Say "No" to Blogger Payola!

FTC is Coming Down on Blogger/Tweeter Payola – From Queensland to Oregon and Scottsdale to Disney, destinations of all types and sizes are using bloggers (as they should) in their marketing outreach strategy.    In an effort to ensure that bloggers  are transparent and authentic about their intentions, the FTC recently voted to update its endorsement guidelines (pdf) and put an end to “blogger payola“.  These rule revisions require bloggers to “clearly disclose any ‘material connection’ to an advertiser, including payments for an endorsement or free product.”     While these guidelines are non-binding and have raised interesting legal questions,  we applaud these  FTC rule changes—the first in nearly 30 years—because it is an undeniable recognition of the legitimacy of social media and a genuine effort to crackdown on unscrupulous advertisers who’re bringing us all disrepute anyway.   Face it, bloggers you hire should be already be disclosing their relationships to products and places they write about.   The prospect of an $11,000 fee might just be the incentive to end this wild west mentality. >>Full Story

Where Are the Clickers?! – We can’t help but be obsessed with analytics and measuring online engagement.   ComScore recently updated the aforementioned “Natural Born Clickers” study and we’re not surprised by the results.  According to the new study,  the “number of people online who click display ads has dropped 50% in less than two years, and only 8% of internet users account for 85% of all clicks.”

The silver lining however is that clicks are just one measure of success; this study also finds that consumers who’re exposed to display ads have consistently proven to conduct more searches than those who’ve not and that display ads are stronger when paired up with search. This reaffirms the silent clickers study we reported on a few weeks ago.   >>Full Story

On the Internets, Critics Are Nice  - If you’re still feeling apprehensive about allowing consumers to rate your hotels and review your attractions, rest easy. According to this recent Wall Street Journal article, “when consumers write online reviews, they tend to leave positive ratings; the average grade for things online is about 4.3 stars out of five”. This positivity is pervasive in the travel industry as well; TripAdvisor’s average review is a “4″ and well over 90% of the reviews on GoSeeOregon.com are positive. But are consumers going to run from reviews and ratings if they become nothing but a sea of positivity?  Probably not, but they’ll most likely start to become skeptical of these “reviews” in general.  A broader and balanced range of opinions gives consumers a more complete view of a business and many sites are taking steps to counter this.   Consider:

• Trip Advisor posted warnings that some of its hotel reviews may have been written by hotel managers
• e-Bay raised minimum standards; 4.3 out of 5- stars is not the new “minimum service standard”
• Amazon highlights “the most helpful critical review” at the top of its reviews page
• The GoSee review sites uses a peer-credibility rating (trustiness) to rate the reviewers

>>Full Story

I am pretty sure we only have one.

(Editor’s Note: The following blog post was first published on Tnooz.com.  This is the author’s original post.)

When approached to become one of the initial contributors to Tnooz I was understandably flattered and naturally began thinking about my first post.  What is my agenda for the site, what do I say, what is my voice, my goal, my cause, what will I write about?  Those of you who know me well are already aware of what drives my personal ambition as well as my writing:  travel, technology and the environment.

And while future posts, articles and theoretical ramblings will present a stronger focus on tourism technology, I felt it appropriate to address a larger subject.  Global, if you will.

At present, while you sit at your desk or check in on your various RSS feeds via the ubiquitous Blackberry, the world is changing.  At grassroots gatherings and worldwide summits, such as the recent Climate Week in New York City, thousands of our peers are addressing the issue of our time…climate change.

I submit to you that climate change is not simply an issue for Greenpeace and the United Nations; it is now an issue for you, for us and for our industry.  The time has arrived to lend our voice to the congregation and become a part of the solution.  The travel industry…utilizing technology…can help lead the way.

Sounds good you say, but how?  And furthermore, why?  Why us?  Why me?

All of us love (or should love) to travel.  We travel to see the world, to experience different cultures and to embrace the variety of natural wonders that exist on our wide-ranging planet.  Beyond that wonderful and sugar-coated fact, we sell destinations and, for the most part, we sell the natural surroundings that exist in these destinations.

Our budgets, profits, local taxes, salaries, families, friends and bankers depend on the revenues that are generated due to the splendors of these amazing sites.  On top of that, our jobs depend on the environment that we sell so eagerly to willing travelers.  That fact alone should be enough cause for you to read on, regardless of personal opinion.

But, as quickly as these wonders of the world are being discovered by the masses, they are at risk of being destroyed due to a changing climate.

The crumbling and deteriorating ruins throughout Greece and Egypt are under attack by the acid rain produced, in part, by exhaust of the rental cars and buses that bring thousands of tourists to these marvels in the first place.

Or, take the first 90 degree day in the Valley of the Sun… Phoenix…a location from which I speak with experience.  According to yearly reading from NOAA, the first 90 degree day in Phoenix over the past 25 years is, on average, April 1st, however when isolating the last 10 years, that date jumps to March 29^th.  On paper, only a two day difference, but in terms of evolutionary time, those two days (over such a short period) represent a large shift in climate patterns.

As you can imagine, it becomes difficult to sell the idea of a lovely alfresco lunch when the temperature reaches 120 degrees.  Trust me; all the misting systems in the world will not cool you down.

Perhaps the most startling and troubling example of this disastrous trend is the tiny nation of Maldives.  The archipelago lies just off the coast of India and is literally being washed off of the map due to our lack of action on such issues as capping carbon emissions.

And the list goes on…drought in Australia, an overpopulation of pine beetles in Colorado and much of the Rocky Mountain West as well as glaciers disappearing from mainland Europe.

The destination that we sell is being destroyed, or at best, becoming nearly unrecognizable.

But we have a green program, you say.

Nothing more than talk, I say.

Sure, you have a couple of recycling cans in the office, perhaps you even buy locally grown produce for your restaurant and let us not forget about that expensive ‘We are Green’ brochure on your website.

Kudos, perhaps the people of the Maldives can build rafts out of those shiny new brochures and sail off to a new island home.

We need to do more.

We need to be at the head of the table, providing real and tangible ideas and solutions for our community to survive.

Solutions like the E-Move Charging Station in Denmark.   The newly unveiled carbon offset kiosk at SFO.  Bicycle exchange programs such as the successful experiment in Paris.  Recycling programs like RAFT in Denver, which provides school supplies to teachers from leftover convention materials.

We need to use technology to educate our consumers about the natural beauty that surrounds them and what we, as the travel industry, are doing to protect it on the local level.

We need to stop printing guides, materials and mailers that consumers do not want and start thinking about how our decisions can be improved with technology and how that technology can improve the natural world.

Simple answers do not exist in this post or topic.  This is a serious issue that calls for serious and thoughtful solutions, which unfortunately cannot be provided in a nice, neat bulleted list.

However, I can provide one solution for this paradox that I have so willingly unleashed on these virgin pages.  We, the travel industry, need to start talking.

We need to start talking to each other, to our consumers, to our peers, to our politicians and to the world.  All too often we spend endless hours discussing the best way to entice visitors to our destinations without even mentioning or blatantly ignoring such issues as air quality, carbon offsets and the potential for environmental damage.  We have trained ourselves to focus on short-term gains and let someone else worry about long-term effects.

Technology is standing by and ready to make an impact on more than the way we communicate with tourists.  Technology is ready to help us change the future.  We simply need to start the conversation.

If you have made it this far into the post, then congrats, I can assure you that future rants will provide more actionable solutions than the previous novel.  And we will certainly talk at length about Twitter, AR, GIS, GDS and every other techie acronym that we can think of, but this subject is beyond important.   It is a personal cause of mine and one I felt compelled to share with our new readers and friends.

I leave you with one final thought.

It is our responsibility to protect and preserve the destination that we sell to millions of travelers each and every day.  It is time we accepted this monumental task and stopped providing excuses.

Otherwise, our children might have no other choice except to visit the Maldives on Wikipedia.

Troy Thompson is a featured contributor for Tnooz.  Follow his posts, articles and stories at Tnooz.com.

The Denver Zoo on Google Place Pages.

Late in the afternoon on Friday, Google quietly rolled out a new Google Maps product aimed at creating a richer map browsing experience for the consumer.  Enter Google Place Pages, exit Yelp.  The new offering is nothing short of a reference library for every place on the planet.

Yeah, not just the U.S., not just businesses, everything.  Or from the Google Blog post on the subject: there are Place Pages for businesses, points of interest, transit stations, neighborhoods, landmarks and cities all over the world.

So, pretty much everything.

Keep in mind, Google does not create content, they collect, parse and repackage data for easy use.  Which explains the integration of transit times, photos, reviews (from sites such as CitySearch and TripAdvisor) as well as user-generated maps in the new offering.

As for Yelp.  Although the Google service is literally hours old the pundits are calling for an end, or at best a strong challenge, for everyone’s favorite local review site.  Will Yelp wither and die?  Probably not, however considering Google’s enormous reach, the new Place Pages offering has a good shot to replace Yelp at the top of the local review site mountain.

Ironically, by pulling in reviews from sites just like Yelp.

As a tourism marketer, what does Place Pages mean for you?

It means you should check out your Place Page quickly.

While the full Google Blog post on the subject includes how to information on updating a listing, we figured it would be best to save you some time.

1. If you own or work for a business, get to the Google Local Business Center and claim your listing now.
2. If you are a place, such as Denver, you can edit some content via the community edits feature, but for the most part the business listings within your destination roll up into your page.  Meaning you need to educate your partners on Step 1 above, rather than trying to quickly add photos to Panoramio.

Case in point, a quick search for the Denver Zoo…consistently one of the most popular attractions in Denver (and a heck of a zoo!)…had this lovely little message just below the title:

This place is permanently closed.

Yeah, you just said a four letter word in your head and you don’t even work for the Denver Zoo.  Which word is a personal preference.

Needless to say the zoo is in fact not closed and open every day of the year.  But, if one was looking for more information about this attraction on Google Place Pages that fact might not be so clear.

Moral of the story, finish reading this article and start Googling your business ASAP.

Finally, yes, this is another online location where you have to ‘own’ your business.  However, unlike every other new local site, Google is in a league all its own.  Keep monitoring and maintaining your businesses on sites such as Yelp, Urbanspoon and TripAdvisor, but go ahead and add Google to the top of that list.

And fast.

(Editor’s Note: We have submitted a change request for the incorrect status of the Denver Zoo on Google Place Pages.  At time of publishing, the change was pending.)

Get it? Nooz instead of news.

A few weeks ago a good friend and colleague of mine, Kevin May (formerly of Travolution) sent yours truly an odd and cryptic little email in reference to a new venture.  Never missing an opportunity to tell a Gunners fan that Liverpool is four places above them in the table (sorry American readers, football talk), I gladly accepted.  After a fantastic conversation, I gratefully agreed to join the writing / contribution team at Tnooz.

Before we get too far into a conversation about Tnooz, let’s cover what this means for Travel 2.0 and my day job.  Essentially, nothing.  Still writing and editing  for Travel 2.0.  Still working days at VISIT DENVER.  The only difference is that a few stories will appear exclusively on Tnooz before being posted on Travel 2.0.

Honestly, it is a great opportunity to tell a global audience what to do.

As for the team at Tnooz, it is quite a collaboration of some of the most thoughtful and experimental minds in our industry today.

• Alex Bainbridge
• Charlie Li
• Claude Bénard
• Dennis Schaal
• Frederic Lalonde
• Jeremy Head
• Kevin May
• Siew Hoon Yeoh
• Stephan Ekbergh
• Stephen Joyce
• Tim Hughes
• Troy Thompson

Needless to say, I am honored to be included in such an esteemed group.

So, update your bookmarks, subscribe to another RSS feed to your reader and friend another tweeter on Twitter…add Tnooz to your list of must read travel and tourism websites.

Oh, and be sure to read my first post: How the Travel Industry Will Save the World.  A call for everyone in the travel industry to address climate change.

Well kiss my grits, that is a beehive.

Utah Rolls Out a New Look – Our neighbors to the West have introduced a new, and fully-functioning version, of Utah.travel…just in time for the ski season push in the Beehive State.  I know, beehive…look it up.  After using a heavily modified splash page, for what seemed like years, the team at the Utah Office of Tourism has built upon their unique look and introduced a very eye-pleasing and brand accurate site.  Here is what we like, or at least find intriguing:

• What appears to be a strong tie to the online (nxtbook) Official Visitors Guide in lieu of traditional website listings.  While we love this idea, we are also concerned about the paradox that it creates…going online to find listings, only to be sent to an online version of a printed book whose value and usability is declining as an actual printed version.  Yeah, crazy.
• The appearance and overall feel.  It feels like Utah.  Kudos.
• The weather icon and options.  Love that look, although, we think MSNBC had it first.
• Social Media integration.  Although it feels like the default for any ‘new’ site, you still have to admire the integration with Flickr and YouTube.  And, to a lesser extent, Twitter and Facebook.
• Testimonials from other sites.  Finally!  Someone else has heard the calls from the mountain top and responded.  We have talked about it before, travelers don’t trust DMOs and CVBs.  The answer, put testimonials from TripAdvisor and Virtual Tourist right on the freaking homepage.  Simple, but brilliant.

Overall, good job Utah.  We wanted a little more content, but can appreciate the strides you made in this update.  B+

http://www.utah.travel/

Miami Gets a Facelift…Literally – In speaking with a local colleague of mine recently, he pointed out the current version of the Miami site.  After regaling me with the story, I was intrigued.  Surely, this cannot be true….oh, but it is.  On the surface, the ‘new’ Miami (and Beaches) site looks good.  Great imagery, clean navigation…plus, I see some social links.  Good stuff.  But, as with so many things in Miami, the beauty is only skin deep.  One click, try ‘Visitors‘ for fun, takes you to an unfamiliar and haunting location of cluttered navigation, bright colors and too much information squeezed into a size 1 dress.

After learning how not to create blinking text, the next lesson in website creation school is not to change the wireframe of your site from page to page.  Users don’t like it.

Perhaps this is simply a measured roll out of the new Miami site, to be honest we are not 100% sure.  We certainly do not want to punish Miami for what could be a planned execution.  However, in either case, they might want to add a full website update to the ‘to-do’ list.

Oh, and P.S.  What is up with the intro graphics on the ’splash’ page?  They look great, but upon closer inspection, the reflection of the models sunglasses actually moves and changes.  Free design tip to anyone and everyone in marketing, graphic design and website development:  stop it with the reflection in the sunglasses trick.  We have seen it before and you can stop using it.  Thanks.

http://www.miamiandbeaches.com/

Social Media Measurement Lags Adoption – Is there anything bigger in the marketing and advertising world right now than social media?  Everyone is trying to get as many friends as possible to follow them on facetwitspace.  While this euphoria of social wonderment continues on the fourth floor, up in the executive suite they really want to see some numbers showing the success of these programs.  The old ‘it’s branding’ line is getting old.  Alas, according to recent stats, no one has a clue on how to measure all these tweets.

Despite widespread adoption of social media, measurement still lags. Only 16% of those polled said they currently measured ROI for their social media programs. More than four in 10 respondents did not even know whether the social tools they were using had ROI measurement capabilities.

http://www.emarketer.com/

What’s Next Is Now Here! Just weeks after we told you to keep watching for AR, it is what’s next, we’re were excited to read on Mashable yesterday about the first mobile application for AR.     Yelp’s latest iPhone app update has a hidden feature that allows users to iPhone users (3Gs only), to shake their phone three times and turn on a view called the “Monocle”.  The Monocle uses the phone’s built in GPS and compass features to let users simply point in any given direction and see an overlay of Yelp content for restaurants, bars and nearby businesses. As we wrote last week, this is a fairly basic but powerful illustration of you can leverage your rich online content to make the travel experience more meaningful…and not to mention infinitely easier! Just imagine being able to walk down a street and pointing your phone at a restaurant, a museum exhibit or anything else for that matter and getting access to a wealth of information about what you’re looking at.

For a video of how this works, check out this video courtesy of our friends at Mashable.

(Watching via email? The video is also here.)

Augmented Reality Is What Is Next – ‘AR’ for short.  We certainly did not coin the term or even break the first story about AR, but the possibilities of AR seem to be an excellent answer to one of the more popular questions that Mo and I get asked frequently…so, what is next?

Honestly people, can’t you just be happy with Twitter?

Well, we have talked previously about the Semantic Web and it’s theorized implications on travel, but never about AR.  However, this post from ReadWriteWeb and video from the firm developing this nifty little app seemed like the perfect introduction of AR to our readers.  So, what is AR?  Basically, it is adding a layer of information to the real world (around you), using technology.  Watch the video, visuals help.

(Watching via email?  The video is also here.)

Pretty amazing, right?  If you did not watch the video, at least watch the first couple of seconds.

So, you can begin to see the basic idea…adding layers or data to the world around us via using GPS, your phone and a whole lot of information gathering.  But let’s take the idea of AR to the travel industry.

A lot of us were just in Atlanta for DMAI.  What if you could have walked outside the Hyatt, pointed your phone at the 3 or 4 restaurants on the corner and determine via the ‘Urbanspoon’ layer which one was reviewed more favorably.

Or, pointed it around the Georgia Aquarium to learn more about the exhibits you were looking at. Or found the closest ATM.  Or the cleanest public bathroom.  Or your friends who have wandered two blocks over.

True, these examples are quite basic and do not show off the wide capabilities of AR, but for our purposes, they do give us something to think about.

And while much of this technology or searching ability does live within a product such as Google Maps, the visual benefits of AR has the potential to take this type of information to a much more usable level for the general public.

Keep watching for AR, it is what’s next.
http://www.readwriteweb.com/

Facebook Buys FriendFeed – If you are a social media connoisseur or just on Twitter all day, you probably noticed the news about Facebook purchasing FriendFeed.  And, I am guessing, most of you had not even heard of FriendFeed prior the announcement.  Well, think of FriendFeed as Twitter’s nerdy little brother…same basic idea, more features, but fewer users.  And while you can read about the speculation on how Facebook will utilize FriendFeed (see the article from Robert Scoble below), we will just leave you with this thought…if you did not have your brand name locked-up on FriendFeed, now would be a good time to sign up.
http://scobleizer.com/

Top Travel 2.0 Sites – Our counterpart and friend from Openplaces, Jeff, asked us to participate in a little blog post about our favorite ‘Travel 2.0′ sites.  Not ones to shy away from sharing our opinion, we agreed:

Great question, thanks for asking. Well, I, like most of you use a pretty standard set of sites when traveling: Kayak for booking, Oyster for (some) hotels, Dopplr for finding other travelers and Twitter for staying in touch. In fact, I could argue that Twitter is the answer to this question regardless of industry vertical. How can you travel without it? But, for today, let’s try to find a hidden gem in the rough and rocky terrain that is travel 2.0.

foursquare – Let’s categorize this one under local travel for now. Part game, part social networking site and a lot of fun. The idea is simple, yet has the potential to break through the review site clutter. Sign up, find your city and ‘check-in’ each time you visit a location…restaurant, building, bowling alley, etc…each ‘check-in’ earns you points, badges and the ultimate prize of being named mayor of your location. Two quotes I love from the site: “think urban mix tape” and “We’re not looking for reviews here…more ‘go here, do this’ or ‘eat here now’ tips.” Plus, they have an iPhone app, perfect for people on the go. A small and simple site that just needs a little more participation (critical mass!) to take off.

Be sure to read the whole article, more good thoughts on what is a good travel 2.0 site from a variety of fellow bloggers.
http://blog.openplaces.org/

E-mail Fails. (credit: eROI.com)

The more experience you gain as an email marketer, the more you come to understand the true purpose of an email. It isn’t simply to blast something to subscribers without relevancy or reason. It isn’t to make a quick, dishonest buck off them. It isn’t to pull off a massive bait-and-switch. It isn’t even to release the hounds on the competition.  It’s about nurturing, building trust and relationships, and ultimately increasing and solidifying the reputation of your brand.

Every email sent must have a purpose and needs to personally relate to the subscriber. If the email lacks personalization or has no purpose, you’re taking a risk that may cause subscribers to not only opt-out of your emails, but also mentally and emotionally opt-out from any future engagement with your brand. When this happens, the recipient immediately becomes emotionally unsubscribed. We in the industry identify it with a very technical term: email marketing fail. >>Full Story

Thoughts// As marketing funds continue to take a hit in this down economy, it is no secret that email marketing continues to be a “workhorse” in its ability to deliver amazing read/click rates at a fraction of the cost of other digital media (with the exception of search).   But as more of us descend down the e-mail hatch and start to use it indiscriminately, “email failure” becomes rampant.   So, what does an email marketing fail look like? Our friend Dylan Boyd at eROI.com recently examined and aerated 11 different types of e-mail failure.   Some of our favorites include:

1. Sending to an unsubscibed address:  Hands down the “ultimate sin” in e-mail marketing
2. Emails that lack functionality:  The example cited, Becker Surfboards, used a large image file to send subscribers a “e-mail message” that a) doesn’t fully utilize the medium and b) more than likely will result in a blank e-mail showing up with folks who automatically block images
3. Personalization fail:  As in sending an e-mail with a “Dear _____” or worse, addressing a consumer by the wrong name.   If you’re not sure about how accurate your database is, don’t set yourself up for failure by using the personlization tools.  Focus instead on making your content invaluable to your readers.
4. Shameless “Partnering” E-mails:  While we’re not huge fans of this,  most industry leaders say that it is ok to occassionally send stand-alone e-mails with messages from your partners; the risk is that you’re taking a chance on alienating readers who’ve signed on because they trust you and want to hear from your state, city or company.   If you must send stand-alone “partner messages”, we highly recommend sending it to a (smaller) segmented list of readers who have have essentially “double opted” to recieve partner e-mails
5. Opt-out games:  “You want opt-out? Opt-this!”.  Sure, it’s a good idea to temp someone wanting to opt out of your list with more relevant offers (e.g. “just e-mail me when the new travel guide is ready” etc.) but as examplified by this DEX e-mail, why try to confuse the reader to signing up for messages from your list renters?  Fail.

Let’s face it; as we wrote last year, we’ve all made mistakes with e-mail marketing. But keeping these fails in mind along with industry best practices can keep your e-mail marketing campaigns well tuned.

Now, if you could only pack your clothes in 0 bags.

I like Delta.  I really do.  They have been doing some great work over the past year in terms of online, design / branding and general flying.  However, as a legacy carrier, at this point the biggest legacy carrier, Delta falls into the unfortunate position of having to follow the lead of every other legacy carrier when it comes to fees.

Make no mistake, they are just as guilty as American, United and US Airways, for giving us the ridiculous list of fees and surcharges that have turned air travel into the 38,000 foot equivalent of going to a carnival.

‘You want to leave the carnival?  Oh, that will be 2 tickets.’

But, don’t say that they are not trying to make you feel good about flying.  As seen in the image above, if you bring zero bags on to your flight, well, that is free!

Thanks!

Personally, we should really highlight more of these free experiences available on all flights.

Other Free Experiences Include:

• SkyMall
• Safety instructions
• Oxygen
• Looking out the window
• Access to the emergency exits
• Being bumped and stepped on by the guy next to you
• Children who won’t stop crying
• Second hand perfume from the woman who has way too much on
• Random updates from the captain

Enjoy your flight!

Email Benchmarks – Everyone loves stats and benchmarks, and the “Q1 2009 Email Trends and Benchmarks” report by Epsilon does not disappoint.  The report covers a wide range of industries, but for our purposes skip to the bottom of the charts and pay close attention to the ‘Travel/hospitality’ industry numbers.

Solid numbers to benchmark your current email campaign:

http://www.emarketer.com/

Twitter Rankings – We would be remiss not to mention the latest official/unofficial tourism industry Twitter rankings from GoSeeTell.  At the top of the board were the usual suspects: @VisitChicago, @BaltimoreMD, @TravelPortland and @ColumbiaSC.

A quick recommendation here.  If you are starting a Twitter campaign, tweet or DM our peers at any one of these CVBs / DMOs and ask them how they are managing their campaign.  Clearly, something is resonating with the 8000+ followers of @TravelPortland and I am sure that Tressia (sorry to put you on the spot Tressia) would be happy to share some (not all!) of their secrets to success.
http://www.goseetell.com/