Tour operators and travel agents get ready for some fresh thinking! Chris Torres author and Brand & Digital Tourism expert with over 26 years’ industry knowledge, speaker at IWINETC 2020, will be offering his advice and guidance on how travel, tourism and destination businesses can gain brand recognition and increase bookings.
In your upcoming talk at IWINETC 2020 you will show us how to produce 90 + days of content ideas from one piece of video marketing. Can you gives us a couple of examples for the wine and culinary tourism industry?
Food and wine tourism businesses have it easier than most when it comes to producing video content, or any content for that matter. You can produce video content around wine tasting, food pairings, wineries, grape varieties and a whole host of other topics to consider.
Say you create a video on wine tasting, talking about 2-3 wines in every video, producing this once per week. That video can also be turned into. A written blog, an audio podcast, short 60 second videos for some social channels… before you know it, that one video have been repurposed for many other channels, giving you more reach and brand awareness.
You talk of staff and customers generating content for the wine tourism player be it a tour operator or a winery. Can you define what you mean by that?
For me, the best story tellers should be your tour guides and those in your business who have a passion for wine and the process of making wine. Utilise the skills you have to generate content around their strengths.
Tour guides are the ones who take customers around your wineries, talking to them, inspiring them and hopefully persuading them to buy a bottle or two. Who else would be best to front a video series or an audio podcast?
In the age of internet and DIY tourism can you give us a few tips on how tour operators and travel agents can remain relevant?
I am going to say something that may shock you… but don’t run a tourism business. To survive in todays marketing landscape you must become a media company, one that just happens to sell tours.
By media, I mean articles, guides, videos, and anything else that adds value to people researching travel or just looking to be entertained. It’s not enough to have expert product knowledge in your T&A niche if your potential customers don’t know about it.
Becoming a ‘media company’ involves putting out meaningful content about your niche to drive traffic to your website or your off-site booking channels.
Making content takes time and money, but it’s the only way to make yourself visible online, and to — ultimately — make yourself more visible than your competitors.
Creating video content for example does not need to be highly polished. Film on an iPhone or a GoPro… just be truthful to yourself and you will humanise your brand, making it more appealing to travellers.
You mention storytelling to humanise a brand. Can you define that with a couple of examples?
The best way to sell a product is not to sell it but to build up why it is the best product on the market. The best way to do this is through people. People buy from people so become your own influencer within your sector. Become an authority within your niche market and this will help you create a stronger business I noted long run.
Coronavirus: Life after lockdown. How do you think the wine and culinary tourism industry might change after lockdown?
This is such big question. Personally I feel the later part of 2020, and only if this passes quickly, will be strong with the staycation market. People will have less money, be nervous with international travel, so local tourism should be the main focus.
I also believe the 2021 will be a boom year for travel as travellers will be fed up being stuck at home or in their destinations for so long they will want to experience a new location so producing content now, to inspire them while stuck at home, is the prime time to plant that seed.
Meet Chris at IWINETC 2020 where he will be delivering a talk titled: How to Easily Generate 90+ days of Content to Promote your Tour business
