

I recently came across this nice post from the Hotel & Technologies Software group in Linked IN, and thought I would share some of it with you today. If you're doing one new technology thing a month, consider joining Linked In as a business resource.

Later
Beth

Why do hotels have Standard Rooms?

I am surprised by the number of hotels that are still trying to market themselves selling standard rooms. What is so special about that ‘Standard Room’ that it will persuade potential guests to buy? How is one standard room different from a standard room in another hotel? Where has our creativity gone? Have we forgotten that we have to differentiate ourselves from the competition?

I am sure we all agree that asking someone to pay €100 to €200 for something ‘STANDARD’ is not very convincing. It is probably a legacy from hotel GDS systems we are dealing with. Room names are deviated from the GDS room type coding like C2T, B1D or D2C. And how about that double or triple room, doesn’t it sound exciting? How come we are putting occupancy into the name? Doesn’t this get filtered when you put the number of people into the hotel reservation system?

Funny enough hotel meeting and conference rooms have been give some more creative attention. The have been given names of painters like Renoir, Van Gogh, Picasso or Rembrandt. Or city names like Amsterdam, Barcelona and Berlin are being used. But why oh why aren’t we trying to do a better job at positioning our hotel rooms? Don’t we want to sell them and put heads in beds?

You have 30 characters at your disposal in the GDS and about 40 on most hotel booking engines. Use this space! We have been preaching this issue at many of more than 200 hotel training courses over the last 3 years and are happy we have seen some results.

The Hotel de Roode Leeuw in Amsterdam has uses names like ‘Comfort Room and ‘Budget Room’. The Berns Hotel in Stockholm has the following original room types: extra small, small, medium, large, large with balcony and extra large. Qbic Hotels calls their rooms a ‘Cubi’ after their cubicle shape furniture unit.

Most chains start simply at Classic or Deluxe and go up from there. W Hotels uses creative names like ‘Cozy’, ‘Wonderful’, ‘Mega’, ‘Fabulous’, ‘Fantastic’, ‘Cool’, ‘Spectacular’, ‘Marvelous’, ‘Wow’, and ‘Extreme’. I would like to sleep in one for those rooms...

It seems design hotels and boutique hotels have been much more original. Maybe other hotels should simply follow their example. Be different, be daring. Sell experience! A great word by the way. Why not call a room for a hotel in London the Chelsea or Piccadilly Experience? Simple, right? And why not call multiple occupancy rooms, Family Room? In the end that is the target market, right? Remember if you stand out, you will more likely to be chosen.

Differentiate yourself, not only on your hotel website, but also on OTA’s and GDS. Hopefully in a few weeks we will see those standard rooms replaced by some more appetizing and exciting names.

For more ideas and tips from Xotels visit our blog: http://www.xotels.com/en/blog

Cheers, Patrick Landman - Xotels

Top Tourism Websites

2009-09-08T10:48:00.004-03:00

Today we provide you with a link to Vandelay Designs, and what they consider the top travel websites.

http://vandelaydesign.com/blog/galleries/travel/

Some are government, some are hotels, but they are all excellent examples of what a travel/tourism site should look like.

You'll notice about halfway through, Signature Attractions, Explore the best of Atlantic Canada!

Congrats guys on making the list.

Another Tourism Technology mentoring success story.

Being proactive about vacancies

2009-08-21T11:49:00.005-03:00

I read this article, link below, and it struck me as being very proactive about vacancy rates.

High-end hotels are going wireless -- latimes.com

Posted using ShareThis

Of course I was attracted to the title as I searched for something to blog about, but the content of the article was what I really found intriguing.

According to the article, high end hotels are taking advantage of low occupancy rates to renovate their rooms. In this particular case it's with new technologies.

Of course, I understand that we're not all high volume hotels with access to big budgets and the latest gadgets but the principles are the same. We could repaint. Put up new pictures. Recarpet.

And we could, make that SHOULD, revamp our website and start using AdWords so that when the economy does turn around, we are READY. Because it will turn around, and the Internet will be more popular then ever when it does. If one thing is certain in this world, it is that technology is here to stay.

Now is the time to prep for the upswing with fabulous images, online reservation ability, short videos, creative and engaging content.

You NEED to be top five in Google, and Bing searches.
You NEED excellent online reviews and testimonials.
You NEED to show them via the web that your spot is the best place in the world.

Touristicallly yours,
Beth

What to blog...

2009-08-14T10:25:00.005-03:00

August is a weird time of the year for tourism. The summer numbers are not in, the spring numbers don't reveal much. You're wondering whether to change up your approach, while maintaining the guests you have. A lot depends on the weather...If July was rainy, many more feel the urge to "get somewhere" in August before the summer is over. So there's a lot of potential for walk ins and last minute reservations.

And this is all assuming that your operation is mainly a summer seasonal business. For those who are year round operations, this is just one of the weird times of the year.

Can you tell that I'm grasping at straws for material?

Good.

Point made.

Here's where we sit down at our computer and face that question

Which is more detrimental - Blogging about nothing or not blogging at all?

Frankly it's been a weird week for me at work, there are several things going on, none of which are blog worthy. I've been reading newsletters and tourism websites looking for something and not able to find items.

I've been distracted by other tasks, and really just not inspired.

What are steps I could have taken to prevent having to post such lame content?

1. Write a few posts all at once and save them for later
2. Have a guest blogger, assign it to another staff member
3. Assign a specific time of the week to blogging and stick to it, no distractions
4. Relax, I guess one missed week isn't so bad
5. Others ...

And so in conclusion, there are no strict conclusions in the Internet. Honesty and truthfulness will come through as authentic. Collect and use feedback. Try it and see if it flies.

Sincerely lacking inspiration today,
Beth

Labels - the ultimate online organizer

2009-08-05T15:17:00.004-03:00

I've starting something new on my blog today. Can you spot the change?

It's relatively subtle...

But it should lead to increased traffic on previous posts.

Ta-Da ~ I've labelled all my posts !

In total I have 43 posts, I took a quick look at the headlines for all of them and came up with a few common threads.

Then I added the labels gadget. Which I didn't have before. See how I'm learning as I go and incorporating more tech as I get more comfortable. See. See how I'm doing that.

Then I started from the first post and went through to the last one, opening each one, adding a label and resaving.

Took about 30 minutes in total and now if you're interested in reading just all my "how to" posts you can find them all in one easy click!

My labels are:
About TT.com - those are the posts where I boast about the great one on one website mentoring session that I provide to Tourism Operators for the low price of $125

How To - those are the posts where I give more explicit instruction, like this post

Informational - those are the posts where I publish stories that may interest tourism operators or items like what conferences I'll be attending

Successes - those are the posts that highlight great tourism successes online, and frankly there aren't nearly enough of those kinds of posts !

The great thing is I can add more labels if the need arises.

Til next time,
Beth

The piece of string

2009-07-27T14:52:00.004-03:00

Here's a useful analogy that I'm borrowing from a book called "Gut Feeling", by Peter Urs Bender...

Take a 3 inch piece of string, lay it out on a table in front of you. Then PULL it along the table by one end. You can make it go anywhere and it will follow you. Now try PUSHING it. The string piles up on itself and nothing happens.

The same can be said for a website. You cannot push a person into a vacation, but you can pull them along a journey with great photos and narrative. You can influence them into wanting to take the same journey by outlining the whole thing from start to finish.

Flashing red buttons that say "Come Here, Come Here" simply aren't going to work. Putting your brochure (verbatium) on your site isn't going to work.

A steady tempting of what awaits them in your little corner of the world is a much better approach.

Nudge, encourage, listen and empathize.

Underperforming web tools (like your website or blog) are a reflection of the organizational objectives rather then the tools or technologies them selves. It really is about the organizational culture and the approach.

Later gators,
Beth

Twitter among the stars...

2009-07-24T12:56:00.011-03:00

Recently Kevin Spacey, one of my favorite actors, and David Letterman had a conversation about Twitter.

When I saw it, I felt that a lot of my readers would be having the same kind of conversation, and be able to relate to the interaction between Kevin and David.

So here is the embedded video.

You'll notice that this is my second embedded video on my blog, and unlike the first one (two posts previous), this one is custom fitted to the proper width. I left the first one AS IS, to show that blogging and embedding is a continuous learning process. And that you don't have to exactly master the whole thing at once. Just pieces.

I've been blogging for a little over a year and during that time video clips have become more and more popular, the code to embed them is presented for you, and so I've started to incorporate them into my blogging. I'm ever evolving :) It's not required that I or you be on the cutting edge, just that we add a splash of the new every now and then.

So you think it only happens to other people...Part Two

2009-07-14T15:38:00.004-03:00

One week later - An update on the Sons of Maxwell VS United Airlines

Views on the You Tube video - astronomical and counting
Appearance on Canada AM - check
Appearance on CNN - check
Wolf Blitzer mentioning your name - check
Print media tailgating on your success - check

Numerous Tweets - check
Facebook sharing links - check
Follow up video on You Tube thanking everyone for their support - check

People who whole heartedly agree with you - check
People who totally disagree with you - check

Did it work? Was it worth it? Only time will tell.

So you think it only happens to other people...

2009-07-08T14:14:00.006-03:00

Social media frenzy right here in Atlantic Canada.

The band, Sons of Maxwell, recently travelled to the US for a concert with United Air Lines. Long story short, the baggage handlers broke a guitar. After several fruitless phone calls to United, the frustrated band vowed to unleash their wrath on You Tube.

As of this writing, the video, posted 48 hours ago:

has received 82,000 (and counting) plays
was featured on the website consumerist.com
was played on my local radio station
was facebooked by many of my Atlantic Canada friends
was facebooked by my local DJs
was twittered
was Dugg
was shared and forwarded

Check it out, it's a catchy tune

Update: when I went to get that link the views were up to 132,000

How can I do something like this? Or do I even want to?

More importantly - How do I keep my operation from becoming a "United" and forcing someone to blast me on the internet?

All good questions. Ask me when you sign up for your Tourism Technology mentoring session.

beth at tianb dot com

Thinking outside the box

2009-07-02T12:48:00.003-03:00

This week I stumbled across unique uses for Trip Advisor, and I thought what a great outside the box use for a vacation rating site. Especially in the Tourism Industry where we are facing a human resource shortage.

Quoted from a Linked In group discussion:

Tripadvisor.com Secondary Use for Employers & Job Seekers

Two additional uses for Trip Advisor :
Not only is Tripadvisor a great tool for consumers it is also a great tool for employers and job seekers.
1. Recruiters and employers should check all GM candidates past hotel’s placement on Tripadvisor. As past performance is a good predictor of future success.
2. Job seekers should check a hotel rating on Tripadvisor prior to a job interview to learn of any operational weaknesses that they could help to address. I believe most employers would be impressed to learn that a potential candidate took the time to research their property beyond the company website.

So here's the challenge, do you have a favorite website that you use for a purpose that might not be what the developers intended?

Can you think of outside the box uses for other sites?

Send in your ideas and I'll share them in the next post
beth@@tianb.com

Website / Blog Verses Twitter

2009-06-25T09:26:00.004-03:00

I recently read a great quote, unfortunately I've misplaced the source but here goes:

"Make your blog/website your home base and Twitter your outpost"

That strikes me as great advice for those wondering if they should twitter or not. Twitter for kids is all about the status updates, but Twitter for business is about something else... It's about engaging customers with your product, and driving traffic to your website or to your physical store.

Your website is your archive. Twitter feeds are not archived. Facebook events are archived but in a hidden sort of fashion. So if you Tweet that your tourism operation is now serving lobster chowder, if you do not also include that on your website, only the few fellow Tweeters who read that initial Tweet will know about your new product offering.

For tourism operations, archives or history of success is important. It relates stability to new buyers. People do have (rational) fears of airlines going under, hotels closing, and travel agents closing. You must show that you are going to be operating the whole season and they will not be losing their deposit.

Websites and blogs are showcases of true passion and commitment to your operation. If there is one thing I know about tourism operators is that they are passionate. You need to express that to all who visit your site. And if your passion is waning, find someone who's passion is exploding to write the blog for you. A summer student, another employee...

I know you're busy, I know you're stretched thin, and I know you think it's going to take a lot of time. Frankly sometimes it does. Sometimes I sit for a while before I know what to blog. Sometimes it comes quite easily.

If your website and blog are functioning properly then that should lead to less repetitive emails and phone calls that require your time and energy. If your website and blog are functioning properly then your increased sales will justify hiring another part time worker and again leave you with more time and energy to put forth. It's a cycle. You just need to get started.

Twitter is like social sticky notes (another great quote that I can't take credit for). It's snack size content, a nibble to wet your appetite. Your website is the full meal deal. And it should satisfy their hunger.

So first build a great website (actually first take the Tourism Technology website mentoring session to learn how to build a great website)

Then start to Twitter

And know when to draw the Twitter line

Website revamp OR Exercise in discovering your clientele

2009-06-18T11:04:00.005-03:00

The key to a successful website redesign is research.

Especially for Tourism Operators.

A successful tourism website has the information that the visitor is looking for... and how are you going to know what information they are interested in unless you ask them ?

Why does a Tourist visit a website?

to confirm that they want to visit there
confirm hours and costs
confirm directions
to see other people enjoying the property or attraction (validate)
to find out what unique things they can do while visiting
perhaps to find rules or regulations

Are you providing that kind of information?

View your website through the eyes of your target market? Is everything there that I would need to know if I was coming to the area, plus some exciting pictures and tidbits that reassure me that your destination is the best choice.

The summer is the perfect time to research your clients. Are they mainly elderly? Are they families? Ask them if they looked at your website? Ask them what they thought of it?

Then take all that information and compile it over the fall and find a developer over the holidays and have your new site launched for the new year, when visitors are just starting to scope out where they are going to spend their summer.

Trust me

If you don't tell your developer what you need, you'll have a nice new site but it won't fulfill the needs of your customers and you'll have wasted your money
If you don't get a nice new fulfilling site for next season, you've missed the boat.

Commitment

2009-06-10T11:24:00.002-03:00

Today I thought I'd share a confession of imperfection with everyone. Copied from the ISL newsletter

Monthly Commitmentby Stephanie Lummis

You may have noticed this monthly eNewsletter has not always lived up to its billing. Mea culpa. In site is a year old and ISL is not practicing what it preaches.

It was a big step to start this eNewsletter. We planned and talked for months. We knew we were capable but realized the commitment it would take. It was this very threat that held us back. I could claim it’s a case of the shoemaker’s children - we are busy with client projects and there isn’t enough time or resources to devote to our own Internet marketing efforts.

And it is, but it’s more than that. After all we are also encouraging and advising our clients: non-profits, CPG companies and government alike, to do more of this kind of Internet marketing. The fact is it’s harder to give priority to an email newsletter – or any non-direct-revenue generating activity, such as a blog, Twitter feed or corporate Facebook page.

These activities can be at odds with sales and business development resources as they are direct revenue generators. How do you convince your organization of its value? How do you justify the investment of time and effort?

The True Value is Intrinsic Relationships – People don’t like to be "sold", preferring to come to informed decisions on their own. They are more apt to engage in advice or conversation instead of a sales pitch. It establishes a level of trust and comfort that they will have the ear of those they buy from.

Reach – These types of marketing efforts create long tentacles and expand your circle of influence. These peripheral connections are more apt to produce a customer. They have more to learn and their investment will be greater.

Goodwill – For people who know you already - clients or partners - an eNewsletter can serve as a reaffirmation of your commitment to your company and the industry as a whole.

Measured Success - This eNewsletter has been a tremendous tool for ISL. Subscribers look forward to seeing it in their inbox each month (sorry we’ve kept you waiting), and some print it off to share with their bosses and colleagues. A few articles have even been reprinted in other eNewsletters for tourism and manufacturing industries.

So while you may not be able to tie these Internet marketing efforts directly to sales, you can gauge their influence in many areas: list growth, forwards, referrals, reprints, comments, and time on site. These are all valuable measurements of success that justify the investment.

It has been one year and we’ve published 10 issues. Not how we planned it, but we remain committed and thank you for reading each month. Writing this article was just the pep talk I needed.

Roger Brooks stole my material ...

2009-05-29T14:39:00.004-03:00

If you attended the recent TIANB conference in Caraquet, and listened to Roger Brooks (international tourism guru), then you know what I'm talking about.

Several points made by Mr Brooks, I have been telling you for the past two years. If you had taken the Tourism Technology website mentoring session prior to the conference then little bells should have been going off in your head ... "Beth mentioned the very same thing during her mentoring session"

"I guess she knows what she's talking about"

That's right folks, I'm not just a pretty face.

There's more to the session then the long winded title implies.

70% of tourism shoppers are frustrated with the online experience
80% of operators are still spending more on print, then their website (backwards!)
e-newsletters are essential
user friendly domain names are essential
have seasonal content
have updated content

It's not too late to call me for a session, and at $125, I'm way underpriced.

Beth

PS If you did take the session and haven't done anything yet, dig out that manual and get on it!

Your best home page

2009-05-07T10:00:00.003-03:00

Your home page should state clearly, who you are and what you do.

It should relate your core business aspect in a few simple lines. Yes, it can be done.

What are the properties of some of the best home pages?

It's all about knowing your audience. When you surf the web, what pages make you feel tranquil and serene? What pages make you feel adventurous? Why do they invoke these feelings- imagery, colour selection, sounds?

Be upfront and honest about who you are targeting with your website. Grab their attention with imagery and key descriptives that relate to that demographic.

The most simplistic home page could be Google. What is Google's main product? Search. And so what is their home page comprised of? A search box. They haven't changed their core home page since they started. They've added a few buttons off to the side, and they change up their logo every now and then, but the basic core aspect stays the same. And it works for them.

A person who is interested in the latest news, and flashy ads for their home page would be more inclined to choose msn.ca or canoe.ca for their home page rather then Google.

Match your online esthetics to your audience. Your website belongs to your customer not to you!!!

Be totally awesome - not mediocre

The concept of ROBO

2009-05-04T14:34:00.004-03:00

More learnings from the Altantic Internet Marketing conference.

ROBO - Research Online, Buy Offline

Some quick ROBO stats:

89% of buyers perform ROBO

81% of Canadians plan to perform ROBO when making their next purchase

50% of local businesses do not have a website...(or an adequate web presence)

ROBO is essentially comparison shopping. In the old days we used to drive around from store to store with a notebook to comparison shop. Or maybe we used newspaper inserts.

Today we do it online - website to website.

And instead of driving to the "shopping"district of town, we use Google to find our results for us.

No matter what your business people are looking for you online.

It's time to embrace your customers where they are. You have your own "hand picked" community out there waiting. Put your product in front of an engaged audience.

So while you may still be getting sales over the telephone, next time ask them if they checked out your website, 8.9 of 10 will have done so before they called - and that's ROBO in action.

2009-04-27T16:02:00.004-03:00

The following are some key points from the Atlantic Internet Marketing conference keynote. (See, even though I got to go, you get the benefits - and you didn't have to sit in those chairs !)

How to make love to your client, Mike McDermont, Freshbooks.com

People are people, they don't want to be treated like a business.

Freshbooks is an online invoicing service for professionals. They have, through social media, positioned themselves as more then an accounting software firm, they are a firm that is in the experience delivery business.

Aren't we all in the experience delivery business?

Consumers talk about their experiences - good or bad. And as tourism operators we would hope for it to be all good !

You can use social media to get to know your customers - just like we used the 1-800 number to get them to call us, we can leverage social media to find out what they want to see, and what they really think.

You can use social media to DRIVE the one on one communication.

Social media, for example Trip Advisor, allows you to "track" the coffee table conversation. People used to take a vacation and then go home and complain to their families, their neighbours and perhaps their co-workers...around the coffee table. Now people take a vacation and go home, get online and complain to the WORLD...around the social media table.

The web is a word of mouth machine !

You can leverage negative Trip Advisor comments into positive ones. Respond in a positive way, let other viewers know the proposed resolution.

Every product can be reinvented

That's assuming you'll ever get a negative comment, 95% of the WWW comments are positive ones. And savvy users can tell a true negative comment from one that's a result of an impossible customer.

Take the negative comments under advisement and reinvent your product if need be. Just like the new Triscuit with addition of rosemary, your B&B can with a bit of revamp, suddenly become the hot spot of the Maritimes.

Google External Keyword Tool

2009-04-15T09:34:00.004-03:00

The Google External Keyword Tool will help business owners understand how their audience searches for them. And it will help you utilitze negative kewords - for example eliminating those who are searching for a free vacation, you're not interested in people conducting those kinds of searches.

While I normally tell my session participants to have an expert run their keyword campaigns and SEO (search engine optimization) there are a few of you who handle it yourselves.

I've only taken a passing glance at the tool but like all Google tools, it's easy to use, free and has lots of help features.

Like I preach in my sessions - repetitive content is key to natural search engine ranking, and this tool can help you find your meta data keywords and your content keywords.

So if you're stuck on keywords, give this tool a try.

https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal

Conferences

2009-04-15T09:27:00.003-03:00

Just a heads up about two Conferences you may want to attend:

Firstly, the annual TIANB conference is coming up, early bird registration ends April 17 (save over $100). We are having TWO Tourism Gurus this year, Joe Pine and Roger Brooks. This conference is value for your money. May 22 in Caraquet. Visit http://www.tianb.com/ for more information.

Second, the Atlantic Internet Marketing conference will be next week in Halifax. I will be attending along with my other tourismtechnology.com counterparts. While not geared to tourism specifically, it's a great broad base of information and local contacts to help you generate the most out of your website and blog. http://www.aimconference.com/

Just get the job done.

2009-04-07T13:26:00.005-03:00

This week's post is dedicated to procrastination and doing those things which you do not like to do.

I'm generally pro technology, and bubbly smiley about websites. However I get the feeling that not all people are like that ... imagine.

Imagine not being at one with your computer, imagine not being in total sync with MS office products ... I shudder at the thought.

So I have a confession.

I dislike to exercise. I loath it the way most of you loath checking and composing email. Not just general loathing, but a deep deep psychological loathing of lactic acid pain.

But for the past two weeks I've been on the exercise bike and drinking at least one glass of water EVERY DAY. And that includes Saturdays and Sundays. In fact I'm sitting at work right now with my water and drinking that bland ol' H2O as I type.

So if I can make the effort to Exercise, You can make an effort with your website !

Start like I did, with a small goal, and just keep at it. Set up a time of day, and stick to the routine.

There are two main factors in my success:

One - there is a chilled water dispenser at my office. It's right there in front of me. And chilled water is a bit tastier, so it's not to much of a hassle for me.
Two - I also own an exercise bike. It's not fancy but it does the job. And it's right in my house, so again it's not a hassle.

Look around at your technology options, are they a hassle ? If so, think about making some changes.

If your computer is too slow, take it in for a professional "cleansing" or a few upgrade parts
Consider buying a new computer
Is your computer in a comfortable work area?
If your website is a pain to update, consider getting a new one.
Or talk to a web developer to see what can be done with the one you have.

In this market, every developer should be keen on any business, even a few hours of work. Find someone who speaks to you at a level you understand and don't be afraid to get a second opinion (or a third).

I finally started thinking in terms of the rewards, rather then the tasks. The rewards of exercise is good health, long life, better fitting clothes.... while on the beach visiting one of your fine establishments.

The rewards of a technology / website upgrade is that it will make your life easier, it will encourage you to make those frequent updates, and it will lead to increased business.

The Story of Bill, Gary, and Jane

2009-03-18T10:42:00.003-03:00

(fictional)
Bill runs Trinity Escape, a small cottage property on Newfoundland’s Avalon Peninsula. He offers a dozen oceanfront cottages from June through September. He is usually booked solid in July and August.

Bill has had a website for four years that was built by his brother-in-law. He cannot update it himself so every 4-6 months Bill pays to make any changes that are needed. He receives about 30 email and phone inquiries per week, but this number has dropped off over the past year or two, even though travelers are already starting to plan their summer vacations.

One such traveler is Jane from Calgary who has just clicked onto Bill’s website. Jane is flying home in the summer to visit her family and is planning a girl’s weekend away with her sisters. She went online and Googled "cottages for rent in Newfoundland" but found no good results. She then Googled "tourism Newfoundland" and found a list of properties on the provincial tourism website, which she is going through one at a time.

Jane likes the location on the ocean and the cottages look comfortable. She needs to bring her sister’s dog but it takes her awhile to find the policy information. It’s a bit ambiguous as to which cottages will allow dogs but she is willing to take a chance. The cottage fits her budget and she is ready to book. After scanning around for online booking, she realizes Bill doesn’t offer it. Jane hits the "back" button and returns to the provincial tourism website. She may be back if she doesn’t find another property that is suitable -- and if she remembers the site.

Jane clicks the next link in the list and she arrives at the site of Gary’s Oceanside Cottages, 25 km down the road from Bill’s. Jane quickly finds an ideal cottage. She stares in awe at a photo of the sun setting over the ocean, as seen from the deck of the cottage, and salivates at the homemade raspberry scones, crème fraiche and coffee that are delivered each morning. She sees that the cottage is available when she is visiting. Jane is sold and clicks the Book this Cottage button adjacent to the room description. Jane is so excited she calls her sisters

Gary is relaxing by the pool at his condo in Bradenton, FL. He spent the day deep sea fishing. He checks his email and sees that cottage 8 was booked online for a 2-night package in the second week in June. That brings his occupancy for that month up to 74%. He sends Jane a short email to thank her for her business and asks if they have any special requirements for their breakfast or her sister’s dog.

Its mid-June and Bill is shaking his head. For the first time in 20 years he still has vacancies for July. He looks around his property – his gardens are in full bloom and the new dock he built over the winter is just waiting for visitors to launch the kayaks. "Maybe I should lower my rates and put an ad in the paper?" he asks himself.

What do you think?
Do you think an Ad in the newspaper is going to do anything for Bill's occupancy rates?

You know what I think - I think that Bill should have taken the Tourism Technology Website Mentoring Session from myself, and updated his site. Even just a few updates/changes may have prompted Jane to perhaps reserve by phone, and would not have cost Bill a lot of money.

Call me to book your session.
506-451-0173
beth@@tianb.com

Creating links both real and virtual

2009-03-10T13:34:00.003-03:00

The following content is taken from the March 2009 enRoute magazine which I read on a recent Air Canada flight to Toronto.

Travel is a social activity. You meet people you wouldn’t otherwise meet. On a business trip, you hang out at your hotel bar and meet others doing the same thing. You strike up a conversation. Sometimes, you stay in touch. Every business trip is really a trip to meet someone.

So it’s not really surprising that the social aspect of travel has morphed into social networking. Sites like FlyerTalk are not just message boards about airlines and airports but also places where people “meet” and talk and, eventually, socialize.

The endless number of applications built around travel speaks to our desire to see the world or, if we can’t, to experience it vicariously through others. What these sites do is something many are calling “intelligent networking.” Our business trips are often networking opportunities, and the Internet has allowed us to network without leaving our desks.

On Twitter anyone who is thinking about travelling announces it to the world. The “tweets” come in waves when someone is actually on the road; it’s almost as if you’re travelling with them, and, in a sense, you are. From Twitter you can link to a site where you’ve uploaded your photos, so your followers can see what you’re talking about.

Go to Flickr, another photo-sharing site, and you can sort through millions of vacation photos from all over the world.

Why are we doing this?

Well, what’s the first thing you ask when meeting someone who’s been away?
How was the trip?

Because travel is social. You want to know the story. Watching others travel allows us to construct our own stories in our minds. Every traveller has something to relate, no matter how mundane the reason for travel, and every anecdote has the potential to illuminate and entertain.

And if this social travel allows me to grow my network and even wins me new business? Well, that’s about as intelligent as networking gets.

http://enroute.aircanada.com/en/articles/site-seeing

Product Development

2009-02-27T13:59:00.007-04:00

So you think you're best angle is your sweet coaxing voice on the phone...once you have them on the phone you tell me you can sell them on whatever it is you're selling (overnite stays, meals, tours).

And I ask you, "Is the best use of your time?"

Yes, we all like the interaction with our customers/clients. It's the best part of the day sometimes. But is it the best use of YOUR time.

What about that garden that needs tending, scoping out those new tours routes you have in mind, running cross promotions with near by attractions, even those dreaded HST returns.

What if clients could ferret out a lot of information via your website?

What would you spend your time doing if you weren't answering the same questions over and over again on the telephone?

Would you be able to spend more time mingling with the clients you already have? Leading to better referrals and repeaters.

Would you be able to spend more time with your family and pets? Leading to less home life stress.

Would you be able to build that sunroom/gazebo/rock water fall? Again leading to better referrals and repeaters.

Let your website be their guide, and shift your focus to product development/renewal.

Brand Management and maintenance

2009-02-27T13:44:00.002-04:00

The best way of convincing ourselves to continue to spend marketing dollars in a recession is by thinking of brand management as a sustained effort where returns are cumulative and compounding.

Building brand equity can be thought of in the same way as building a retirement fund - slowly and cautiously.

What is the best way to spend those scarce dollars?

On your website of course.

What better time then now to find a "hungry for work" website developer and negotiate your best price ?

No time. There's no time like the present to put forth your best "web face".

Not going to be able to hire a student this summer to take phone calls, change your voice mail to redirect clients to the website for more FAQs and other useful information. By the time you have returned their call, they are ready to make the booking.

Better yet, include online reservations into your site and the bookings will come to you.

Make sure your website reflects your brand to the best of it's ability.

Shameless Corporate Plug

2009-02-20T12:47:00.007-04:00

In the news recently, a restaurant in NB got slammed on facebook. This is every operator's worst nightmare. This is the dread in the back of every operator's mind - the posting of negative feedback ONLINE.

While I won't mention details, the scenario is that it was a busy night, a patron was seated, was not happy with the seating, and was verbally rebuffed by management. She took her issue to her facebook page, created a group to ban the restaurant, and almost immediately got 1,100 others to join her.

There are many lessons here.

First, if the management and staff had Superhost training from TIANB, perhaps they would be better at customer service relations. We also offer Food Safety, and Responsible Beverage... that's the shameless corporate plug. It's a fact that trained staff know what to do and not to do in situations like this. Trained staff feel better appreciated and stay longer.

Second, if the patron had known of another outlet to vent her rage, she may have used that instead of facebook. For example corporate emails, corporate blogs and forums on your own corporate websites. You need to provide outlets for patron rage, in a sense it will give you some control.

Third, there's a golden rule that if you're getting negative comments online, then you've got a problem offline. It's as simple as that. This patron didn't start out to create such a fuss, but it appears she is not alone in her opinion of this establishment and 1,099 others were just waiting for this group to start ! They were just out there waiting.

This is why you NEED to start a facebook group. If you had a facebook group of your own, perhaps she would have done a search for you on facebook, posted a comment to your group, and you could have answered personally about what you were going to do to prevent it from happening ever again.

If you had your own facebook group, perhaps a few of the other 1,099 folks that seem to have issues would have posted before now, and you could have sat back and thought, maybe there is a problem. (It's called an ounce of prevention.)

You would never delete such a comment but use it for what it is, genuine feedback, and respond appropriately. In your "contained" environment. Or in your online forums on your website.

People wanted to turn this into a problem with technology - the Ultra Bad Power of facebook. It's not. What this boils down to is a customer service problem that bled into the internet. There were many many many opportunities for this restaurant to resolve this patron's issue before it went online.

In today's economic climate - customer service is going to make or break you.

Get your staff Superhost trained.

And start a facebook group.

The Oprah factor

2009-02-11T14:41:00.006-04:00

Oprah, the most influential woman in the world, I would dare say. Still going strong after all these years. And how does she do it?

She uses technology to reinvent herself and maintain her connection with her audiences.

Yes, she does.

While I watched yesterday's show, I realized how much Oprah is using today's technology to reach out to fan base all over the world.

She has incorporated online learning, and webinars into the fold. Through her series of online segments about spirituality based on that book, what was it called ...oh well it was the largest webinar ever held in the world.

She's "Skyping" regular folks into the show. Viewers with questions can contribute from their own homes via Skype.

She's using satellite radio to reach millions more.

Her website is a mix of show content and complimentary articles using various medias.

It's quite remarkable. I encourage you to watch the show and visit the site sometime. Yes folks I'm asking you to couch potato it for a couple of hours.

There is nothing on the Oprah show that you could not be doing yourself.

Skype is a free Internet calling program, in fact we use it in the Tourism Technology program. There are widgets you can put on your website for folks to Skype call you. With a web cam you could potentially have a face to face conversation with a potential guest.

I've mentioned the importance of online forums before, Oprah has those in spades.

Multimedia rich online experience is extremely important in the tourism industry. Images (that include happy shiny people) and videos that convey the experience will get results.

And that's the Oprah factor.

The process of buying lettuce

2009-02-10T10:32:00.001-04:00

There has been a shift in the process of buying travel. For the better or for the worse, it's happened.

Travellers are using the Internet to search out their own deals and itineraries.
They are starting with inspirations from friends or broad based DMO campaigns and then drilling down from there.

Travellers are visiting as many as 22 different websites before making that buying decision.

Think about that.

Would you travel to 22 different stores to buy lettuce?
Of course not.
How would you feel after you trekked to 22 different grocery stores, compared prices, and lettuce volume? Made notes. Returned for second looks. Asked the grocery cleck for more information on the lettuce and waited two days for a response.

You'd be tired.
You'd be frustrated.

Imagine how the traveller feels about his/her online experience.

Review your website through the eyes of someone who has spent the last hour looking at similar bed and breakfast websites. Does yours clearly state information like prices, rooms, amenities, policies on kids and dogs???

While we may never get to the point where we are comparison shopping for lettuce, we are in the midst of online comparison shopping for travel experiences.

It's a reality that operators need to respect and deal with.

Remember when travel agents used to be Gods... We wined and dined them and sent them special gifts. Well the travel agent is feeling the crunch, and now we need to wine and dine the online tourist directly.

Clean and clear websites chocked full of relevant information and inspirational imagery.

That's what we need to present to today's lettuce shopper.

The "did you knows" about the internet

2009-02-09T14:07:00.001-04:00

A few fun facts and trivia gleaned from the e-connect conference

Did you know:

10% of a businesses marketing budget is spent online - however consumers spend close to 30% of their free time online
consumers age 70 or older read a newspaper every day
only 10% of consumers age 20 or older read a newspaper
1.4 billion computers have access to the Internet
there are 3.4 billion mobile devices in the world today
there were 12 billion online videos viewed in November 2008 alone
81% of travellers view videos of potential destinations
25% of the 122 million online travellers in the US do not know where they want to visit
80% of customer reviews posted on websites are positive ones

Stats are so ...boring. But hey, if that's the only way I can convince you that your website / Internet presence is important to the viability of your business, then I'll take the risk and publish the boring post.

Are you answering the social media telephone?

2009-01-29T10:04:00.001-04:00

I recently attended the Canada e-connect Conference, billed as e-tourism strategy focused. Among the sessions, some of the same themes were repeated. One that struck me was this:

It's 1999 again.

Remember back to 1999, people were just starting to sign up for email addresses. Businesses were fussing and fretting over who would answer all these emails, where would the personnel come from? What would you say in an email? What was the optimum response time?

Well it's 1999 again, only instead of getting an email address, it's time for you to start promoting your business online via face book, twitter, blogging, and including customer forums on your website.

Again we're faced with personnel issues, response times, and managing risk.

And just like when we first got our email addresses and learned how to make that modem work - we will learn how to leverage social media.

We will prevail !

Beth

e-connect

2009-01-19T16:32:00.001-04:00

Canada's e-tourism strategy conference, Toronto, January 22 and 23, and guess who is attending?

That's right, me.

As one speaker put it "Consumers have seen the economic headlines and now expect to see the deals. 2009 has been proclaimed the year of the travel deal"

I'll be hanging with my friends at TIAC.

I'll be learning how to engage the tourist via e-tourism, and many other exciting things which I will be sharing with you over the coming posts.

So have a great week, and I'll see you again at our usual Friday post.

Regards,
Beth

And so 2009 begins

2009-01-09T15:23:00.001-04:00

Greetings all,

I hope that the New Year is treating you well so far. As for myself, I spent a great holiday with my family, only to be taken down by a cold the first day back to work. Ironic - yes.

And so the first post of the year which should be full of fresh ideas and tidbits is going to be short and sweet...I'm too wiped out to look up anything new and exciting for you.

If you didn't do any of the following at year end, what better time then year's beginning to complete them:

Back up your files. Back up, back up, back up ! And put a reminder in your outlook or day planner to do it every week (that way you'll at least do it every two weeks !)

Clean out your email clutter, learn how to creat folders in outlook and move stuff around. Delete your deleted items. Clean out your sent items.

Go through last year's planner and find projects that are not finished. Move important dates into your new planner - such as my birthday July 15

Organize your sticky notes...and stop using sticky notes, it's not environmentally friendly, create a task list in outlook - much better.

Curl up and read those books you've been putting off. Winter days are perfect for that...this should not interfer with your casusal web browsing time that I recommended you do about 3 posts back :)

And so I leave you with this pearl of wisdom:

A smile is a curve that sets everything straight - Phyllis Diller

PS - My calendar is wide open for January and February if you would like to get together for a website mentoring session visit here for more information

Season Greetings

2008-12-16T09:41:00.001-04:00

A sincere wish for a Happy and Prosperous Holiday Season !

Just a reminder, the TIANB office will be closed starting December 22 and will reopen January 5th, 2009 !

Take care
Drive carefully
Enjoy
Feast
Be silly
Laugh
And even cry !

See you in 2009

Beth

PS if you see Santa, tell him I've been really really good this year.

The non-importance of content

2008-12-10T10:33:00.001-04:00

So, I haven't blogged in a while, 2 weeks... I've been remiss.

And when I did pencil it into my schedule for today, I really had trouble coming up with content.

And then it hit me, blogs do not necessarily have to have exceptional content !

Readers just want to know you're out there and relatively current, within a month between postings in the off season.

So even though this is meant to be a mainly technical blog, if I rant on about my Christmas shopping woes, it will be amusing and timely content. People who read my blog will know that I have not dropped off the earth. That I do still care about their virtual experiences on my blog.

Even random comments about the weather, as Canadians are known for doing, is acceptable blog content during the winter - OK any time of year !

Blog on, and when you need a "cheater" post, talk about the weather or your grand kids.

Beth

Bill Clinton

2008-11-26T09:37:00.001-04:00

On Tuesday the entire staff went to hear President William Jefferson Clinton speak in Moncton (Thank you Management !).

While his talk mainly focusing on economics - you can be sure I found several relevant tourism technology references !

1. There were 5000 attendees, and since it was general admission seating we all arrived early. I couldn't help but notice how many of us were on the phone, or "blackberrying". In fact the person behind us was giving his colleague a lesson on his new Samsung Instinct. I wondered how many were surfing the internet ...perhaps looking for a place to have lunch after the speech.

2. President Clinton mentioned the recent election campaign several times. He eventually referred to the amount of money that both candidates raised over the internet. Perhaps this is the first time that large amounts of campaign funds have been raised over the internet - not sure. This year the internet did contribute to the change in voter demographic. US residents from all over America felt like they were a part of the election, even though they didn't live in an urban centre and were no where near a rally site. Blogs, websites, chat rooms, and internet sponsorship allows Joe Public to feel a sense of ownership in the process.

3. He focused mainly on the economic crisis in the US and the interdependent world we live in. Whether good or bad, this is how our world has evolved and we have to live in it. So my advice to you is to be positive, and start using the cheapest and broadest based advertising available to you - your website !

Clever thoughts

2008-11-21T15:55:00.001-04:00

No, I didn't think of these BUT they did make me think ...

The old approach to websites where we leave them hangin' for more information so that the customer will pick up the phone and call you, no longer applies. The customer will simply move on.

Your website is your full time dedicated sales person. It talks to more potential customers then you do in a day and all night !

If a potential traveller is sending you an email you can bet that all your competitors got the same email. Who will respond first? Who will respond best? The location that resolves the inquiry quickly and accurately will end up with the sale.

Just like your voice on the phone when talking to a customer, your website needs to be fresh, easy to understand, and provide timely information.

If you have timely advice that you would like to share, drop me a line at beth@@tianb.com

There's another tip for you, faking out your email address on the Internet avoids spam crawlers

beth (@)tianb.com
beth [@] tianb.com
beth at tianb.com

Commonalities

2008-11-14T10:13:00.001-04:00

What do Australia and Atlantic Canada have in common ?

Besides the obvious - coastal lands, culture, diversity, and a cloudy British heritage.

We are both desperately trying to educate our Tourism Operators about the benefits of being online !!

The National Online Strategy Committee funded by the the Australian State and Territory Tourism Office offers the same program as Tourism Technology.com funded by the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency.

So ask yourself - Why am I not taking advantage of this program?

We're not on the leading edge of this issue, we're in the running with all the other nations of the world.

And so you say to me - Well I'm not trying to lure tourists from Australia?

Correct. You're not. But imagine I went to Australia, I live in Nova Scotia and I went to Australia. I booked my entire trip online. It was great, and easy.

Now I want to spend the Labour Day weekend in New Brunswick.

Since I could book Australia online - surely I can book my "backyard" online.

Only I can't. I can't even find your website. And when I do, I can tell it's outdated.

How do I feel about that? I feel the stereotype that Atlantic Canada is behind the times creeping up on me. I feel that whomever I do find on the Internet deserves my business.

How do you feel ??

What's in a name?

2008-11-04T11:12:00.001-04:00

What do the following have in common?

Road Runner
Copper
Bluehome
Earthlink

Probably the last one gave it away - they are all American internet providers.

There are thousands of internet providers out there, each with their own proprietary email domains.

When you receive an email from a prospective tourist, you don't need to know their email to reply to them, the computer does it for you. I bet you don't even glance at it.

However for them to send you that email, especially if they type it manually, there's plenty of room for errors.

Just because you know how to spell "sympatico" doesn't mean you're average tourist does.
Just because you know that "nb.aibn.ca" is a common extension for Aliant business clients doesn't mean they know that.

Sign up for a hotmail.com email and forward it to your Outlook client.
Get a gmail.com account too.
Get a yahoo.ca and a yahoo.com

They are all free, and all easier to remember then the one you have now.

Even my mom knows Gmail :)

Friday is a great time for ...

2008-10-31T14:31:00.001-03:00

Every person has their favorite time of the week...we also have our least favorite times (Monday mornings !).

Friday is a great time for website updates, or just plain internet surfing. Strategic internet surfing.

For example, starting with the Travel Mole newsletter has lead me to
getsatisfaction.com
technorati.com
geckogo.com

What I'll do with the information gleened from those sites, I haven't decided. But I've made some notes, and organized them in my favorites.

Perhaps they will have their own blog post, perhaps they will go out in a Tourism Technology participants update...perhaps I will just sit on them for a while.

The point is today was a great day for doing that kind of stuff.

Pick a time of the week that is great for you and do your own internet browsing.

*Google your industry
*Wikipedia is another great starting point
*Haul out all those e-newsletters and start clicking

And take a journey of bits and bytes!

Beth

2008-10-24T13:46:00.001-03:00

Good coming from tragedy...

Thursday, October 23 there was a tragic fire at a famous NB attraction. The restaurant and theatre at Pays de la Sagouine burned to the ground.

To set the scene - the fire took place at night, just a couple of hours before midnight if that long.

Before midnight Thursday - someone had posted a video of the fire on You Tube.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GCs6diJN_YY

You can tell by the posted date, it was the SAME DAY as the fire. Most likely if you knew about the posting, you could have watched this video of the fire while the firemen were still fighting the fire.

What's the good that can come of this?

Harsh realization that the internet is quick and fast and sometimes dirty.
Someone is out there right now - blogging about your operation, chatting about your operation, posting a review of your operation, facebooking about your operation.

Right now.

And again.

And again.

You need to have a strong online presence. You need to google, you tube, twitter and flickr your operation periodically to see what's being written about you out there.

You need to have a comment section on your website so people will use your site to air their views. Manage your comments and I don't mean screen them. Post the negative comments, and then right after post what you are going to do about it ! Show new clients that you take comments seriously.

NOW is the time to get a professional looking website, and online reservation or ticketing service.

Don't wait any longer.
Beth

2008-09-30T11:03:00.002-03:00

Shift your spending to your website

Check out this great article from ISL in Halifax.

http://www.isl.ca/en/home/company/enewsletter/insitesept08/marketingbudgetunderpressure-shiftspendonline.aspx?utm_source=September%2Binsite&utm_medium=Email&utm_campaign=September%2BNewsletter

Next week, October 6-9, I'll be at Atlantic Canada Showcase in Moncton. If you're there stop in and meet the whole Tourism Technology crew at the Connection Centre.

http://www.atlanticanadashowcase.com/

And if I don't see you there,

Happy Thanksgiving

Beth

2008-09-22T09:37:00.001-03:00

Selling yourself on the Web !

In order to “sell” someone on coming to your B&B or cottage, tours, or even just a location, you have to make them think about what the experience could be if they were there. There are a few simple ways of doing this with your website and the internet.

Photos. Take photos of your operation every chance you get. Even if you aren’t a great photographer – and most people aren’t – hopefully you will be able to get a few nice photos every so often. With digital cameras, you can take as many photos as you please and then select the best ones for your website. You can crop them to get the sections of the photos that you want, and the best part is that photos only need to be 25% of the size that a newer digital camera produces. If you have a digital camcorder, you can select frames right out of the video. Remember to make sure someone is in that picture of the beach. If all we saw were photos of a property with no one there, we would wonder if anyone even visits that place! Take photos of people and families enjoying themselves and involved in the activities that you have to offer. These will sell them on you and your operation! If you feel that you still cannot acquire any quality photos, ask a friend or a professional to come and take some photos during the season. Either way, get some great photos and post them on your website.

Inviting Text. Write the text for your website so that it invites or describes what your cottage is like when they are there. Use the text to spur on their imagination. You want them to picture themselves sitting there on the deck of that cottage, overlooking the view of the beach and their children playing horseshoes in the yard in front of them. If you have a B&B, talk to them about the evenings that you and your guests sat down to a dinner, shared a bottle of local wine, and talked about your past experiences as if they were the neighbor that lives down the road. If you run a tour or experiential tourism product, sell them on the must see or must experience details of the tour or experience.

Talk about your property. Start a Blog, or a Facebook page. Send out emails or e-newsletters to past guests describing the new improvements to the property or if you have a local event or special that you think they might be interested in. Send out Christmas e-cards thanking them for their business that past year and that you hope to see them next year. Stay in contact with them (within reason and respect their privacy, of course) and they might consider you when they travel again, or better yet, refer you to their friends or families.

Get others to talk about you. Blogs, Facebook, Tripadvisor, Travbuddy, and other social media avenues create great exposure for you and your business. Encourage people to share their experiences of their stay with you. Word-of-mouth and recommendations from friends and family are one of the most influential factors in someone determining where to visit or stay when planning a vacation. Be remarkable! That not only goes back to you and your operation, but it also has to carry through to your website because even if your operation is remarkable, and your website isn’t, then you will never get the chance to show them.

Your website needs to be remarkable, and it has to sell that fact to the consumer the first time that they see your website. If not, the opposite is, well, forgettable, and that is not what you want to be!
If you would like to read the article I was referring to, please visit http://www.tipsfromthetlist.com/2008/03/marketing-your-small-tourism-business-in-the-21th-century-1-be-remarkable.html

Scheduling your website mentoring session

2008-09-09T15:52:00.001-03:00

Greetings,

As September hits us and we reflect on the summer past, perhaps now is the time to think about refreshing your website.

Just a little note to let you know that I am still available to do sessions, in fact they will be ongoing until April 2009

Drop me an email or give me a call to see when I can make the trip to your area.

I will review your current site and give you some pointers. I try to point out items that can be done right away and items that will need a bigger budget or are part of a long term technology plan.

I will also go over current trends in the tourism online market, and leave you with a manual so that you can either show your developer or review it while you are talking to your developer.

All for $125

Looking forward to hearing from you,
Beth

506-451-0173
beth(@)tianb.com

Choosing an SEO provider

2008-08-11T11:24:00.001-03:00

I found this great article on tips for choosing an Search Engine Optimization provider.

Since I always recommend that SEO be done by a professional, here are the tips for choosing the best one for your needs.

Click here to read the article

Website Magazine is a great resource for articles and helpful tips, check out their other articles.

Regards,
Beth

Google Tools

2008-07-28T14:44:00.001-03:00

You owe it to yourself and your business to check out the assortment of FREE Google Tools.

Trade up from your old NB Tel email with it's limitations and sign up for a free GMAIL email account. Lots of storage, ability to receive and send lots of attachments. Lots of valuable user names left.

Which do you imagine is easier for a consumer to remember "nb.nbnet.com" or "gmail.com", or even "hotmail.com"? Especially if they are coming from outside New Brunswick! And that goes double for "nb.aibn.com" - lots of opportunity for typos with that one.

Embed a GOOGLE CALENDAR into your site. If your operation depends on the tides or a certain departure time, enter that data into a Google Calendar - a benefit of your new Gmail email account - and then publish it to your website. Or have your developer help you embed the code into your website. Google provides the code!

Setup GOOGLE ANALYTICS on your website. The easiest and most informative website statistics package out there - and it's free! Google provides the code and you get your developer to insert it on your website. You can configure it to send you weekly reports to your email account - and since you're now using Gmail you can keep weeks worth of reports.

And that's not all.

There is plenty of freeware out there that can make you more efficient and put more information about your tourism operation into the hands of the online consumer.

Check it out at http://www.google.ca/intl/en/options/

Regards,
Beth