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The Travel Vertical: October 30, 2019

9 Brilliant Tourism Campaigns That Got the Most Views in Our Newsletter

From fantastically animated imaginary Oregon characters to classic “horse walks into a bar” jokes from Lexington, Kentucky, these are campaigns you loved hearing about. More here.

Small Restaurant Owner Gains Star Power by Inviting 1-Star Yelp Reviews

Frustration gave way to ideation for the owner of this pizzeria who beat Yelp at their own game. Read more and see a documentary film trailer here.

ChefsFeed is Partnering With Destinations Because… #NomNomNom

Where do chefs eat? ChefsFeed is an app that shares awesome recommendations and makes creative videos with destinations. Check it out here.

Top Instagrammers Tell the Bosses That Too Many Hashtags Are Sad

@Zuck and @mosseri showed up at an invitation-only Instagram event in NYC last week where 300 top influencers mixed with mainstream media. Read more here.

Locations & Destinations Plus People News

All the DMO, social media, attractions news that’s fit to print and all the news that fits, we print. Send us yours? Read more here.

ChefsFeed is Partnering with Destinations Because… #NomNomNom

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Good food is a travel motivator. Everybody likes to eat it and some make it for a living. Ever wonder what and where chefs like to eat?

ChefsFeed is an app that gives you awesome food recommendations from great chefs in each city.

The platform also enables culinary professionals and the world’s best brands—including destinations—to discover innovative ways to work together.

In the past 24 months, we’ve had the pleasure of collaborating with Austin, D.C., Utah, Tucson, UAE, Belize, Oregon, Portland, Seattle, Santa Barbara and more to tell their unique ‘stories of place’ through a culinary lens.” – ChefsFeed

Delegates at eTourism Summit enjoyed bites and drinks at ChefsFeed HQ, a working kitchen/entertainment space in San Francisco.

They’ve created a landing page to showcase video collaborations with DMOs, like these for Utah and Austin.

Rustic farms, rugged coastlines, rural vineyards or a rooftop pool bar, how might your destination tell its culinary story? Even better, told through the eyes of a chef?

Meantime, eat with your own eyes. Have a look here.

9 Brilliant Tourism Campaigns That Got the Most Views in Our Newsletter

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Creative travel marketing campaigns that have stood out for readers of The Travel Vertical since we started publishing nearly four years ago.

Visit Seattle Breaks the Mold

How would an out-of-town artist describe this destination as a flavor of ice cream, a wallpaper design or an original song?  

Nebraska Tourism Shakes it Up with Hilarious New Campaign

Adopting a cheeky, self-deprecating point of view, with the attention-grabbing tagline, “Nebraska: Honestly, it’s not for everyone,” is the clever positioning for this “least likely to be visited state.” 

Tennessee Totally Crushes it with ‘Snap Your Way in’ Free Garth Brooks Concert

When the State of Tennessee launched its own Snapchat channel to engage Millennials, the destination needed a reason for them to want to follow, and a free Garth Brooks concert sent to smartphones via the platform was just the ticket.

Tennessee Department of Tourist Development: “The Colorblind Viewer“

The beauty of Tennessee fall foliage literally brought people to tears in emotional videos filmed in state parks. They were seeing color for the first time. Here’s how it worked and gained national attention, gaining hundreds of millions of views.

VisitLEX: A Horse Walks Into a Bar

Lexington, Kentucky is the Horse Capital of the World in the heart of bourbon country, so watch what happens when a horse wants a drink at the bar. The only thing that wasn’t big about this spring campaign idea was the 10K production budget.

You’ve Never Seen a Tourism Video Like This: Travel Oregon

Animated characters, fantastical sea creatures, mystical cloud people, and sky whales, accompanied by symphonic melodies in this 1:45–minute visual narrative for “Oregon. Only Slightly Exaggerated.”

Destination Pride Reimagines Rainbow Flag as Digital Dynamic

Canadian-based “Destination Pride” interprets the colored stripes on a rainbow flag as a bar graph to display the LGBTQ-related safety of a destination based on its equality laws.

‘I Am Not Wisconsin’ Says Michigan’s Upper Peninsula

Find out why @UpperPeninsula took to Twitter to challenge @MountainDew to customize a can for the region and the giant beverage company accepted the challenge.

“Come, But Please Don’t Tag Us,” Says Jackson Hole

Slowing the flow of Instagram hikers going off-trail and geo-tagging remote, fragile eco-locations at Delta Lake was the objective of #staywild and “Keep This Spot ‘Grammable.”

eTSY Award Winners Announced at 2019 eTourism Summit

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Sponsored and Presented by (l to r) Josh Collins, Director of Destination Activation + Marketing at Streetsense and Derek Price, Director Business Development–North America at Expedia Group Media Solutions

SAN FRANCISCO, Oct. 9, 2019—Connect Travel, owners and producers of eTourism Summit, is pleased to announce the winners of the 2nd Annual eTSY Awards. The event took place during the 20th Annual eTourism Summit, the top North American gathering of destination digital marketers in travel and their partner agencies.

Powered by Expedia Group Media Solutions and Streetsense, the eTourism Summit Excellence Awards recognize and celebrate the best of 2018-19 campaigns and programs with awards in a dozen original categories. 

Josh Collins, Jake Steinman, Derek Price

New this year is the top award for “Best Campaign of the Past 20 Years,” presented to Las Vegas Convention & Visitors Authority for “What Happens Here, Stays Here” and an annual “See Tomorrow” award presented to Jake Steinman, Founder and Chairman Emeritus of eTourism Summit.  

The call for entries opened in May 2019 and concluded four months later, garnering strong interest from city, state, county, and regional DMOs and attractions throughout the United States and Canada.

Appreciation goes to a panel of expert judges: Josh Collins, Director, Destination Activation + Marketing, Streetsense; Andrew Dysart, VP of Digital Solutions, Tarsus;  Andrew Hertz, with Dade Media Inc. and Monya Mandich, Global Vice President, Marketing at Expedia Group who considered three key criteria: strategy and objective; creativity; and impact/measurability.

“The eTourism Summit community is comprised of tech-savvy digital marketers who are always looking for innovative ideas that will deliver measurable results for their destinations,” said Monya Mandich, Global Vice President of Marketing, Expedia Group Media Solutions.

Ralph Thompson, Executive Director of Travel + Tourism at Streetsense said, “Because Streetsense thrives in creating brands people love and places people love to be, it’s an honor to partner with the eTSY Awards showcasing the best from the people and places that make the travel and tourism industry so amazing!” 

Many of the awards were evaluated according to size for those with annual marketing budgets under $5 million or over $5 million. “The quality of digital marketing in the travel and tourism industry is impressive. Every category was highly competitive,” said J. William Seccombe, president of Connect Travel. “We applaud everyone submitting for examples of great work and congratulate the winners.

We also salute Bloomington Convention & Visitors Bureau for two decades of perfect attendance at eTourism Summit.”  

Representing the sponsors of the eTourism Summit 2019 eTSY Awards for Excellence were Derek Price, Director of Sales – North America, Expedia Group Media Solutions and Josh Collins, Director – Destination Activation + Marketing, Streetsense. 

Josh Collins, Mike Green (Tourism Winnipeg), Derek Price

Best Destination Website — BeginatBothell.com for Begin at Bothell and Streetsense 

Best Content Marketing Program (small budget) — Frankenmuth and TwoSix Digital for Frankenmuth Spring Shoulder Campaign 

Best Content Marketing Program (large budget) — San Francisco Travel Association for “Why San Francisco is So Delicious”

Best Influencer Marketing Campaign — Oregon’s Mt. Hood Territory for “Travel the Entire Oregon Trail for the 175th Anniversary”

Best Use of Video (small budget) — Economic Development Winnipeg for “Autocomplete – Winnipeg Edition!” 

Best Use of Video (large budget), A three-way tie  — San Francisco Travel Association for “Freedom to Create” Arts Anthem Video; AND Punta Gorda and Englewood Beach Visitor & Convention Bureau and Aqua Marketing & Communications for “Outsiders Welcome” Video Series; AND The Beaches of Fort Myers and Sanibel and MMGY Global

Innovation Award — Conversant and Visit Savannah for how to use one-to-one transactions to measure the complete economic impact of digital ad spend 

Best Campaign of the Past 20 Years — Las Vegas Convention & Visitors Authority for “What Happens Here, Stays Here”

Perfect Attendance — Bloomington Convention & Visitors Bureau for never missing eTourism Summit since 2000

See Tomorrow Award — Jake Steinman, Founder and Chairman Emeritus, eTourism Summit for his ideation and vision

ABOUT CONNECT TRAVEL Connect Travel creates efficient and effective environments to expedite the sales process by connecting tourism professionals with the products, services, people and ideas that allow them to thrive in a rapidly evolving and highly competitive global marketplace. For more information, visit connecttravel.com. 

ABOUT CONNECT Connect is a leader in the meetings, travel and tourism industry. Specializing in destination marketing, the company produces a full suite of digital programs, online and mobile solutions, meeting business and travel magazines, trade shows and consumer events, travel guides for newspapers and leisure magazines and destination information, which is distributed through broadcast and custom programs. More information about the company’s brands and services is available at connectmeetings.com

     

What’s New? Assorted DMO Reports From the Field

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Sonoma County Wine Region of the Year

Swirl, Sip & Savor: Across the Golden Gate Bridge just north of San Francisco, beautiful Sonoma County has been named 2019 Wine Region of the Year by Wine Enthusiast magazine on the 20th anniversary of its Wine Star Awards. To experience the place and the award-winning wines, register for one of the few remaining spots on the day-long pre-eTourism Summit “Wine Tour & Pour,” on Oct. 6 — a great deal at $100 including transportation and three tastings on-site at outstanding wineries (thanks to our co-host Sonoma County Tourism).

New BFFs: NYC & Company and Visit Berlin have signed a first-ever official city-to-city tourism collaboration agreement. The new partnership includes sharing of best practices in tourism marketing and destination management to include strategy around neighborhood promotion, sustainability and responsible tourism management. For more about the plans, click here.

Chihuly Glass

State of Glass: VISITSEATTLE.tv has launched a three-part series featuring a trio of Pacific Northwest glass artists. The digital effort is a prelude to a four-day event on Oct. 17-20, 2019, “Refract: The Seattle Glass Experience,” highlighting the region as  “American Venice,” the nation’s most recognized hub of glass art. At eTourism Summit’s “Video, Video, Video” track, Mellie Lutz, Director of Marketing at Visit Seattle, will present more about how the DMO has found success through media partnerships and by producing 150 million minutes of digital content on their proprietary TV platform.

Give Way to Pedestrians: Tourists flock to the zebra crossing in Abbey Road, London to see where The Beatles shot their album cover. Now, 50 years later, the famous crosswalk is being recreated for a day (Sept. 26, 2019) in Los Angeles at Vine St. & Hollywood Blvd.

Steal This Idea: A town in Iceland has created a pedestrian crossing of an entirely different sort that’s bound to become a tourist attraction while saving lives. In the small fishing town of Ísafjörður, a pedestrian crossing is has been painted to appear raised; it’s a 3-D optical illusion to slow cars down and prevent accidents. Take a closer look here.

Hong Kong skyline

Tough times, no takers: Four months of continual Hong Kong turmoil has raised questions about HK’s branding as “Asia’s World City.” The Hong Kong government recently took out ads in key overseas markets, such as the Australian Financial Review, to assure investors. However, that paper is running opinion pieces with titles like “The end of Hong Kong as we know it.” According to The Holmes Report, an RFP from the HK government to global PR firms aimed at salvaging its reputation has come up empty with no takers from the likes of Ogilvie, Ruder Finn, and Brunswick. More from PR Daily here.

Related: DMO Crisis Management – Why We All Need a Plan Now

UK Passport

Brexit Bummer: New research from ADARA, the predictive traveler intelligence company, has revealed the significant impact of uncertainty around Brexit on both inbound and outbound travel to and from the UK. Inbound US received a decrease in British tourist bookings by 26% and searches were down by 29% compared to September last year. Read more here.

Emmanuelle Legault

Can you hear me? Emmanuelle Legault, VP of marketing and strategy, says Tourisme Montréal has joined forces with Prologue AI to develop the prototype of “The Voice of Montréal,” claiming to be the first tourism agency with an AI-driven hybrid (image and voice) assistant. Hear more from Martin Stoll, CEO of Sparkloft Media and from a Travel Oregon executive at eTourism Summit in the session “Alexa, Should DMOs Do Voice Apps?“

Discover Long Island

Dress the Part: Discover Long Island is partnering with LocaLI bred to offer its first retail collection of destination-branded attire and merchandise plus curated seasonal gift boxes of innovative products created on Long Island. A new online retail section is now featured on the Discover Long Island website where customers can purchase merchandise including a selection of t-shirts, water bottles, sandals, baseball caps and winter hats priced from $10 to $35.

TripIt app

Skip it? Hmm…TripIt, the instant travel organizer app, is partnering with GeoSure to launch a deep dive into safety ranking scores of 1-100 for neighborhoods, rated by both day and night risk. DMOs might question: How does the app know best on a hyper-local level in 180 countries? They’ve included new features for women’s safety and for LGBTQ, too. Read more here.

Edinburgh Castle

Marketing Edinburgh was hit with an 89% budget cut over the next two financial years. Despite an extensive lobbying campaign, supported by hundreds of world leaders in tourism and conventions, was unsuccessful in changing the budget cuts. The Scottish capital will be leaving BestCities Global Alliance at the end of 2019; Edinburgh gets the distinction of becoming the only major city in the developed world without a DMO.

In response to the Mexican government defunding its national tourism board, some regional DMOs (Los Cabos, Puerto Vallarta, Oaxaca, the Yucatan) have responded by opening their own privately funded offices to market to the biggest source of travelers—California. And there’s a revamped privately funded bare-bones website for Visit Mexico.

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Laurie Jo Miller Farr, Editor
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