360DigitalInfluence

From our colleagues in APAC.

This entry was originally posted on Flagged for Follow Up.

Disclaimer: Don’t worry … I have no intention of fashioning myself as the next Gary the “social media sommelier” Vaynerchuk [for those of you who are not familiar with Gary, check out http://tv.winelibrary.com/ for a truly unique experience].

I recently returned from my first-ever trip to California wine country [specifically Sonoma].  In addition to pristine weather, post-card vistas, incredible wine and some of the best food I’ve ever had, I also picked up a few lessons that might be useful for any marketer.

Lesson 1 - In sea of uneducated consumers, free is a good starting point: If you’re like me you haven’t the faintest idea why one winery is better than the next.  The ones we ended up visiting our first day were largely based on free tasting passes [a $10-$20 value] passed on by our concierge.  Not the most sophisticated method of choosing, but a starting point.  I’m not advising marketers give away their product [who do you think I am, Chris Anderson?] but I do think trial is crucial, and free is as powerful driver of that behavior.

Lesson 2 - Get your story straight, then tell it with passion: My wife and I were fortunate enough to visit with a guy called Stewart Dorman who runs a winery called Adrian Fog.  Stewart has a great story [former wine writer ... left to pursue his passion ... spends his days toiling in the vineyards or perfecting his blends ... only makes 1,000 barrels a year ... etc.].  It’s not so much Stewart’s story [which is awesome] but the passion with which he tells it.  We walked away from our conversation with two bottles of relatively expensive wine - I wanted to take part of Stewart’s story home with us.

Lesson 3 - Create a captivating and differentiating experience: Of all the places we visited, we only joined one wine club - and it wasn’t necessarily the best wine we had [but it was damn good].  Rather, it was the winery that did an elegant snack pairing with their tasting flight, spent an hour talking us through the flight, answered our questions, told us their history … they were the anti-wine snobs.  And it made their tasting room different than the others, and a really fun experience.  The winery is Williamson Wines.

Lesson 4 - “Limited edition” can be a powerful sales tool: I quickly realized that most wine for sale was not available for distribution [meaning only sold direct or via a wine club]. So the pitch is: You can’t get this anywhere else other than buying it right now.  Wouldn’t it be a shame to get home and think to yourself, ‘too bad I didn’t get that wine when I had the chance’?

Lesson 5 - Search is king: Found on every street corner in the town of Healdsburg.  Charming, no?

Screenshots from my iPhone

Foursquare is an interesting, fun and [at times] useful service that’s gotten some solid buzz in the last few months.  It’s the brainchild of the folks who brought us the one-time Internet service darling, Dodgeball.  I found this article from the New York Future Initiative which does a nice job of explaining the service, and the creators’ vision for what it might become.

With the ever-growing buzz, I thought you might appreciate the skinny …

What it is

Foursquare describes itself as 50% friend-finder, 30% social cityguide, 20% nightlife game, though my personal bias is that [at least for the time being] it’s more game.

How it works

A player checks in with Foursquare when they are out and about at a restaurant, bar, museum, movie theater, etc.  Checking in earns you points.  Points earn status [e.g, I was for a fleeting moment the Mayor of the Bowery Hotel Bar].  You can also earn badges for doing interesting things, like checking in at odd times or out-of-the-way places.

For now points/badges only get you bragging rights, though clearly that will change at some point [e.g., Ian checked in 5 times at Old Town Social, earning him a free cocktail].

How you play

Players check in via a slick iPhone app [uses GPS to find your location and things around you], mobile site and text message.  You can have Foursquare ping Twitter when you check in.

Where it works

At the time of this post, Foursquare is  available in: Amsterdam, Atlanta, Austin, Boston, Chicago, Dallas/Fort Worth, Denver, Detroit, Houston, Las Vegas, Los Angeles, Miami, Minneapolis/St. Paul, New York City, Philadelphia, Phoenix, Portland, San Diego, San Francisco, Seattle, and Washington D.C.

My recommendation

If you’ve got an iPhone, I recommend giving it a whirl - nothing to lose.  If you’re a marketer, you should take a peak under the hood so you understand the possibilities when Foursquare [inevitably] opens for [paid] business.  If you’re a business in one of the cities above [particularly in a hipster neighborhood] maybe play around with rewarding patrons for checking in from your store/bar/restaurant.

It’s not there yet, and may never be.  But I continue to hear the buzz …

Fascinating (in a nerve wracking way) article in yesterday’s Wall Street Journal about the challenges of getting checked luggage to its intended destination, on time.

No big insights here … just that you might want to say a prayer every time you hand over your bags (and another one when you retrieve them at baggage claim).

Full article here.

I recently read on Springwise about a nice promotion from Omni Hotels called Omni Flips for Summer.   From Springwise …

… families staying at any of the chain’s hotels and resorts in North America can borrow a pocket-sized video camcorder for free and use it to record their most memorable moments. The camcorder provided is the new Flip Ultra video camcorder, launched this spring by Pure Digital, and it’s available to guests who purchase any “Omni Flips for Summer” weekend package … When their weekend filming is complete, guests can upload their video memories to their own laptop or use the Omni Hotels Business Center at no charge to transfer the footage to a thumb drive to take home. Guests are also encouraged to upload a three-minute video to Omni’s Local Scoop social networking website as part of the Omni Flips for Summer Video Contest, the winner of which—announced in September—will get a free trip for four to the Omni Bedford Springs Resort in Pennsylvania.

In the last few years hotels have become a very attractive environment for brands to reach their targets.  In my experience, here are a few things brands should keep in mind when partnering with hotels:

1. Simplicity. Hotel brands are usually governed by a centralized brand team, but operations are very much determined property-by-property.   And these days, operations teams are stretched thin.  The more you - the brand - can do to create a truly turnkey promotion, the better your chances for success.
2. Beta. Rolling a promotion out to an entire chain of hotels is risky, expensive, and will require logistics coordination you never imagined.  Instead, pilot the promotion in one or two markets - validate guests interest and take the opportunity to tweak the operational aspects to make it easier on a grander scale.
3. Localize. If possible, try to localize the promotion to make it more interesting to the guests in a particular market.
4. Delight. Travel - particularly business travel - can be grueling.  When possible, delight guests with something unexpected and fun.  At the very least, don’t make them jump through hoops.
5. Talkability. Don’t think me too.  Think me first.  The latter will generate much more word-of-mouth.

So what else should go on this list?

Have the reports of the death of luxury travel been greatly exaggerated?  Perhaps not (for now), but there are a few social networks out there catering to the more discerning traveler.  Here are the ones I’ve heard about lately.  Any others?

Voyage.tv is part TV station, part social network, part online travel booking service.  The New York Times recently profiled the web site in an article, the full text of which can be found here.  The cornerstone of Voyage.tv are their videos – all of which (at least the few I watched) are very highly produced, but are currently focused on the Caribbean.  Curious to see how they expand their offering to LATAM, EMEA, APAC, etc.

Indagare describes itself as “a membership-based community for sophisticated travelers, providing access to curated online archives, printed black books and custom advisory and booking services.” And true to form, much of the content on the site is off limits to those who have not paid for a membership, which ranges from $250-$1,200 a year.

The informational tour gives you a good sense of the rewards of membership.  What I find most interesting is that they’ve grouped travel recommendations around 10 passion points (e.g. adventure, arts, family, etc.) in addition to geography.  For travelers like me and my wife who are open to vacationing anywhere, this is an interesting approach.

SQUA.RE describes itself as “the first and only community-generated TV site dedicated to your ideas of Luxury, Style and Inspiring Lifestyle.”  And while not devoted to travel, they do have an “Escape” section devoted to travel.  As with Indigare, membership to SQUA.RE is by invitation only, and it’s unclear how many members they actually have.

The question I have is, where do these sites fit in with popular blogs like Jaunted, or even Twitter?  Is their value in their niche area of expertise?  Access to bespoke travel itineraries via luxury travel experts?  What do you think?

Image from National Geographic

National Geographic has a nice rundown of travel related apps for the iPhone.  An app to help you remember your hotel room number?  I guess there really is an app for everything!

Safe and fun travels this holiday weekend.

One of the biggest challenges facing a country vying for foreign tourism dollars is giving prospective tourists a good sense of what the country is all about, enticing them choose your destination over another.

There are four relatively inexpensive ways to give people a taste of your culture, in the comfort of their own home.  Here are a few ideas for thought …

1. Pictures tell a thousand words. If you’re a destination known for its beautiful sunsets, pristine beaches or unique architecture, why not start a group on Flickr?  I’m a huge fan of Barcelona, and particularly Gaudi’s work.  This Flickr group has 575 members, with more than 3,200 photos of Gaudi’s work.  There’s no reason why a country’s tourism board can’t start a group and invite people to post their vacation photos (as Albania appears to have done)
2. A way to a tourist’s heart is through their stomach. I read today on the New York Times blog about a pop-up dinner club making its way around the US, featuring native food from Buenos Aires chefs Diego Felix and Sanra Ritten.   My colleague, Eileen, posted about the power of food in destination marketing.
3. Music is a universal language. Why not work with a licensing company to create a branded CD - featuring music from your country - that can be sold or given away at restaurants, bars and clothing stores?  Not only will the music get people in the mood, but the CD case is a great billboard for you to communicate specific information about your country.
4. One influential voice can tell your story to many followers. Ogilvy PR has executed a number of successful familiarization (”fam” for short) trips with highly influential bloggers.  For the cost of their trip, we can reach many of their readers who turn to these bloggers for vacation advice.

Any other ideas for cost-effective ways to bring the spirit of a destination to your potential visitors?

A rather simple thought as we finish out the week …

[This post is adapted from one I originally wrote about two years ago. You can see that full post here.]

I was in a meeting where someone used the Finnish term Sisu.  They were shocked that I knew what it meant until I explained that l used to work for Nokia.

What many people know, but many more don’t, is that Nokia is a Finnish company.  I had many [+15] opportunities to travel to Finland.  As you can imagine, I got to know many Finns and learn about the culture.  One of the guiding principles of Finland is something called Sisu.  As Wikipedia describes it, Sisu …

“… could be roughly translated into English as strength of will, determination, perseverance, and acting rationally in the face of adversity. The equivalent in English is “to have guts”, and indeed, the word derives from sisus, which means something inner or interior. However, sisu has a long-term element in it; it is not momentary courage, but the ability to sustain the same.”

I suppose the closest American equivalent is “patriotism,” but that does not get at the essence of Sisu.  You see, the Finns have endured centuries of struggles against the Russians, Germans, Swedes (and probably several others I don’t know about).  Not to mention that Finland is a tough place – cold, dark and vast.  These factors combine to give Finns a fortitude unlike any I’ve ever seen.

Interestingly, Sisu can also cause insularity — it is after all a bunkerish mentality.  Despite that I always very much appreciated Sisu — maybe not so much for what it stands for, but more for the fact that an entire nation operates under such a clear guiding principle.

SO WHAT IAN???

So it just got me thinking … what’s your destination’s Sisu?  Or as my colleagues might ask, what’s your lighthouse?  What’s the guiding principal on which your destination/country is built … find it, articulate it and use it as the cornerstone of all your marketing.

Have a great weekend.

Came across this on SpringWise.  It’s a self-cooling canopy bed called Evening Breeze, “a canopy bed with built-in air conditioner that uses only a fraction of that energy.”

We find no shortage of green and eco-related online content when it comes to tourism.  It no longer seems to be a differentiator, but rather the cost of entry.  Would love for you to share some of the eco-friendly products you’ve come across.

Full post on SpringWise here.  Excerpt below:

In the Evening Breeze bed, air is filtered and cooled to a set temperature and humidity level and then gently directed over the sleeper via an upholstered canopy ceiling. A built-in mosquito net protects the sleeper from uninvited visitors while also helping to contain the cooled air, meaning that no airtight insulation is necessary—rather, the room can be left to its natural state, with windows open for fresh air. The eco-minded bed is crafted from FSC-approved wood, and it uses only environmentally friendly R410A coolant. Perhaps best of all, however, is that whereas conventional air conditioners use between 1,200 and 2,000 Watts, the average energy use for the Evening Breeze bed is only 400 Watts, creating a reduction in energy use of 60 percent per room.