Smart Social Web Marketing Solutions

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OK, then watch this:

Another convincing video by Socialnomics author Eriq Qualman that says it better in a few minutes than I or many others could in a thousand word post.
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This is a brilliant video, a must view in my opinion and not because it’s about Apple (although I’m an admitted Fanboy!) but about much more than that.
The full post is on CNN Money

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reads the intriguing headline of this new post in Social Media Examiner today. It contains some key insights into how psychology does influence social media content and how to make this work in your favor when marketing on the social web. I found this graphic especially compelling:

If you notice the year it was published at the bottom (1969), you realize that some of the basics in information retention haven’t changed at all and are as relevant, if not more so, today in our interactions on the social web. One key difference is the tools at our disposal which make it so much easier to instantly produce, distribute and consume content and communicate about it. This has significant implications on how to develop effective marketing strategies that take all this into consideration to assure success.
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reads the headline of this article in Travel Weekly. While many destinations are talking about green travel and the environment, Switzerland has delivered on these points for many years and played a pioneering role in raising awareness on a global level. One of Schmid’s predecessors proclaimed back in the 1970s that “tourism should not destroy tourism” in other words with un-checked over development the very reasons for people to visit certain places disappear. Today’s reality has proven him right when more an more travelers are looking for authentic experiences far removed from the artificial ones created all too often to attract visitors. The Swiss tourism industry is positioned extremely well to capitalize on the trend in the coming years, even when visitor numbers are in a temporary downturn.

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Below is a quote from the foreword of the 360i Social Marketing Playbook a useful guide on how to engage with customers in an environment where old marketing rules no longer apply:

Social Marketing eliminates the middlemen, providing brands with the unique opportunity to have direct relationship with their customers

There is a lot of chatter about the topic of social media and social networking but uncertainty still remains regarding the right approach by companies and how to correctly use the tools available to make their marketing successful. This paper touches on these issues and seems to be a useful guide.

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Of course, widget are nothing new on blogs or sites but I found this new one introduced by VisualDNA adds an interesting twist that should make it much more fun for site visitors to use. Here’s Stephen Fry telling you how it works:

As a matter of fact, you can try it out right here on this blog. Just at bit down on the right hand side is an attractive selection of pictures to click on. Based on the clicks the tool will determine your preferences, or travel related DNA and offer the products it determines are most relevant to you.

There are different shop options and the widget can be personalized. If you’re interested in having your own, just go to http://shops.visualdna.com and click “Create a shop”, you should then be prompted for an access code. Please enter “buhlerworksvisualdnashops” and you should be able to set up a PRO shop of your own.Tweet

All are full of insights. One of my favorites, having been around for a while is #10

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reports Springwise in their latest trends newsletter. YokMoK, a Spanish adventure travel operator came up with this idea and it seems to me a great example of customer involvement in product planning. At the same time it offers these past travelers a reward for recruiting others to travel with the company.

Knowing how influential recommendations by friends are in the choice of travel products and destinations this looks like an effective way to take advantage of this and also get useful word-of-mouth support. Should be a model to be copied more widely.

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Old Media Strikes Back is the title of an article on Newsweek.com by Daniel Lyons writing about why Hulu, the venture founded by NBC and Fox is winning the online video race. This has made me realize certain similarities with the travel industry based on his lead in:

As the worlds of technology and media collide, the same contest keeps getting played out over and over again: lumbering old-media companies take on nimble new-media upstarts, and usually the new-media guys win, since it’s easier for them to figure out the content business than it is for the content companies to figure out the techie stuff involved in launching an Internet business.

We can replace “media” with “travel” and come to pretty much the same conclusion. Twelve or so years ago when the web first started to impact business, it was the new outsider tech start-ups like Expedia and Priceline that pioneered online travel. It was way before any of the traditional travel industry players entered the fray. The same was true in Europe and Asia.

It was again the case a few years ago, when travel 2.0 – the phase we’re presently in with online travel research and planning moving online – was ushered in not by the OTAs, the traditional tour operators or destination marketing organizations (DMO) but start-up companies like Uptake, Tripbase, Travelmuse, Triporati and others.

This seems to confirm how hard it is for established companies to break out of the status quo, innovate and, if necessary, change business models. While this might be understandable, what I do not understand why there are not more ventures where these new players are being sought out by the traditionalists to cooperate. This is especially true for DMOs who do not have to fear being a competitor to these companies but a potential partner. The only thing they need to fear is becoming irrelevant in a few years time by not being innovative enough and have their role being assumed more and more by the new disruptors and innovators.

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