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Social Media Starter Moves for Tourism

chrisbrogan · April 15, 2009 ·

I’m in Wellington, New Zealand. This picture was snapped at the Maranui Surf Life Saving Club, which is not only a club but a great way to get lunch. Many of the people here at the Marketing Now! conference are from the tourism industry, and are seeking ways to bring New Zealanders and Australians to the various destinations they are promoting. Their questions to me during breaks was how to get started. Here’s my take. I want your take in comments and follow-on blog posts.

Social Media Starter Moves for Tourism

First Steps
Before dipping into social media, let’s assume that your basic strategy is to build awareness and drive purchases of vacation experiences to your destinations. Awareness and sales. Easy to do. For our first steps, let’s focus on determining where your people are online and start listening to what they’re talking about.

  • Begin listening today. Here’s a step-by-step guide to grow bigger ears. That’s how the Roger Smith Hotel found me!
  • Comment frequently where you find contact. Here’s a crash course in comments.
  • Tinker with search queries to find how to discover people who might benefit from hearing from you. I made a sample query here.

Now that you know how to listen, how to comment, and how to search for new people, you’ve got a sense of the online landscape. What should come next is a conversation internally about how to engage, what conversations you want to have, what actions you hope people might take next, which social tools to use, and how you might use them.

Potential Engagement Ideas

Let’s assume that what you want most is to find people talking about coming to your area (or looking for ideas on a vacation destination), and then you want to equip them to have an even better time. You’re going to build a relationship where you will trade some information and maybe even some special access in exchange for the hope of better exposure to the experience after the fact. Let’s talk about that a bit more.
Let’s say you are responsible for encouraging visits to the local volcano. You have a typical tour that runs, and you also sometimes run “special” tours for visiting dignitaries. How much expense is there in running the special tour for people you engage via the web? If this answer is “not much,” do it.
On another thread, and they’re related, let’s say that your hope is that you’ll get even more people to come to your volcano. One way to do this is to equip others to share the information. This doesn’t take as much work as you think.

  • Print a small business card and post it at useful locations. On the card, invite people to share their media. Invite them to use Flickr or YouTube or other sharing sites. Make a simple tag for reference and put it on the card. Maybe it’s “whiteisland” for the White Island volcano here in New Zealand. Thus, you can search on the tag and find what people put up.
  • Encourage video and photo sharing on your site. Get permission to post the best of what you find, and ask people if you can use people’s names or website URLs or whatever (to promote them back for helping you).
  • Always be attentive for which bloggers or media makers are visiting your region and invite them to better access to your attractions. If you have a consortium of businesses or destinations, do what you can to network up a relationship amongst as many as possible. Share the potential experience coverage all the way around.

Is this making sense so far? Nothing major, and yet, it’s something you might not yet be doing.

Tidy Up Your Web Presence

I think there’s room for improvement in most tourism-related sites that I sampled. First and foremost, when I say this, I don’t mean “go spend tons of money.” I mean, make it easier for people to connect, communicate, get information, and do what you need them to do.
If you’re looking to encourage people to interact with your destinations, consider making your site something more interactive. I visited a few tourism sites from folks here in New Zealand and what I found was that they’re fairly cookie cutter and that they don’t really give me a sense of what I should do next. Let’s talk about what your site might do (and if you’re really daring, consider scrapping your existing site entirely and putting up a customized blog instead). Cost for this in the US at least is cheap, like $2000 – $4000 USD for a really decent job.
Here’s a potential “site flow” for what your site should be doing for you:

  • Easy access to humans. Make contact information (in MANY formats) ubiquitous. Besides a “contact” page, have something really clear in a corner somewhere (like a sidebar) with a name or two to contact, a telephone number, an email address, and if you’re really cutting edge, your twitter handle.
  • Simple “ask.” If you’re asking people to book reservations to your destination, make that the MOST OBVIOUS thing to do on the site. If you’re asking people to visit a group of destinations, then make a downloadable PDF list of contact and direction details.
  • Ways to collaborate/participate. Allow for comments, testimonials, ways to link up to things. In fact, be daring and allow people to comment negatively if they have a problem. Solve the problem in public, and I promise you that you’ll see a positive response from that.
  • Make things to give away. Like I mentioned above about the downloadable PDF, give people things to take with them: an audio tour (easily recorded with podcasting technology), a list of great videos to watch and/or embed on their own sites (to show off to their friends). Give people things, and they’ll be glad for it.

Convert the Physical to the Digital

Here’s one of the biggest magic tricks of them all: when you share things that are typically only experienced in person with others, it gives ideas handles such that others can take those ideas and run with them. For example, if you put on an event around the Colossal Squid at the Te Papa museum here in Wellington, if you get the local video coverage, that only goes local. If you’re looking for more outreach (like, say, getting everyone in Melbourne to come and visit), you need to go digital and spread things.

  • Hand out a dozen Flip Mino video cameras. Encourage people to shoot the event from their own perspective. Encourage them to interview each other. Have kids shoot their questions for scientists, and maybe then have scientists shoot their responses. Share it on your site, and encourage follow-on participation and Q&A.
  • Encourage photography and hand out both a potential tag ( not sure what I mean? See here) and also maybe an email address where to send photos. Ask people for permission to use them, and/or whether the person has a URL they want promoted when sharing the content.
  • Invite bloggers and build special information into the events. Don’t just look for bloggers that write specifically about the topic at hand. For example, with the Colossal Squid, you could invite Science Fiction bloggers to talk about their interpretations on the squid for fiction. Invite art bloggers to talk about it. Invite foodies and throw a calamari tasting around the squid. Never stop at the straightforward when the tangential can be so much more fun.

Time for Your Ideas

Maybe you’re in tourism and you want to tell me about a specific challenge. Maybe you’re on the tourist side of this conversation. I’d love to have a larger discussion. What do you think? What else do you want? What experiences have you had with social media and tourism?

Business, How To, Marketing, Social Media, Strategy, Technology

Social Media Starter Moves for Small Town Small Businesses

chrisbrogan · May 23, 2008 ·

Today, a guest post, by one of my earliest social media friends and business partners:

Social Media Starter Moves for Small Town Small Businesses

By Becky McCray
Small town businesses have some fundamental differences from our big city counterparts. But our relative isolation doesn’t mean we don’t have a use for social media tools. To the contrary, small town professionals have the most to gain from making new connections. Liz Strauss was kind enough to let me tell some of the reasons why over at Successful Blog. To follow up, here are some starter moves to help you get connected to the larger world.

Twitter to make connections

Yes, I know you’re heard that Twitter can be an enormous time sink. But only if you treat it that way. If you treat it as a way to meet people, to expand your horizons, to learn from others, and to feel connected, you can make it a useful tool for your business. I recommend you start by adding a handful of people, and let your network grow organically. Start with me; I’m @beckymccray, and I love to connect with other small town folks. Check Twitter Packs for more people in your industry or in your state. Share cool discoveries, information, and just connect on a human level. Twitter does not require (or deserve) constant attention. You can check in a few times a day, or monitor it more or less in the background while you work on something else. I’ve been known to let friends on Twitter keep me company while I’m doing my least-favorite bookkeeping chores. And yes, I’ve made and strengthened valuable business and personal connections at Twitter.

Blog to position yourself as an expert

Part of what makes a small town special is the sense of community, and that’s what blogging does at its best. Find the blogs already talking about your field, and start reading and commenting. Then start your own blog, telling stories. While your small town business may not pick up paying clients from your blogging, you will be learning new skills, improving your writing, and making connections with people interested in your field. Read the Starter Moves for Freelancers to learn more about making your blog business-like.

Facebook to reach the community

Even in my home town of 5000 people, there is a healthy group of Facebook users. I just got an invitation to join the community summer band, via Facebook. I’m also seeing small town people using Facebook as a tool to remain connected even as they spread out around the country. By staying active yourself, you can make and keep connections based on this natural geographic affinity. Another option are the local community websites. In your town, you might find people online at the local newspaper site, an independent community forum, or even on a local business’s website. The disadvantage? These are usually hotbeds of local politics. Use caution.

Experiment to learn

Use Flickr to connect with your local photo enthusiasts. Sign up with Utterz to give on-the-spot reports. (I would so love to see an ag commodity report on Utterz! “We’re live at the Woodward Stockyards…” ) Use Operator11, Ustream or Blog TV to share meetings, trainings, or build a networking group across distance. Your goal is not to be on every single network out there. Your goal is to try the tools that could work for your business, or even for your clients, and learn them. Drop the ones that don’t help you. And remember that it’s not all about getting business, it’s also about connection, learning and thinking.

Share your secrets

What tools are you finding the most useful for building connections? Share in the comments, and if you are from a small town, be sure to shout about it!
Tomorrow at Small Biz Survival, I’ll have four examples of people who live in small towns and use social media to build their connections.
Written by Becky McCray

Blogging, Business, Community, Social Media

Social Media Starter Moves for Entrepreneurs

chrisbrogan · April 3, 2008 ·

This could be considered a “backwards” post. I tend to talk from the perspective of a user of technology, but I am writing this one for the point of view of people who might be seeking to build new tools, to join the social software scene. I love entrepreneurs, and I enjoy the notion of building new, amazing things. But I do want you to think about this space, too.
If you’re NOT building a social network or platform, stick around. I want YOU to tell folks your thoughts, too.
The Platforms We’re Using
I’m definitely not going to list out every social network and social media tool, but I do want you to understand a bit about HOW we’re using these tools, so I’ll mention a few.

  • MySpace or Facebook – Not just for kids any more. The grown-ups I know use both of these services for roughly the same thing: connecting with people they already know and making some new connections.
  • LinkedIn – Business social networking, and the top of the heap. It’s getting a little more interesting, because of their status stream, and the redesign.
  • Twitter – Not everyone’s on there, but we’re more on there than Pownce and Jaiku. Why? It’s not because it’s better. It’s just because we’re all still there, because it’s simple, because it solves a lot of needs.
  • Flickr – We’re sharing photos on Flickr and SmugMug.
  • YouTube – We’re sharing video on YouTube and Blip.tv and a few dozen smaller places.
  • Digg – We’re getting news from Digg and Reddit and SlashDot, and there are lots of new upstarts for specific niches. We seem to like these sites because they let the crowd vote on what’s newsworthy to US as a niche.

So that’s some of what we’re interested in. You’ll certainly want to add places and tools into the comments section, so that we can get those called out, too.
The Marketplace Overall
I’d say the barrier to getting me to join a new social network is getting higher and higher. If you’re doing a business network, I’m already using LinkedIn. If you’re building a place for friends to connect, Facebook in all its annoyance still handles that enough-ish, and Twitter handles it great.
What comes next for networks? Velvet rope. Lots of it. I think the next step (and this was once prophesied by Eric Rice somewhere) is something closer to an anti-social network, or more accurately, a professional social network. Want to see a top shelf example? Check out Sermo, a social network for physicians. I met with Daniel Palenstrant, the founder, recently and he’s a smart cookie. He’s got a great product and he knows it.
What about tools?
Social Media Tools
There are lots of overlap experiences going on at the moment. For instance, there’s an entire social information aggregation space, all with different spins. There’s Lijit for search, FriendFeed for aggregation, and then maybe a dozen variations on the theme thereafter. Check out Louis Gray‘s site for TONS of these types of apps. (Good guy, Louis).
There’s Blog Talk Radio and Talkshoe offering phone-to-podcast experiences with different twists (and I’m friendly with both companies, and they’re both full of great people).
We have Twitter/Pownce/Jaiku. We have Utterz for the multimedia-meets-phone. We have Qik and Seesmic and a flavor in between.
In blogging software and content platforms, we have WordPress, Drupal, Tumblr, Blogger, Joomla, TypePad, LiveJournal, and another million opportunities.
There are MANY tools. So then, what is the barrier to entry with either another tool or network?
High. Challenging. Difficult.
So What Do We Want?
This is your turn to answer. What do you think is necessary out there? What do you want built to suit YOUR world? How can an entrepreneur turn your head and get your attention? What would lure you off your platforms right now, or what aren’t your existing tools covering for you?
The comments section of this post will far outweigh the value of the post itself, so remember to click through to [chrisbrogan.com].
The Social Media 100 is a project by Chris Brogan dedicated to writing 100 useful blog posts in a row about the tools, techniques, and strategies behind using social media for your business, your organization, or your own personal interests. Swing by [chrisbrogan.com] for more posts in the series, and if you have topic ideas, feel free to share them, as this is a group project, and your opinion matters.
Get the entire series by subscribing to this blog, and subscribe to my free newsletter here.

Blogging, Business, Chris Brogan, How To, Social Media, Technology

Social Media Starter Moves for Entertainers

chrisbrogan · March 31, 2008 ·


Twitter brought me a really special gift a month or two back, in the shape of Grace Nikae. She’s a concert pianist who is exploring the use of social media to build relationships with her audience and fans of music. In imagining how I’d advise someone who was a professional entertainer to use social media, I doubt that I could find someone more accomplished at reaching into social media than Grace. Let’s explore a bit.
Blog Behind the Scenes
Grace has a great blog called Stretching Intervals, which is a perfect mix of what goes on behind the scenes, as well as information about what it’s like to be a pianist. She writes posts that are worthy of being full fledged journalistic articles, and yet, they’re very approachable and readable.
By blogging what’s on her mind, Grace gives her fans, aspiring pianists, professional women, and anyone else who wants to know what it’s like to be a busy creative and professional a glimpse of what we all want to know.
Share a Little
Grace provides links to her YouTube videos, to photos on Flickr, and to other little tidbits all through her website. It gives you a sense of what she’s about, her style, and a peek at what you’re missing if you don’t go to her concerts. Sure there’s a store and other things you’d expect from a professional musician, but if you fault her for that, you’re crazy. After watching/listening to her YouTube videos, I plan on picking up her debut solo album, Fantasies, myself. : )
Stretch Out
Grace also maintains a presence on Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, and a few other social sites, and though it’s a bit challenging to maintain it all, I’ve seen her have conversations on Twitter, and have been privy to several thoughtful comments on my blog. So she’s managing to find a little time to cover some thoughts and have conversations with people well outside her typical sphere of the world of a pianist.
Will it be fruitful? I guess Grace will have to tell us in several months whether all this social media brought her a different experience than before she started using it.
For Entertainers
Musicians and comics know that MySpace is a viable place to meet new audiences, build community, and promote your performances. Dane Cook made a good chunk of his career’s launch off MySpace’s mechanisms. Facebook isn’t as effective for performers, but I know that more folks are coming over to try it out. Twitter? It’s not exactly teeming with celebrities, but savvy folks like Grace are trying it out, so we’ll see how that turns out. My advice?

  • Do this social media yourself. Don’t use an assistant.
  • Communicate two-way. Just blurting out your calendar isn’t going to win you friends.
  • Be just as much about other people as you are yourself.
  • Give us peeks behind the scenes.
  • Share a little something.
  • Don’t get lost in all this stuff, as your real product is your performances.

We have lots of talented and upcoming performers and entertainers in our midst, several of whom already use these tools to great effect. Is it having an impact on their career? Will these tools benefit the mainstream stars as much as it does those who have a built-in appeal to the social media set? Time will tell.
What other advice could we give entertainers with regards to social media? What’s your take?
The Social Media 100 is a project by Chris Brogan dedicated to writing 100 useful blog posts in a row about the tools, techniques, and strategies behind using social media for your business, your organization, or your own personal interests. Swing by [chrisbrogan.com] for more posts in the series, and if you have topic ideas, feel free to share them, as this is a group project, and your opinion matters.
Get the entire series by subscribing to this blog, and subscribe to my free newsletter here.

Blogging, Business, Chris Brogan, Community, Social Media

Social Media Starter Moves for Real Estate

chrisbrogan · March 27, 2008 ·

houseDisclaimer right up front: I’m not in the real estate biz, so I’ll write this from the perspective of what I’ve observed and what might be useful. Some REAL real estate pro can come and fix this on their own blog, and it’d likely be better. Why would I ever let a simple thing like inexperience get in the way of sharing my opinion?
Show Me the House
The first and most obvious thing I think the real estate world can (and should) be doing is buying video cameras and shooting their own walkthroughs. You don’t have to be a pro. You DO have to know how not to make something look horrible, but that comes with trial and error.
Pick up a Video Camera
If you don’t already own a video camera, two ends of the spectrum that I’d recommend for realtors are:
Sanyo Xacti VPC-E1 for a nicer rig (around $400) , or the Flip Video Ultra Series Camcorder for around $160.
The Xacti is a higher end picture. The Flip is YouTube quality. Honestly, the Flip is the camera for the job, but some folks want the best, so it’s up to you. Me? I’d buy the Flip. (Personally, I use a digital camera’s movie setting to shoot most of my stuff).
Editing
Now, to actually do it, you have two options: learn how to edit things easily in iMovie (Mac) or Windows Media Maker (PC), or pay someone to edit what you shoot. Benefits of A are that you can do it when you need it and your time is all you pay. Benefits of B are that the editor will be good at what they do, will save you time, and will know what to do next. Drawback of B is that it costs and you have no control of when you get back your files, depending on how professional your person is.
Posting the Video
Last step to putting a video up is to find hosting for the video so that you can then embed it on your blog. YouTube makes sense for two reasons. One, it’s easy and most people can navigate it. Two, it becomes a second market for your homes if you’ve added captions at the end that show how to contact you.
If you want a different look and feel from YouTube, you can try Blip.tv, Brightcove, Vimeo and a gazillion other companies who host video and have a nifty player.
I could probably write a series on just how to add video to your world, but I’m in the middle of another series, so let’s leave it there for now. If you want helping DOING any of this, let me know and I’ll point you to the right resources.
Ways Your Blog Will Help
First, blogging about certain properties you’re hoping to move will give you an obvious potential return, but that might be limited. Instead, think of what buyers and sellers might need to know, and what they might need to know about you. You’re likely going to weigh this information heavily on the sell side, and that’s okay, so make your website a great place to learn about things like “curb appeal” and how to declutter a home for better show-ability. Give people ideas that have added thousands back to the sale price of your clients’ homes.
Testimonials
People are so itchy about asking for testimonials. Don’t be. Ask. Ask your clients with whom you’ve had a great business experience to comment. Want to get really edgy? Be willing to post someone’s negative comments about your business with them, and don’t be defensive. Instead, just thank them.
The Secret Sauce
As a media maker, you can do things that will add to one’s impressions of a potential new home. You can shoot video of the general neighborhood, add Flickr photos of some selling points of the town, record audio reports of people’s general feelings of the town. Can you imagine the impact that might make? You could potentially take a “normal looking” house and demonstrate the value of the home’s setting through media.
Will everyone care? No. WIll you have a chance to reach more folks? I’m betting yes.
What’s your take?
—
The Social Media 100 is a project by Chris Brogan dedicated to writing 100 useful blog posts in a row about the tools, techniques, and strategies behind using social media for your business, your organization, or your own personal interests. Swing by [chrisbrogan.com] for more posts in the series, and if you have topic ideas, feel free to share them, as this is a group project, and your opinion matters.
Get the entire series by subscribing to this blog, and subscribe to my free newsletter here.

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Blogging, Business, Chris Brogan, How To, Social Media, Technology

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