Lessons from the Cruise Industry, specifically the Navigator of the Seas

Some lessons or reminders from Royal Caribbean's Navigator of the Seas

1 - Service design - have you taken a good look at your tourism service (all tourism businesses are service businesses) from the guests' point of view?  That's what the cruise industry seems to be doing very well. My wife and I commented how Royal Caribbean had thought of everything on the cruise we took with the family during the Holidays (see below). To analyze and assess the quality of your service, take a walk in your potential guests' shoes, from the moment they arrive, to the moment they leave. How can you make their experience better? Where are the fail points, if there are any. From the friendliness of the concierge staff (if you manage a hotel) to the cleanliness of the facilities, to the quality and variety of the food, etc.

2 - Animation/Entertainment.  Not everyone thinks of their tourism business as an entertainment business, but almost any tourism business could be considered an entertainment business, even if the entertainment is provided by the guests themselves. If you provide the right environment, in say, a restaurant, the patrons will entertain themselves accordingly. The obvious example is a club. If the decor and facilities are right and the music and the sound system rock, the drinks are good and at the right price (according to the type of establishment), the guests should have a good time.  In the era of social media there has been a lot of talk and much has been written about being remarkable, about creating products and services that are outstanding, because those are the things that drive conversations in cyberspace. That's great. But the key reason to strive for the extraordinary is to succeed.

3 - Staff. As important as everything else, if not more. One of the amazing things we noticed and commented about the staff on the Navigator of the Seas is that everyone seemed to have the same critical competency for tourism: a genuine love for people and a relentless customer satisfaction orientation. Almost anyone can learn how to wait tables or serve drinks or register a guest or clean up a room, but to, at the very least, give the impression of genuine caring for a guest, that's not so easy to find.

4 - FUN At many a tourism conference in Canada over the last 10 years, I heard different people mentioning the word fun. We have to put fun back in our tourism offerings. This is obvious for some destinations or businesses (e.g. Niagara Falls, The CN Tower), but fun is not only delivered by an attraction (e.g. Niagara's Fury attraction), it can be delivered by the ticket takers, the waiters, and others. During the cruise we had a bit of fun with the assistant waiter, Tayfan, a young man from Turkey, who was quite adept at magic tricks. Think of where in the path of your guests you can inject some fun (it can be little things, but they can make a big difference).

Royal Caribbean - 1.2.3.4  From the design of the ship to the selection of the staff, the Navigator of the Seas is a great example of all of the above.  The ship is huge. There were 3,670 guests on the ship (full capacity) and, I believe, about 1,200 staff. But you never felt crowded. Much thought (and experience) has been put into making the cruise a great experience for the guests. My guess is that this is a constant focus from the company (is it yours?). From the theatre, to the pool, to the food establishments to the animation staff to all other areas and activities Royal Caribbean has thought of all the different types of guests they can attract. Remember Bertrand Cesvet's engines of conversational capital? Royal Caribbean is very good at many of them - Exclusive Product Offering, Over-Delivery, Relevant Sensory Oddity and Tribalism.

Finally, the cruise also reminded me of something I have mentioned in a past blog post: that tourism is driven by PPE, Price, Proximity and Ease of Entry. The price for the 6 night cruise on the Navigator of The Seas can be as low as approximately $600 CDN per person (it's very difficult for any destination to compete with that considering everything that's included in the price). Over 60% of people on this trip were American. There about 180 Canadians on board followed by 80 Mexican guests and 80 UK guests. The rest were guests from various countries. The majority of Americans on board were Florida residents (my daughter met a young man travelling with his family. They live 15 minutes from the port in Fort Lauderdale. So remember, your most likely customers are those who live close or relatively close by (within province, nearby province or nearby country).

Think of your tourism business as theatre. The "show" is what will make your guests have a good (or not so good time). The "show" is what the guests come in contact, what they see, who they see and interact with. They should never be aware of what goes on behind the scenes (training, logistics, etc.), but it is the behind the scenes planning and support that can make the difference between something remarkable and something mediocre.

Happy travels,

Jaime

A Twitter customer care experience from a brand that cares about its customers - IHG again

In my previous post I wrote about the great experience I had at the InterContinental Le Grand Paris. Speaking of IHG brands, on our last night in Paris we stayed at the Holiday Inn Express Charles de Gaulle Airport in order to be at our departures gate with plenty of time to check in the next day. As I mentioned in the previous post, I usually look for IHG hotels whenever I travel, but especially when I am not very familiar with the destination. And so we booked a room at this Holiday Inn Express. But this experience did not meet my expectations. It felt short. However, the post-stay-Twitter-customer-care experience made up for it and it's a great example of how a global brand in hospitality is looking after the brand and its customers.

We arrived in the afternoon and checked in. The front desk attendant was very friendly, polite and professional and she gave us an upgrade to an executive room because of my loyalty card status, which was great. Only thing was, this executive room's bed is awful. I was not surprised that the room is very small (as they tend to be in many hotels in Europe), but my wife and I were surprised that the bed in this executive room is a Murphy bed (wall bed). The bed has two metal feet jutting out on either side which one can keep bumping into on account of very little space between the bed and the wall. But we took that in stride and even thought it was a funny thing since we kept bumping into them (as long as we didn't hit a toe, it would be alright). 

But then we tried the bed and this bed is very uncomfortable – uneven – like Murphy beds and pull out couches can be.  We decided to ask for a different room and – coincidentally at that point – there was a blackout at the hotel. All electricity went out. We went to the front desk and waited for Rommie, the front desk manager, to have a minute since she was really trying to do something about the blackout (she was on the mobile phone speaking to someone about it).  Once we were able to talk to her, she understandably told us that she couldn't tell if she had another room to do the switch because her computer was down.  Being close to dinner time – and not knowing if the electricity was coming back any time soon – we decided to go to Paris for supper and deal with the room upon our return to the hotel.  When we returned Rommie had gone home and we told the front desk person in charge about the bed and that we would like another room.  Unfortunately by then all he could offer was a regular smoking room. My wife thought that room could be worse than the exec room (because the smoking room might smell of smoking, which we don’t like at all).  So we kept the exec room and slept there as best we could.  When we checked out and the attendant asked us how our stay was, we said – ok, “but the bed in that room is terrible, really bad.” She did not know how to react and just gave us the bill for € 221.20. 

Before we left for the airport, I tweeted that the bed in question was the worst I had ever slept in at any hotel. We flew back home and several hours later when I checked my Twitter account I saw a reply by IHGCare "We would like to assist w/ your exp..." inviting me to email IHGCare to explain. So I did. Very soon after I sent the email, I got a very nice response and apology for the inconvenience from Global IHG care indicating that they would forward my comments to the appropriate people at the CDG HIE. They also said they would credit my loyalty program account with a few thousand points.  

As I said in the first paragraph, this experience is a great example of using Twitter strategically to protect and enhance a brand's reputation and of showing customers that they are important to the business. IHG is out there listening and responding to customers concerns and doing it in a timely fashion. This ensures that customers remain engaged with the brand and hopefully satisfied.  However, having said all this, I do think that in cases such as this one, it would be much better to empower front line workers to deal with issues like these. The front desk person in charge should have been able to apologize on the spot and to offer me the loyalty program points. If I wasn't a loyalty program member then she should have been able to offer a discount on the rate right there. Many customers are not on Twitter and might not be inclined to try and escalate the issue. You would just lose those customers.  So the moral of the story is: yes, use Twitter to listen, engage, respond and promote, but you should also empower your front line workers to do the same in person and on the spot.

Happy travels.

Jaime

www.cactusrock.com 

Ottawa Tourism reaching out to Indo Canadians and Indians abroad

Wilbur Sargunaraj is a YouTube celebrity, singer songwriter, producer from India who lives in Toronto when he's not in Tamil Nadu or touring performing his mix of hip-hop and Bollywood music with a strong touch of comedy. He has a following on YouTube (2.7 million upload views) and Facebook (14,000 fans). He visited Ottawa recently where, with support from Ottawa Tourism, he shot one of his auto-tuned videos, this one called "The Canada Song." He has a penchant for calling his tunes "The (filled in the blank) Song."

A propos our conversations about video and travel at Canada-e-Connect 2011, I think this is a great example of creativity in travel promotion using video. You may or may not like the video. What's important is that the audience for which the video is intended likes it. I am not Indian or Indo-Canadian so I cannot say with any certainty whether this video would make them want to visit Ottawa or not. But kudos to Ottawa Tourism for taking this risk, and most importantly for doing something to target a very specific segment of the travelling public (segmentation). I personally like the tongue-in-cheek nature of it, and I wouldn't be surprised if it goes viral to a certain extent. Apparently it's already doing very well in views. I will be interested in learning what the results in visits from Indians and Indo-Canadians is over the next 12 months.

Watch.

Almost final blog post of the year. Ready for 2011? Start early with Canada-e-Connect and consider the new Canadian Tourism Marketing Summit

The disaster that was 2009 is hopefully a distant memory. While 2010 was not spectacular, we did see some recovery in the Canadian Tourism industry. It is by no means a great state of affairs, but there's cautious optimism that 2011 might be an OK year for Canada. The challenges going forward are many: the weak American economy, the rising loonie (Canadian dollar for those of you who don't know our currency's nickname), the debt crisis in Europe, and the intense competition from a myriad of other destinations.

Do you long for the good all times BYT, BFB, BT (before YouTube, before FaceBook, before Twitter)? The digital revolution has been wreaking havoc in many industries for several years now and it's like a tsunami that keeps on going. Music, advertising, marketing, public relations. Even politics has changed because of the digital revolution. Just a mere 5 years ago you could still compete very effectively with traditional marketing communications (TV, radio, print, static Web) and trade relations (wholesalers, tour operators, airlines, etc). If your destination had big budgets you could make more noise than the others and get decent results. Today, that's not the case.

Destination marketers are having a very hard time keeping up with the consumer and the ongoing changes that the digital world brings about. 5 or 6 years ago the buzz was SEO, optimize your website so that people can find you on search engines - improve your rankings so your website/destination appears on the first page of Google organic results. And just when many destinations were getting right, in came the Social Media storm. Today, a DMO's voice is just one of thousands talking (or not) about a particular destination. Same thing goes for tourism businesses. Even when none of the current digital means of communication existed, admen and adwomen talked about "cutting through the clutter." We had seen a fragmentation of TV audiences with the "500 channel" universe, and that was hard enough. Now the audience is fragmented into millions (even if 500 million of them are on Facebook).

How are you competing in this environment? What is your strategy going forward? In my previous post I encouraged you to attend Canada-e-Connect. I still do, but you may also want to consider attending the new Canadian Tourism Marketing Summit next March. If you need help with tactics and hands on learning, there's Online Revealed also in March. If you plan to attend ITB this year and you are interested in the latest technological developments in tourism, I recommend the PhocusWright @ ITB conference (the theme in 2011 is "Marketplace Chaos: Spotlight on Technology and Innovation). Unfortunately PhocusWright @ ITB takes place at the same time as Online Revealed and the Canadian Tourism Summit, so you will have to choose.

Today more than ever, it is important to keep up with technological and communications developments in the tourism space. The old tourism marketing, advertising and distribution system that lasted for decades has been creatively destroyed in just a few years and changes happen almost on a daily basis. Stay on top or fall behind.

Jaime

www.cactusrock.com

Todd Lucier on WiFi and Social Media - get with the program people

Todd Lucier is a pioneer in Canadian Tourism - one of the first Canadian tourism professionals who understood the digital revolution and its impact on tourism marketing.

(watch out Rick Mercer)

Price, Proximity and Ease of entry - the drivers of tourism worldwide

A few days ago FutureBrand, the organization that ranks countries' brands, announced that Canada reached the top spot in the Country Brand Index. This prompted some lively discussion on Twitter and on the Canadian Tourism Professionals Group on LinkedIn regarding the value of such rankings in tourism performance. I believe that rankings of this type do not materially affect tourism performance one way or the other. While ranking at the top in the Country Brand Index is something to be proud of, just as being in the top 10 countries on the United Nations' Human Development Index is something to be proud of, the facts don't support the idea that any of these rankings help tourism performance. In general what drives tourism around the world (and domestically) is proximity, price and ease of entry.

Proximity - when you look at tourism on a global scale and see where destinations are actually getting their tourists from, you'll see that most of them travel from countries nearby - No #1 source of international tourists to Mexico is the US followed by Canada. No #1 source of international tourists to the US is Canada, followed by Mexico. No # 1 source for Spain is the UK followed by Germany and France. Most international tourism in Australia is generated by Oceania countries and East Asia (China, Hong Kong, Japan). China derives the biggest percentage of tourists from neighbouring Asian countries. But we don't have to go global to see this. We have always seen that domestic tourism is also driven by proximity (if you are tourism marketer you have known this for a long time). Most visitors to Muskoka, Ontario are from the Greater Toronto Area. Most visitors to Whistler are from the Greater Vancouver Area. Most visitors to Montreal (outside Quebec) are probably from Toronto, etc., etc.

Price - we can come up with the best and most creative campaigns to attract visitors to our destinations or attractions, whether these campaigns are digital, physical or singing telegrams, but unless the price points are affordable to our guests we will not grow the business (and in some cases won't survive). This is a bit of a cruel truism in business. Not only must the visitor see an attractive benefit per dollar, but he or she must be able to afford it. Currency wise, Canadians are rich at the moment vis a vis the US greenback and the Mexican peso. What do you think will happen this winter when Canadian winter destinations will be competing for Canadians travel plans if an all inclusive week in Mexico, Dominican, Cuba, etc., will cost them a fraction of what it would cost to spend that week in Tremblant or Whistler? We are in for a spike in our travel deficit this winter courtesy of the weakness in the US dollar and higher commodity prices. At the same time, the appreciation of the loonie is making our destinations more expensive than they already were 2 or 3 years ago. Skiers in the US may find that skiing at home will be more affordable than skiing in Canada. European skiers (those left who can afford to travel) will find European slopes much more affordable than Canadian moguls.

Ease of Entry - there are various reasons why most tourism industries around the world are sustained by domestic tourism. The biggest is ease of entry. People can move around their own country with the most ease (and of course there's significant VFR travel domestically). Speaking internationally, we have seen how important this driver of travel is by witnessing how it has affected the flow of US visitors to Canada since 9/11. Another case is the dramatic drop in Mexican visitors when Canada imposed visa restrictions on them last year. But ease on entry not only refers to visa and security issues, it also refers to airlift, airport fees, and other issues. Ease of entry is very much related to proximity and cost. 9/11 notwithstanding, it is still very easy for Canadians to enter the US and for Americans to enter Canada. And it's still very easy for both Americans and Canadians to enter Mexico. In North America, Mexico is a good example of a destination that competes very well with other destinations because of its proximity, its prices and its ease of entry. It is remarkable that with all of Mexico's image and security problems, its tourism industry has not seen a significant drop in American and Canadian tourists in the last 2 years, and according to the Mexican Tourism Ministry (Secretaría de Turismo de México) Canadian visitations have grown 38% since 2008!

In conclusion, look at your destination or tourism business and remind yourself where you get or can get most of your guests/customers. Sharpen your pencil and price your offerings so that they are attractive and affordable to your target community/tribe/market. Regarding Ease of Entry, you may not be able to do much about it, since you are where you are (on the other hand, make sure that the directions and maps on your website are correct - and definitely make sure that your place appears correctly on a Google Maps search).

Jaime Horwitz MBA

The Quest for the Remarkable - "Great Balls of Fire," Seth Godin and the TIFF

Sometme ago my eTourism colleague and fellow soccer fan, William Bakker, a remarkable eTourism professional himself, wrote a blog post on his blog Wilhelmus about the "Great Balls of Fire." No, not the great hit song written by Otis Blackwell and Jack Hammer and made famous by Jerry Lee Lewis. William was writing about cheese balls, yes cheese balls. But not just any kind of cheese balls. He was writing about Oregon's restaurant Salvador Molly's spicy habanero cheese balls. Apparently, these cheese balls are so good, so remarkable, that William and his friends drove 5 hours from Vancouver to eat this marvel of hot cuisine. The point of his post was to ask the question:

"What’s the remarkable thing your business or destination has that’s worth driving 5 hours for?"

A corollary to the post is that not all remarkable things (or people) are remarkable to everyone. You might love Eminem and think he's a remarkable artist, while I may disagree and say that Michael Bublé is truly remarkable (I happen to like both artists, but you get the point). The main thing is to achieve critical mass. In the fragmented world we live in where there are countless substitutes for every product and service out there, the key thing is to create something that is remarkable to enough people that it makes it viable at worst and enormously successful at best.

The famous marketing blogger Seth Godin wrote a now famous blog post about "How to be Remarkable." I won't quote the entire post here. You can read it by clicking on the title. And while I don't necessarily agree with all of Seth's statements he makes very good points, especially his mentioning that it is not what's remarkable to you, but what's remarkable to me (ie your customers, fans or guests) and that what's remarkable today may not necessarily be remarkable tomorrow (e.g. iPhone).

The Toronto International Film Festival is one attraction, if we can call it that, that keeps getting more remarkable every year (Caribana might be another example). Of course, that must have something to do with the remarkable films the festival manages to show every year. The star power that the festival attracts does not hurt either. This year, on its the 35th anniversary, the festival celebrated by opening its own building, the Bell Lightbox. The new headquarters of TIFF has brand new cinemas with state of the art technology. Bell Lightbox will not only be the festival's headquarters, but also run many of TIFF's programs all year long, including film related exhibits, starting with a Tim Burton Art show. The Toronto International Film Festival started 35 years ago as the Festival of Festivals. It was started by a few friends who loved film. It was their initial passion and the response of Torontonians that made the festival what it is today. Remarkable.

One of the problems with many tourism destinations and businesses is that they're not remarkable at all. For those that were once remarkable the problem is how to recapture their former glory. And the tourism boards cannot create the remarkable attractions or businesses. Tourism boards are marketing organizations. Their job is to promote the destinations, which very few do in remarkable ways. To grow tourism, industry stakeholders must reach out beyond their silos and foster a culture of excellence inside and outside the industry. Our roads must be remarkable, our public transportation systems must be remarkable, our taxi drivers must be remarkable (good luck with that one), our customs officers at point of entry should be remarkably friendly (one can only dream), etc. In a fiercely competitive global tourism industry, the winners will be those who manage to be remarkable.

Jaime

Spotlight on Wendy Perrin Canada-e-Connect eTourism Strategy Conference

I can't remember how I found Wendy Perrin on the Web, but I often check her blog the Perrin Post and I also follow her on Twitter. You can learn a lot about what's hot in travel around the world by following and reading Wendy. Wendy is also Condé Nast Traveler’s consumer news editor and writes the magazine’s practical advice column, The Perrin Report. She is one of the most respected travel bloggers I know about and, even though, she does work for a mainstream publication, she has a reputation for honest reporting and opinion. I am very excited to meet her next week in Montreal and share the stage with her and Kim Mance of GoGalavanting and Shannon Hurst Lane of the TravelingMamas.com blog. The travel bloggers session promises to be one of the most interesting parts of the Canada-e-Connect 2010 program.

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Jaime Horwitz MBA

Co-Chair Canada-e-Connect 2010

Spotlight on Claude Benard owner of HoteliTour - panelist Hoteliers 2.0 at Canada-e-Connect 2010

Claude Benard is an eTourism and eTravel expert in France who happens to blog in English. Claude started his career in tourism as a technical sales manager for a tour operator in Marseille (France) and worked with the network of travel agencies in the south of France. He spent 6 years as sales executive at the Envergure / Louvre Hotels group, especially for the 3 stars brand “Bleu Marine." After his work with the Louvre Hotels Group, Claude became the sales and marketing manager for a regional hotel booking engine managed by the Marseille Chamber of Commerce.

Since then he has spent many years as an independant consultant for the hotel and tourism industry with a dedicated focus on french DMO’s, independant hotels, emarketing, Travel 2.0 and travel social media. Claude managed the popular blog Les Explorers for 3 years and started his new blog (in English) www.hotelitour.com in march 2008. Claude is a member of the Tourism T-List, the international community of eTourism bloggers, and very active in the major eTourism and technology conferences like PhoCusWright at ITB (where we met a couple of years ago) and all the eTourism conferences in France. Recently, Claude joined Kevin May's TNOOZ, a digital portal and publication that covers tourism and technology issues and news (based in the UK).

I look forward to Claude's contributions and discussion at the Canada-e-Connect Hoteliers 2.0 panel on Friday, January 29 at 2 pm. This panel will deal with the issues, challenges and opportunities that hoteliers face in the new world of Social Media where digital channels are king and the traveler is in control. His fellow panelists will be Ken Lambert, Vice-President, Sales and Marketing, Delta Hotels and Dimitri Antonopoulos, Vice-Président, Marketing et Développement Hôtels & Restaurants for Old Montreal Hotels, a small group of high-end boutique hotels. The session will be moderated by Bill Brown, Executive Vice-President, Hotel Association of Greater Montreal.

Canada-e-Connect 2010 is almost full. You have a few days left to register if you want to attend this year's edition of the premier eTourism Strategy Conference in Canada. Go to www.canadaeconnect.com and register.

A bientôt,

Jaime Horwitz Rodriguez MBA

Chair Canada-e-Connect 2009

Co-Chair Canada-e-Connect 2010

Spotlight on Joe Buhler, panelist Mobile and Mobile Challenges, Canada-e-Connect 2010

Joe Buhler, Senior Destination and Social Media Marketing Analyst, PhoCusWright, has seen it all (well not all, but almost all) in the travel business. With wide-ranging global experience in destination marketing, the airline industry, retail travel and wholesale tour operations, Joe Buhler advises organizations on how the latest web developments impact customer interaction and travel marketing. Prior to joining PhoCusWright, Joe was Executive Vice-President, Business Development and Strategic Alliances of EuroVacations.com, and also worked for Switzerland Tourism, where he managed the development and realization of the award-winning myswitzerland.com. Joe is also an avid industry blogger and member of the T-List with his blog Marketing on the Smart Web.

Joe will bring his significant experience and vast knowledge of eTourism to the Canada-e-Connect 2010 panel on Mobile and Mobile Challenges. In the past couple of years we have all witness the revolution on mobile communications that is taking place around the world. As recently, as yesterday, January 12, an article in the Globe and Mail indicated that "Consumers are shifting away from land-line phones to wireless, with 28 per cent wanting smart phones and 19 percent a Qwerty keyboard...new research suggests the next six months will see 55 per cent of Canadians buying a new handset, likely a smart phone."

Moreover, the explosion of smart phone apps (ie iPhone), including thousands of travel related ones, has big implications for travel marketing and travel product distribution, from hotel rooms to activities to events.

While you don't necessarily have to develop a mobile app yourself, you should make sure that consumers can find information about your destination through your mobile device. The behemoth Google has entered the fray with its Nexus One device anticipating that the mobile device will be the computer of the future. Apple's tablet is generating enormous buzz in technology circles with some pundits saying it'll make the iPhone look like a toy.

Whatever the future holds in mobile technology, one thing is certain: tourism organizations and businesses must at the very least understand how mobile technology works, how consumers and travelers are currently using it and how they may want to use it in the future.

The Mobile and Mobile challenges session at Canada-e-Connect will take place Friday, January 29 at 2 pm. Time is ticking and the conference is filling up. If you plan to attend, register now before it's sold out. www.canadaeconnect.com

See you in Montreal,

Jaime Horwitz MBA

Co-Chair Canada-e-Connect 2010

Psycographic segmentation in Canadian Tourism

Canadian DMOs as I suppose DMOs everywhere are spending a lot of money researching consumer and travel behaviour, their demographics and psycographics, their online habits and many other attributes. The Canadian Tourism Commission, for example, devised a segmentation tool called the Explorer Quotient that classifies people as traveller types. The EQ is basically a psycographics and lifestyle segmentation tool. There are other tools and ways of segmenting consumers, all of which may be valid and helpful. However, psycographic segmentation has its limitation and cannot be considered the be all and end all of marketing. One of the issues with this kind of segmentation is that people are constantly changing, their circumstances change, their different life stages force them to change. You can surmise this by examining your own life and that of people close to you. For example, my EQ is Free Spirit, one of the highest yielding tourist types. But I am also a Cultural History Buff and a Rejuvenator. I don't have the resources to prove this, but my sense is that most travellers may be one or another type depending on the circumstances, the mood and their financial resources. While I prefer to travel as a Free Spirit (luxury accomodations, the best of the best), I can't always afford it. I might sacrifice luxury for a cultural experience, which I've done on many occasions, and I every year my family and I try to take a Rejuvenating vacation. When I took the EQ questionnaire a few years ago, it turned out I was a Free Spirit. I often get marketed to as a Free Spirit even though I may feel like a Cultural History Buff or a No Hassle Traveler (which I definitely am as well).

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In conclusion, while segmentation tools are very important, one must keep in mind that people are not as easy to classify as plants. In the era of instant direct communication one-to-one, one-to-many it is critical to listen to travelers and be ready to respond with the right message at the right time so whenever a traveler expresses Free Spirit desires or No Hassle Traveler needs, you'll be ready to address their wishes with the right offer.

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Happy travels,

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Jaime

PhoCusWright 2009

I was not able to attend the PhoCusWright Conference in Orlando this year, but I kept more or less informed by following comments on Twitter and Twubs. Now that the conference is over I can recommend UpTake's Elliott Ng's summary for those who want more details as to this year's conference revelations. Elliot's takeaways:

• Mobile will open up new opportunities for in-trip planning, shopping, and booking.
• Sensors, system data, and geolocation-tagged data will be everywhere
• An Epic Battle over the social web is ensuing between Facebook and Google, creating opportunities for all
• Online search and discovery is still the biggest problem in travel planning and shopping (in other words plenty of need for the kind of stuff UpTake is doing)
• The industry continues to focus on using data to drive better ad targeting and site conversion.
• Social media is changing travel marketing, distribution, and customer service, and new tools are being created to help companies monitor and manage this new channel.
• Many consumer-oriented startups still seem to be in the “build it and they will come” approach toward traffic acquisition. C’mon, don’t do that to yourself. Stop it. Now.

Read Elliot's complete wrap up on UpTake's Travel Industry Blog

Cheers,

Jaime

Some key take-aways from the Ontario Tourism Summit Conference

Canada's economy is in good shape relatively to other industrialized countries - particularly the United States. The recovery will continue this quarter and good growth is expected for 2010. However, employment will lag growth in other sectors. The Canadian dollar will stay strong perhaps fluctuating between $0.85 and $1. This last point is the most important to remember from Don Drummond's economic overview at OTS '09 because it means that our tourism product will not be as competitive relative to other destinations. A strong dollar will also allow Canadians to travel more abroad impacting the growing travel deficit.

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Peter Yesawich gave a very intersting and helpful update from the Ypartnership sureveys (travel habits-intentions of Americans and Canadians) . Some key points: we are currently in a very price sensitive era. Even the affluent are price sensitive (though 66% of affluent, high-end travellers are still shopping for value not price). Yesawich mentioned the importance and proliferation of meta search engines, a topic that is somewhat outdated, since sites like Kayak are maturing and a significant sector of eTourism is moving towards travel inspiration and trip planning (that's not to say that price comparison shopping is going away anytime soon - or ever).

Canada trails Europe by a wide margin when it comes to places Americans would like to go to.

Intergenerational travel is growing, e.g. grandparents taking the grandkids on a Holiday.

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Mr Chris Rodriguez, Chair of VisitBritain gave an eloquent presentation about tourism marketing, DMO's (Destination Marketing Organizations) and DMMO's (Destination Marketing and Management Organizations - see comments). Mr. Rodrigues made several good points that may not be new, but are worth remembering. A destination must first make sure that it's attractive to the locals before trying to attract international visitors. Making the best better is not easy. DMO's and, more importantly DMMO's need to focus on common goals, cooperation and a strong understanding of partnership. For DMMO's to work well, leadership is key.

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Michelle McKenzie and Robin Garrett gave good presentations about converting brand equity into sales. Ms. McKenzie provided an overview and update of the LocalsKnow campaign, which had over 4,000 spots uploaded and over 800 deals. If I recall correctly, I think she said there were over two million page views and over 400,000 visits to the site during the summer campaign. I would have liked to learn, though, how much money the whole campaign cost and how much money in bookings was generated?

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Ms Garrett spoke about Ontario's accomplishments during the past year and the success of the There's No Place Like This campaign (made special mention of Justin Hines' appearance on the campaign). She also talked about Ontario's international marketing. Basically Ontario is aligned with the CTC when it comes to international markets.

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Speaking of markets, both Ontario and the CTC are working to open up the Indian and Brazil markets in addition to the other overseas countries they already market to. I made a comment at the session with TIAC's president Randy Williams and TIAO's president Bill Allen that the imposition of visa restrictions on Mexican visitors is a red flag vis a vis emerging markets and how much they can grow. Ontario and the CTC can do a great job of marketing Canada to Indians and Brazilians creating demand for travel to Canada, but visa processing is the responsibility of Immigration and Citizenship Canada (and CBSA). Indians and Brazilians who want to come to Canada must apply for a visitor's visa. There's a limit of how many visas can be processed at any given time.

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I personally believe that there are still many international opportunities for Canada in countries where Canada does not require a visa, including the United States. I would look at Italy and Spain in particular. Spain is the only European country that's showing any growth in inbound tourism to Canada this year (and one of only two countries overall).

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Jaime Horwitz MBA

Co-Chair Canada-e-Connect eTourism Strategy Conference Montreal 2010

Ontario Tourism Summit at the Caesars Windsor

Delegates having a good time at the Cosmos bar after a day of interesting sessions about "the Road Ahead" at the Ontario Tourism Marketing Summit 2009 in Windsor. (more posts coming)
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Jaime Horwitz
Co-Chair Canada-e-Connect eTourism Strategy Conference 2010
CanadAmigos Social Networking Site
Cactus Rock New Media Ltd.

Nelly Furtado launches new album entirely in Spanish

This past weekend Nelly Furtado introduced new songs from her upcoming Spanish language album "Mi Plan" at the Hard Rock in Mexico City. Canadian born of Portuguese descent (her parents are Portuguese immigrants who settled in Victoria, BC, Ms. Furtado is a bona fide international star. The fact that she chose to produce an album entirely in Spanish as oppose to Portuguese was probably a business decision given the size of the global Spanish speaking market and a testament to the importance of Spanish in the music world. Could this be an opportunity for Canadian DMO's? Did the CTC or Tourism BC sponsor her presentation in Mexico City? I don't think so, but to me this is a no brainer.

Could a Portuguese album be far behind. I think Nelly should produce an album of Brazilian bossa nova and samba inspired tunes. It would probably be a big hit not only in Brazil, but also in Latin America and Spain. Nelly Furtado's official site.

Jaime Horwitz
www.canadamigos.com

Forbes 10 best Travel Campaigns

Forbes.com has published a list of what they consider the 10 best Travel campaigns (not necessarily new). Canada's current Locals Know campaign came in at number 8. Congratulations to the CTC and Canadians who are uploading their favourite spots to the LocalsKnow.ca website. Here's the list:

1 - Las Vegas "What Happens here, stays here" (since 2003)
2 - Incredible India (2009)
3 - New Zeland - 100% Pure (since 1999)
4 - Australia - Paul Hogan's ads (1984-1990)
5 - Jamaica - "Once you go, you know" (since 2004)
6 - Pure Michigan - since 2006
7 - Alaska - "B4UDIE" 2005
8 - Canada - Locals Know 2009
9 - Oregon "150 Challenge" 2009
10 - Virginia - "Virgina is for Lovers" since 1969

Read the story Travel Campaigns Aim To Get People To Hit The Road in Forbes.com

Happy travelling.

Jaime

Visiting Gananoque, the Gateway to the Thousand Islands

I am in Gananoque for a brief two day visit. I was invited by Kathy from Gananoque Boatline to spend some time here, attend a special event she organizes every year to show appreciation to partners and collaborators. It's been a very interesting visit where I've learned about some of the challenges the area faces as well as some of the opportunities Gananoque has to further develop their destination. I was surprised to learn that that no one in the area seems to have participated in the localsknow CTC campaign. One of the challenges, it seems, has been the timing which is understandable given the fact that the campaign has been put together in virtually no time so it may be that many inthe industry will not benefit directly from it. Today I played some golf with another visitor, a former Gananoque Boatline Captain, now town councillor, and the mayor. It was a lot of fun, but also very productive in terms of learning more about this beautiful part of the country. I hope to be able to work with tourism stakeholders to promote Gananoque as an overnight spot for Hispanic independent travellers in the future. Many Hispanic visitors stop here (or in Kingston) to take tours of the Thousand Islands, but they don't spend more time in the town. I think there is an opportunity to engage Hispanic travellers to Ontario and Quebec to stay longer by educating them in what they can do here in a 24 hour period.

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I am staying at the Gananoque Inn where Lori and her staff have been wonderful. I knew about the Gananoque Inn, but I have only been in Gananoque once before and only to take the cruise of the Thousand Islands. Lori and I had some good conversations and I am glad that she's interested in Hispanic tourists. The Gananoque Inn is ideal for a segment of the Hispanic travelling public that travels independently and wants to see and experience authentic Canadian experiences (small families, couples, honeymooners). What we must do is communicate effectively to educate the market (not just Hispanic markets) as to what there is to do here. One way is to show them not just tell them, and by show I mean video, not just pictures. The Gananoque Inn is also an excellent option for small meetings (sales retreats, incentive meetings, board meetings). Hope to come back soon.

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Tonight I'll go on a Gananoque Boatline Drinks and Entertainment Cruise. Hope the weather cooperates as it did this morning when I played golf.

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Jaime Horwitz

CTC launches LocalsKnow.ca and SecretDici.ca to help Canadians promote our country

The Canadian Tourism Commission has launched LocalsKnow.ca and SecretDici.ca asking Canadians to upload pictures of their favourite spots (because locals know where the best spots are, of course), that perhaps are not as well known as iconic Canadian attractions . The sites look very good with Canada Brand colours and layout and the pictures are quite good, for the most part (the CTC approves the photos before they're posted). Being very new, there aren't many spots up yet. As of this writing the English site had a bit less than 80 spots and the French version only 15 (all CTC uploads), but I think once the public gets a hold of it, it should be a hit. But it's not all roses. There are some issues with the site that a little tweaking can fix. You have to register to be able to upload photos, but once you register, there's no "sign in" link on the site. When you go to upload a new spot, then you sign in (or register, if you're new to the site). For every spot you upload, you get an entry to a contest to win one million Aeroplan miles - that's a lot of flying. But again, every time you upload a photo you have to re-enter your name and Aeroplan number. Not a big deal, but it'd be better if you only had to do it once. And finally, you can't seem to go back to your spots if you want to edit something. I was uploading one and before I could finish the description, I don't know what key I must have pressed in haste, but I think the photo was submitted (again, because I don't have an account like setup I can't go over the photos I uploaded - maybe this will be a future iteration of the site - to turn it into a full social media website a la Concierge.com)

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If you live in Canada, go to the site of your choice, LocalsKnow.ca or SecretDici.ca and show us your favourite spot.

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Jaime

Tourisme Montreal making waves in the blogosphere with its 100% digital marketing budget.

Gasps and wow's were heard during last month's Canada-e-Connect conference when Emanuelle Legault, Directrice, Communications et Publicité, mentioned during her presentation that Tourism Montreal's marketing budget was going digital 100%. Since then, the blogosphere has been abuzz with comments (mostly very positive) about this bold move. I myself am in awe that a Canadian destination has become the (as far as we know) first destination in the world to put its money where most of the worlds' travellers are today, that is in the digital space (whether accessed via a computer or a mobile device). If you can read German see what the TourismusZukunft blog had to say about it. Otherwise read the excellent article by Vicky Brock in her Tracking Tourism: The Tourism Research Blog. The also German Cofree blog blogged about this today. Canada's Marketing Magazine has also featured news about this strategy.

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I am confident that Tourism Montreal's strategy will pay off, especially in this challenging yearmuch success, and I wish them . If at all possible, we hope to see an update presentation by Tourism Montreal at Canada-e-Connect 2010.
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Jaime Horwitz MBA
www.montrealenespanol.com

Sweden, Bjorn, the Winter Games and the Big Idea

At the recently concluded Canada-e-Connect eTourism Strategy 2009 conference, Terry O'Reilly, adman, enabler, radio personality and raconteur extraordinaire, talked about the Big Idea in communications whether it's in an ad, a blog post, a prosumer video or a multi-million advertising campaign. His presentation was entitled "Ideas Move Mountains." Here's an idea on video I found on the home page of the CommunityofSweden social networking site. I don't know what the genesis of the idea is, but I think Terry would agree with me, it's good. Perhaps risqué for Canadian sensitivities, but this YouTube video makes the point in a very...well...why don't you see it and decide for yourself. Oh and by the way, this particularly idea may or may not move mountains, but it certainly went to a few mountain peaks. It certainly sparked my interest in Sweden's Åre and Östersund ski destinations.

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(unfortunately, if he goes, I may not see Bjorn in Vancouver in 2010 because I did not get a single ticket from the games' lottery, which by the way upsets me to no end)

By the way, if you have any great ideas you may want to share or any big ideas you may have seen in tourism marketing let me know and if I agree with you, I'll blog about them.

Jaime Horwitz

www.canadamigos.com