We are continually researching and curating to provide the most relevant content possible while avoiding content that everyone can get from the mainstream media.
Right now, this is a corner for light relief and positive posts to build community, share ideas, and keep people’s spirits up. Every little bit helps.
We’re thankful for this great community. Would you like to share your thoughts? See “Contact Us” in the newsletter footer.
New project: Wonder From Home. “Wonder can be found all over, and right now, finding wonder matters. Over the coming weeks and months, we want to help you find people, places, and projects out there that inspire and help us all hold on to our spirit of discovery and sense of community. We’re calling it Wonder From Home—think of it as a different kind of WFH.” Submissions are welcome. Send them to pitches@atlasobscura.com and put “Submission for WFH” in the subject line. — Dylan Thuras, Co-founder, and Ariel Azoff, Head of Brand Partnerships, Atlas Obscura
Virtual Virginia was fast out of the gate. If you’re working on your content, get inspiration from Virginia Is For Lovers.
Many museums are offering inspiration-inducing virtual tours and online galleries. San Diego Museum of Art, for example, is hosting free online tours, plus video lectures, performances inspired by works of art, and more. Monterey Bay Aquarium is taking to Instagram for daily guided meditations set to videos of sea life. — Source: BizBash
“To the trade associations and DMOs out there, please go on a massive campaign to collect personal email and phone contacts and keep the newly unemployed in the loop of ‘communication to our members’ as a first step to their recovery.—Jonathan Elkoubi, Chief Commercial Officer & Co-founder, VisitorTix
Related: #OnlyYou from Visit Las Vegas
Related: “What Destinations Can Do Now“ – Charles Harris, CMO, Visit Anaheim
“By far the most important value any brand or destination can focus on during coronavirus is trust. Do everything you can to cultivate that. It’s a highly prized commodity that is hard to earn and easy to lose.”—Josh Collins, Director Destinations Activations & Marketing, Streetsense
Build out your COVID-19 Information & Resources webpages with updates, virtual attraction tours, 360º videos, kids’ activities and more. “As the nation grapples with this crisis and people are encouraged to stay home, this page is intended to help you pass the time and consider ways to give back to the hospitality community, even if you can’t do it in person.” — Destination DC.
“Create a page on your destination website to keep your community informed. Many DMOs, including Visit Augusta, have added pages to their site to house information and updates regarding COVID-19. These pages may express concern for public safety and offer suggestions for outdoor activities that adhere to social distancing best practices.”—Codi Bott, Content Marketing Strategist, Simpleview
Examples of supporting restaurants, even when we cannot dine in them, there are initiatives to encourage locals to enjoy takeout from local eateries, benefiting at least some restaurant employees. — Miami Eats from Greater Miami Convention & Visitors Bureau and Dine Stockton from Visit Stockton, California.
“Should your workload slow down in these next few weeks due to quarantines and the overall drop in travel right now, I highly suggest taking the free Google Analytics Academy courses to earn your Certification. This will aid you in finding helpful leads, understanding the numbers coming into your website and making smart decisions for future ads and target audiences. Make the best of idle time!”—Shared by Brindley Faile, Digital Marketing & PR Manager, Visit NC Smokies
Good advice: Continue to communicate. The worst thing we can do is ghost people. We should “…discontinue flooding newsfeeds with information that is irrelevant…lower the frequency of social posting…and be positive…” —Brian Matson, Senior Director of Strategy & Education, TwoSixDigital
“Word for Today: Thankful” organically built out from an email that became the Gratitude Chain. “This pandemic affects us in so many ways—but we can only control how we react. Gratitude and thankfulness for what we have is the best way to brighten your day.” (Think beyond family, friends, health, shelter, food, and politics.) — Chris Collinson, President of Connect Meetings.
Recent contributions look like:
- Taco Bell Triple Chalupa
- Red Licorice
- Ruffles potato chips
- Cooking videos
- Facetime
- Ping pong
- A cold IPA
- The Masked Singer
- Ranch dressing
- Oldies music
- Disney+
- The sun being out
- Gifs
- Wet wipes
- Black and white cookies
“Use downtime to create future accessible product. It’s not going to be business as usual for weeks—maybe months. Use the downtime for product development that will help you in the recovery. Hire interns or re-deploy existing staff who are forced to become idle due to the crisis to research and identify accessibility features (by phone, email or web searches) offered by your hotels, attractions, museums, zoos, outdoor/nature, and restaurants in your destinations that can be simply developed into a landing page. —Jake Steinman, Founder & CEO, TravelAbility.
Learn a new skill for free. Use this time to expand your knowledge, both professionally and personally. Audit an Ivy League course. “Knowledge is power.” — A great idea from Taisa Veras, Director of Social Media & Influencer Marketing, NYC & Company
Brush up on rusty vocabulary or learn a new language on Duolingo where there’s free bite-size instruction in all levels for 30 languages.
Got kids stuck at home? Students From Harvard, MIT, UC Berkeley, and other top universities are giving free face-to-face video conferencing 1-to-1 tutoring to students K-12, ages 5 to 18, at GoPeer.org. Read more here.
