It takes in city tours, launch parties, workshops, networking dinners, an award lunch (including a best blog category) and the main crux of things: 2 days of what can best be described as intense, business ‘speed dating.’
But before you spit biley chunks of poutine in my general direction, do consider that I had to endure a Trans Canadian train trip from Toronto with Via Rail, 3 nights amid the spectacular fall foliage of Jasper National Park and a two day excursion on the Rocky Mountaineer, one of the world’s finest luxury train experiences, to earn my invite. ;-)
Before you go you’re prompted online to request appointments with around 25-40 organisations, which range from provincial tourist boards to museums and lodge resorts. You’re then matched with around 30 of them. You’ll get issued with a neat little ring binder with an overview of each appointee, where you can staple your partner’s business card and scribble notes. You have 15 minutes with each, before a shopping centre-like PA bell rings and you move on to the next one.
It is a pretty exhausting process but worthwhile for two reasons.
1.Canada’s a vast country, so you’ll get a unique opportunity to acquire handy snapshots of each destination you meet under one roof
But more to the point..
2. You get to meet the people with whom you can build relationships, people you’ll also socialise with informally over the course of the event.
Of course you’ll also meet other writers whose brains and contact books you can pick and a few travel editors (who keep a low profile for obvious reasons). Leading lights from the travel blogging community are represented too, those I’d be unlikely to meet otherwise included Matador co-founder Ross Borden (@rossborden) and Kim Mance (@KimMance) of TBEX fame.
The effectiveness of the tourism PR pitches you get varies, as you can imagine. The best came armed with pics and video clips on an ipad, maps they’ll scribble on and let you take away and USB drives loaded with story ideas, which you can use to pitch paying editors with.
As with ordinary speed dating, sometimes it’s obvious the chemistry just isn’t there.As with ordinary speed dating, sometimes it’s obvious the chemistry just isn’t there. Your folder will tellingly reflect this. Some pages of mine are almost entirely obscured by my messy scrawl, some are blank, one just cryptically states: ‘hiking boots tree.’
Most seemed more interested in print coverage opportunities, no surprise there really, and some when hearing the magic words ‘I have a blog about train travel’ gave me that look that says ‘That’s nice dear. It’s good to have a hobby’, but a few had done their homework and made an effort to suggest ideas tailored to Trains on the Brain, even when train travel options in their region were obviously limited.
I found it’s best to set your stall out early on and tell them the sort of travel you’re interested in and are likely to write about. Some were clearly flagging on the second day and had lost their voices, so they’ll appreciate you taking the wheel anyway. And some will flip the loonie cake and ask you what your interest in their resort/region is, so be prepared for that. So far only a handful of those I met have followed up by email, which I found surprising, but regular attenders told me that the value comes with repeat visits.
Now I am a ‘slashie’, in the parlance of Zoolander, but if you’re a pure blogger it should be easier to talk turkey, since there are no middle men in the publishing process. Keith Jenkins (@velvetescape) certainly found this to be true and even managed to turn the tables on a few, pitching them his blog as a sponsorship opportunity.
Although I appear to have been the only Brit invited who owns a blog, most of the international writers I met do blog and there was growing interest in the machinations of social media at the panel sessions which Keith and others spoke on.
So how can you jump on board this particular charabanc? If you’re European it should be pretty straight forward. UK PR Manager of the CTC Nim Singh (@canadanim) is very approachable and increasingly engaged with bloggers, since they sponsor events like TBEX and TBU. Make sure you tip your white Calgary cowboy hat in her direction and get on her radar.
The European market seems to be an important one to the CTC. I’d heard anecdotally that there were significantly fewer Canadians invited this year to make way for more international writers…
Next year’s event will be hosted by the Yukon, the wild Northern territory bordering Alaska, and if their closing party was anything to go by it promises to be entertaining, so long as you don’t mind supping on a sour toe cocktail or two.
Is there a tourism networking event you’d recommend for bloggers? Share it with a comment below.
Images: Canadian Tourism Commission
Post Revisions:
- 20 December, 2011 @ 5:40 [Current Revision] by Jools Stone
- 19 October, 2011 @ 18:10 by John O'Nolan
- 19 October, 2011 @ 18:10 by John O'Nolan
Great post Jools. Gosh, we had a fun time! :-)
The speed-dating was actually pretty ingenious. I found it easier to take the reins by introducing myself & what I blog about, thanks to advice from @nikkibayley, so they would know what to tell me that would interest me.
All in all, it was a fantastic experience. The conference was very-well organised – loved the personal ring-binders – and Yukon promises to be a huge party next year! :-)
Keith
Man I wish I had known this was happening right in my backyard! I would have scooched up from Calgary in no time. Sounds like a great event with plenty of contacts!
Interesting to read your take on the event as a newbie….. so glad to have had you along and thanks for the kind words. Think you might see a few cowboy hats at this years World Travel market on the Canada stand.
Sorry for delay, Nim. Just found this comment in spam folder.
Thanks for having me Nim, I really enjoyed it and got a lot out of it. I’d be really interested to hear the perspective from the other side of the desks too, so if you hear of any PRs who might be so bold to write about their exp there do let me know!
Cheers
Jools
Any Newfoundlanders there? What does it take to get some east coast representation?
Tourism newfoundland were most definitely at GO MEDIA talking to all the media about NF & L _ as were all of the other Atlantic provinces so the east coast folks were definitely there.
Awesome! Haven’t heard anything about it. Would love to see more coverage.
Hi Jools,
opening my Twitter application I found your great article. As I’m going to write about the Speed-Dating too, its very helpfull and I will link that. Thanks!
I enjoyed the conference too, it was really great!
Your Encouraged me than finally to publish my article about Keith http://www.berufebilder.de/en/berufseinstieg/wie-man-die-krise-als-chance-nutzt-vom-investment-banker-zum-travel-blogger/ (thats the Google-Translated englisch Version… the original-text is without en )
Somebody gave me this link for the International Travel Writers Alliance: http://www.itwalliance.com
And specally for you Jooles: Years ago I wrote an Series about the German Railways Price-System http://www.berufebilder.de/en/serie/sparen-mit-der-deutschen-bahn/ – could be that something changed.
Hope to see you soon!
Thanks Simone, so great to meet you out there and I look forward to reading those – and to seeing you around on twitter!
I was at Go Media last year in Toronto and they really do go all out for bloggers and writers. On top of that, the way that they connect networking between the boards and writers is very organized. That said, my only concern is that the Canadian Tourism Commission has specifically stated they are looking for international coverage and not Canadian coverage so they have denied writers/bloggers from Canada (not all but a lot). I found that disappointing because I think what the CTC fails to realize is that Canadian bloggers//joggers have an international audience and said audience may seek out a Canadian blogger when they are planning a Canadian vacation. Hopefully, they will change this policy or be more open to including Canadian bloggers next year proving that we are just as valuable as other bloggers who have an established reputation.