Sometimes press trips aren’t as great as you think they are. You are at the DMO’s mercy to see and experience what they want to promote. You often do some amazing things in a destination that you would never normally do on your own. But that’s the problem; it’s not your travel style. For me, I don’t stay in fancy resort hotels typically, so why should I start writing about them now on my blog; it’s confusing to my audience.
Recently I wanted to go to Hawaii but no DMO’s were knocking down my door sending me free invites. So I decided to organize it myself. Of course there’s no guarantee you’re requests will be received favorably, but it’s worth it to try.
Plan Your Writing
Determine some topics you would like to write about regarding the destination. What are the headlines, the angles, photos, and what would you need to research further, or who would you need to talk to when you are there in order to write the story.
Research
Research the hotels or types of accommodations you’d like to stay in. As I mentioned earlier, I don’t typically write about big resort stays or hotels as a solo traveler. Instead I like to find apartments or guest houses to stay in because I like working with smaller, individually owned businesses. I go to the lodging website and determine how savvy that business is with social media. The more social media savvy they are, the more likely they will be interested in what I have to offer; a blog post with social media coverage.
Let them know you are coming
Contact the Visitor Bureau and introduce yourself, your blog, and your audience. Send them your media pack that includes where your writing is featured and a list of stories ideas that you intend to write about the area. This is your chance to ask for their help in researching these stories. You can ask for help with airfare, but if you already have your airfare arranged and dates you will be in the destination, then let them know that. At this point, they might organize your whole trip for you since you are already covering the cost of the flights. Or they may offer some other ways they can help. In Hawaii, I was offered a car rental by the Big Island Visitor Bureau which helped me immensely as a way to get around and research my stories.
Be specific in your requests but open to their suggestions.
From your previous research, organize a list of accommodations, tours, experiences, or restaurants you’d like to visit based on your story pitches or interests. Ask the visitor bureau for the PR or business owner contact information so that you can contact the organization personally. Also ask them if they have other suggestions for you to gather information for your story angle.
Contact the business
Introduce yourself and let them know that you are a writer working with the Visitor Bureau to organize your trip. Include your media pack with examples of past projects. Be specific about what you will provide them in return for comped or discounted stays or tours and be prepared to negotiate.
Giving Thanks
Shortly after the experience or stay, send the business a thank you and remind them when the piece is planned to be published, ask for any additional editorial images and data you need to round out your story.
Follow up
When the post is live, send them the story links, screen shots of Social Media mentions. A few weeks after the fact, you can also send them the post analytics if possible. Finally, be sure to do a final wrap up to the Visitor Bureau with links to all articles and stats. Who knows, they may invite you next time!
For my eight-day stay on the Big Island of Hawaii, I was able to organize all of my accommodation and experiences with this method. I developed strong relationships with small business owners and the Visitor Bureau to utilize for future trips. Oh yeah, and I had the time of my life hiking, experiencing great restaurants, snorkeling, herding cattle, interviewing farmers, and even riding in a helicopter.
I couldn’t have asked for a better trip if I had organized this ‘press trip’ myself…oh wait a minute…I did.
Post Revisions:
- 1 August, 2012 @ 11:05 [Current Revision] by Sherry Ott
- 20 December, 2011 @ 5:48 by John O'Nolan
- 9 December, 2011 @ 10:30 by John O'Nolan
- 9 December, 2011 @ 10:30 by Alastair McKenzie
- 9 December, 2011 @ 10:28 by Alastair McKenzie
- 9 December, 2011 @ 10:27 by Alastair McKenzie
- 9 December, 2011 @ 10:27 by Alastair McKenzie
- 9 December, 2011 @ 10:24 by Alastair McKenzie
- 9 December, 2011 @ 10:23 by Alastair McKenzie
Great suggestions. I love the idea of taking a proactive approach to press trips, we’ve recently begun to use this approach to reach destinations in which we have a strong interest. We’ll see how it works! Thanks for sharing.
Since I once worked on the CVB / tourism bureau side of things as a PR/marketing rep, I know how valuable they can be as information resource, and as a first point of contact to the local accommodations and attractions. They will know who is social media savvy and who is most willing to offer comps or media rates. They may even make those introductions, saving you the time of sending multiple emails.
They can also take a look at your itinerary and provide helpful hints. e.g. if there are any holiday closings you should be aware of, strikes, or even driving short-cuts.
Invaluable time savings!
Great tips Sheri! I almost always do this :) I just traveled to Wales, Tenerife and Berlin and it was all on my arranging and contacting people on my own and it worked on fabulously! :)
Great tips as usual, Sherry. I strongly believe that if more bloggers organized their own trips we would have better content floating around, it would aid PR reps who want to learn how to work more closely with non-traditional media, and there would be more blogger trust in general.
I am in the “no-one’s-knocking-down-my-door-boat”, so I started to reach out to Tourism boards and tour companies myself. I plan on going to Indonesia in January, and have so far secured a few tours, and an invite to TRAVEX 2012 as media. Still working on more, but very much excited about it all. :)
Another possibility is to bite the bullet and pay your own way. When you work with DMOs, you do give up a certain amount of freedom, and you may find yourself wasting an afternoon on a tour to the Castle Whatsit or the Widgetville Resort Hotel and Spa when you really wanted to check out the Undertakers Museum and the Garfield Cat Sanctuary.
On the other hand, sometimes working a local tourist office does introduce you to things that you might not have discovered on your own. So, if you’re organizing a solo trip, a good compromise might be to accept one or two days of organized activities (such as a walking tour with a local guide) while leaving the rest of your time free for DIY exploring.
Durant – for my Hawaii trip I organized and chose every activity myself. I much preferred it that way. I know my audience best – and the few thing the VB did suggest to me I took a look at and decided weren’t my style. It takes a bit more work – but I find that it was much more rewarding on many levels for me.
Sherry Ott you are a clever girl. Suggesting how to organize your own press trip is a wonderful idea. As a journalist, one of the downfalls of press trips is that they are showing a large group of writers and bloggers the same activity, often times not allowing us to venture off the “press trip” path.
I have found that the DMO’s and CVB’s who are social media savvy start a press trip together and then let us go off on our own, seeking our own unique story ideas, at the end of the trip.
Your suggestion to send a media pack is a good one. Remember, bloggers are a new species to many CVB’s, it is up to us to put our best foot forward and show them how valuable a relationship with us may be.
Great ideas, Sherry.
Love it Sherry! I often see these press trips for travel bloggers and wonder “That’s great…but what about families”. I’m not a professional writer by any means, in fact, I just started a blog. But, I’m going to try this in the countries we are living in, but from a family perspective.
Thanks for the suggestion.
A follow up question… what should we do if we are green behind the ears? No past experience, no past published articles…nada.
I do agree with Durant – you’ll need some number to go to them with. Or take a look at your social media influence such as your Facebook page and the engagement you have with your audience there. You may be able to tout your social media influence. Another thing you can do to start building a media kit is to start writing for other sites that have good traffic – guest post and then you can potentially pitch them stories about your next travel destination – then you can go to the DMO with articles that you know you want to write for other websites and your own.
S King, I’d suggest waiting until you have something to pique the interest of a tourist office or travel vendor: If you pitch before you can offer quantifiable value to marketers (such as a targeted audience of reasonable size), you probably won’t get a trip, and you’ll just be making it harder to overcome the marketers’ skepticism later on when you *are* able to deliver that value.
Great advice! I did this for my honeymoon in Canada by working with both a tourism board and local companies. I was pleasantly surprised at the positive response.
We, too, prefer to organize our own press trips and spend much of our Trans-Americas Journey working this way–doing our own research, making our own contacts, focusing on our own interests/travel style (and that of our readers), tapping into Tourism Bureau help if/when it’s necessary then DELIVERING and FOLLOWING UP with in-country contacts who helped. If more travel bloggers adopted a similarly professional approach the whole media segment would benefit.
Thanks for spelling out the steps, Sherry.
Thanks for taking the time to write this great article. I am just getting started with my blog, so I am not quite to the point yet where I am thinking about press trips, but I really like this approach for down the road a little bit. I think that this could be a great way to make contacts and expand my network (which I am discovering is MEGA important for the success of my blog.)
I just organized my own experience on a trip to Maryland and had the best press trip of my life. I don’t think this could have gone any better if I tried. I contacted the Visitor’s Bureau telling them what I was doing, who I am, and what I was looking for. Before I left, I had a detailed itinerary for my 4 days there. I got to eat at a lot of restaurants for free, had lots of free time to explore and do things I wanted to do, and had a number of doors opened for me to do and experience things I never could have done on my own. If there is such a thing as a perfect media/press trip, I just had it.
Cool Jeremy – it’s great when you can design it yourself – it makes the writing so much easier as you design it for your style of travel and writing! Glad to hear other people are having success with this. Sure – it’s more work – but I think it’s worth it!
After TBEX this year, I received an invite for a press briefing from the Maui CVB. I was hesitant to go because I’ve never really had an interest in going to Hawaii. But, I thought, “Why not? I’ll get to meet new people and network with local bloggers/writers.” Well, I hit it off with many of the PR people and in the end, they did a drawing for a free trip and I won! So, even though I am not under any obligation to write about my trip, it’s just a free trip, not a press trip, per se, I am planning to use the trip as an opportunity for my blog. I’ve been connecting with other travel bloggers and industry professionals via Twitter and Facebook and hope to have a Tweetup with some of them when I go to Maui in March. This could develop into more and I am taking advantage of the opportunity! Great article Sherry, I have been wondering about some of this stuff lately and you answered some of my questions!
Great tips Sherry. Oddly enough I did this a couple of months ago when going to Oahu and had a memorable experience…. I am sooo willing to go back!
Great read and tips Sherry, thanks for sharing. It makes so much more sense to see what interests you and not only what the trip orgnisers want you to see.
Loved your post! Thanks a lot for the tips!! I am preparing a trip to Slovenia this summer and I will do this. Hope it works and I can prepare a fantastic “own press trip” :)
Thanks for the tip! We never have enough! I’am preparing for a trip to japan and i going to try to organize my own trip!
Great advices. Now I’ve invited to Lisbon :). But to be honest I want to create a press trip in my hometown, I know that maybe it’s tricky to do it, but defenetly I will try.
Thank you for the advices.
Vero4travel
A very logical and professional approach for the well organised blogger! It looks a lot of work but obviously pays off if you have a better experience and travel your own way. Pre-arranged one size fits all blog trips have major downsides in that respect, but the company of other bloggers is usually great fun.