There have been several moments this month when I’ve been struck by a mis-match in the way that travel media and travel professionals talk and think about travel. It’s a bit like that old GB Shaw quote about how America and Britain are “two cultures separated by a common language”; the words are the same but their meaning is different.
In particular there is a lack of recognition on both sides. Travel blogger Neil Barnes highlighted it when he wrote about the mixed messages he picked up as a first-time visitor to World Travel Market (WTM):
Upstairs in the seminar rooms travel bloggers were hailed as being the future of travel. Our work was appreciated and travel companies were urged to reach out to bloggers and utilise our skills and audience.
Downstairs when approaching various stands the mention of being a travel blogger bought only blank stares, awkward looks and silence. Maybe the people on the stands weren’t the right people to be talking to about working with travel bloggers, I assume they’re at WTM to sell their product so that’s probably fair enough, but the mixed messages made my head spin.
Well, they are there to sell their product to each other, and the media – the ones with black badges – are supposedly there to listen in, observe and report. Strictly speaking, from a WTM point of view, if travel media want to ‘sell’ themselves – pitch for work or sponsorship – they should perhaps wear a yellow (trade visitor) badge, just as the non-editorial Sales & Marketing staff from newspapers, magazine publishers and TV companies do.
Of course the issue has always been blurred – not least by all those PRs who want to engage with influential travel media, and more recently with the evolution of travel bloggers who are by definition editors, marketing managers and publishers all at the same time. No wonder the sourcing of ‘press facilities’ and advertising/sponsorship, not stories, has become the primary focus of most black badge holders at WTM.
I suspect most travel media, and travel bloggers in particular, don’t really think about travel industry professionals as people who have much to do with ‘travel’ at all.Indeed I suspect most travel media, and travel bloggers in particular, don’t really think about travel industry professionals as people who have much to do with ‘travel’ at all.
The only interest a travel writer/blogger is likely to have in a ferry company for example, is as a cheap or possibly free way to get across the water, or maybe as a source of advertising. They don’t see people with years of commitment and engagement with the communities of their destination ports and hinterlands.
How does the travel industry view travel media?
To be fair, I’m not sure the travel industry thinks that travel media have much to do with travel either. They are struggling to understand the fast-changing blogosphere and for the most part, ignoring it and getting on with their own world. Last week there were two events involving the top people from the top UK travel brands that I thought demonstrated that point rather well.
The British Travel Press Awards featured 20 categories, judged by 60 senior figures (CEOs, Directors) in the travel industry. They were all about traditional media, except one for ‘Travel Blogger of the Year’.
The next day senior managers and directors from all the top UK travel brands gathered as delegates to learn about the developing digital marketplace and online trends at the Travolution Summit. Around mid-morning I noticed I had not yet heard the word “blogger” and began to keep my ears peeled (sic) for it. It never came. A whole day’s conference on the digital marketplace, on social media, on Mobile and ‘local’, and the word ‘blog’ appeared only once – on a slide, in parenthesis with other content types, as part of the legend for a graph!
So maybe travel writers/bloggers are getting the lack of recognition they deserve for speaking the same language – travel – but not listening and engaging with the industry, who clearly speak it in a different dialect.
Part of the problem could be arrogance.Part of the problem could be (reaches for tin hat) arrogance. Or, to put it more gently, ‘ownership’.
Most travel bloggers are experienced travellers, and passionate about it. That’s why they are good at travel writing (passion always comes across on the page) and that’s why they are so experienced – they travel. A lot.
So it’s a bit like being a fan, and we know how that works. There you are, let’s say… Justin Bieber’s biggest and most devoted fan (!) and somebody comes along and launches the “official” Justin Bieber fan website. How do you react? With a little indignation – “What the hell do they know about Justin!?” – and then studied shunning, probably.
It’s easy, when travel is ‘your territory’ to forget that it belongs to the people who work in travel too. Even worse, they have just as much ‘ownership’ and probably more expertise.
Give me some examples
Take tour operator, Max Lawrence, for example. His dad drove to Morocco from England in 1966 and then set up as a tour operator. Max and he built one of the best known and most successful UK tour operators to Morocco, which they sold on and then Max set up another. They’ve created tourism villages, several individual riads/hotels, and local businesses. I’ve listened to Max talking business and joking with his suppliers in the fluent arabic he has learned over years of living and working there. I know some really experienced and knowledgeable travel writers, but none who have that level of knowledge, love and passion for Morocco.
The nature of that role is different too, observes James Mundy from specialist tour operator, Inside Japan. Travel writers, like clients, are observers in a destination. Travel professionals are participants.
Seasoned travel writers may get ‘under the skin’ of a destination, perhaps over an extended period living there, but there’s a fundamental shift in the relationship with locals when you do business with them or they work for you. Then you begin to really understand how things work and what makes people tick.
When the tsunami devastated Japan last year it wasn’t travel writers or the mainstream media keeping the Japanese diaspora in the UK up to date with events on the ground on social media. It was James’ partner Simon King, Inside Japan.
Anyone blogged on a cultural event recently? Like the Bregenz festival or opera at Verona’s ancient Arena? Do you feel you got the emotional intensity across, or any of the historic & cultural significance? You could always ask a tour operator like Martin Randall. I’ve seen heavyweight lecturers and academics meekly defer to Martin’s knowledge of the arts. They don’t defer to any journalists I know in the same field.
How about Africa? Any specialist writers or bloggers with expert knowledge on safari in Botswana or the skeleton coast of Namibia. Wait. Don’t bother. I’ll ask the Managing Director of tour operator Expert Africa. After all Chris McIntyre wrote the definitive (Bradt) guide to both in 1990 and has been taking people there ever since.
I could go on all day, making the same point…
Hotels? The travel media community is stuffed full with experts on hotel accommodation. I doubt many have the sheer love of the industry and experience of somebody like David Morgan-Hewitt, Managing Director of The Goring hotel in London.
What about the ocean? I know dozens of very experienced specialist cruise writers/bloggers, but even they would acknowledge the amazing enthusiasm and depth of knowledge of some longstanding cruise travel agents like the late Bill Whalley of Tappers Travel, or Edwina Lonsdale at Paul Mundy Travel, or the industry knowledge and experience of longtime cruise line managers like David Dingle, who started out as a trainee at the P&O Steam Navigation Company in 1978 and is now CEO of Carnival UK, whose brands include P&O Cruises and Cunard.
You want passion? Take Michael Krafft who as a young boy rowed out to the derelict hull of the 5-masted tea clipper Preussen in a Swedish estuary and fell in love with her. Michael spent the rest of his life in the marine industry and founded the Star Clippers cruise line, who’s flagship, Royal Clipper, is his modern replica of Preussen.
I worry that unless the new generation of travel writers & bloggers acknowledge and engage with the travel industry instead of looking simply to exploit it, they won’t tap its richest seams – its passion and expertise.
Where to start? Well, almost every week I see a travel blog post with yet another interview with a ‘star’ in the travel firmament, IE. a blogger. I don’t see any with the kind of travel lovers/experts listed above.
Ok, they are particularly UK-centric, but those same travel industry characters with a knowledge and love of travel every bit as passionate as any travel writer, are to be found in large numbers in every country…
Take Canada for example, where a decade ago Andrée Boivert, the Commercial Director of inbound tour operator Misa Tours, was a little disturbed to find one of her guests sobbing as he watched the sun setting in Quebec.
“No, you don’t understand,” he told her when she asked what the matter was. “All my life behind the Iron Curtain I dreamed of this and it’s better than my dreams.”
“THAT is why I love working in travel!”, she says.
Image: Bigstock/urbanraven
The most important it’s to have open mind and iniciative. We can create our travel business , we shouldn’t forgot that some of us are expert travellers who knows how its work.
Jesús Martínez
Vero4travel
Travel blogger
Lots of food for thought here Alastair. I sometimes think that everyone involved in/with the travel industry should spend at least a day in the other’s shoes. I’m really surprised about the lack of blog mentions at Travolution Summit but it is interesting to note. Occasionally I get the sense that bloggers are busy talking to each other rather than an audience. Hopefully this post will encourage a wider perspective which ultimately produces better content, which is win win for everyone.
Thanks Lynda, Yeah, there are so many passionate travel professionals (including PRs), it would be great to see *their* stories woven into the online travel narrative as guest bloggers, interviewees, and/or their work featured in posts.
Most importantly I want more travel writers/bloggers to meet travel industry leaders and think “what can I learn from this guy?” instead of “what press facilities might I get from this guy?”
Having worked on both sides of the travel fence I have to say that your point of a possible “misconnect” between travel writers and industry personnel is well articulated. Your key words are observers vs. participants in the travel experience. I first started in the travel industry as a tour guide in Hawaii when I as a university student who had no idea what to do professionally with a fine arts degree. But after the contact with the visitors who told me that they had saved their money for their entire lives dreaming about coming to Hawaii and they were so thrilled to be there, I knew immediately that this was what I was going to do with my life. This is generally a very upbeat job in a personally rewarding industry where one is able to bring joy to others. I fell in love with the travel industry and continued by working in banqueting in hotels, being an inbound tour operator and conventions organizer in Hawaii. Then I was a retail travel agent in Carmel, a group sales agent for a luxury cruise line in San Francisco. Then more wanderlust took over my life and I crossed the Atlantic and worked as an incentive travel product developer and operator in Switzerland.
For those of you who have not worked in the industry, believe me, you have to LOVE it because it is one of the poorest paying industries in the Western World (more recent technology positions excluded). This industry gets into your blood and you thrive on it because it is so personally rewarding by making people happy but as a travel industry participant, you cannot pay your rent with a free cruise across the South Pacific or a champagne reception with the Count and Countess of the Chateau Vaux-le-Vicomte in the Fontainebleau Forest south of Paris. I knew many people in travel who worked at least two jobs. Many outside people are not aware that the profit margins for suppliers in the travel industry are, at best, precarious and the product is completely perishable. We all watch the airlines going bankrupt and the hotel and tour companies consolidate for economies of scale and survival. But the love and passion of the industry remains and everyone works hard encountering one unexpected problem, sometimes catastrophic, after another.
After further studies I started teaching tourism marketing to bachelor students in Switzerland and do not lack for examples from my professional experience. At the same time I have been writing for the travel industry and travel writing for consumers, an activity for which I am also passionate. But I have been carefully observing this newly recognized (by some) professional position as a travel blogger in order to make the right professional decisions in my career. I have inquired into various organizations and with prominent individuals to see if there is any travel blogging code of ethics or self monitoring as a professional industry and have not yet found it. Coming from the “other side” I believe such credibility and communication is essential to gain the respect of and the understanding by the travel industry for travel bloggers and their particular perspective and usually appreciated involvement in the world of travel.
Hi Sonia,
Yeah, travel industry folk *have* to love it because, just like travel writing, it’s an aspirational and oversubscribed profession, so the pay is low.
On blogger codes of ethics. TBH it is early days and the blogging community/industry is making it all up as it goes along. That said, most bloggers consider themselves to be more ethically transparent than traditional media (with some justification) and are beginning to organise themselves into ‘professional’ groups and societies.
Excellent post Alastair. I see so many travel blogs that go to *gasp* other travel bloggers for “expert” advice. I think too many travel blogers forget they are creating stories, just like a journalist. A good journalist would always try to get the best source – bloggers should be no expection.
Too true, Megan. The first thing I saw today on FB was a new interview post notification from a travel blog. The interviewee was, needless to say, another ‘expert traveller’ IE a blogger.
Great article Alastair, thanks!
It’s encouraging for me too, as over on My Destination we have recently launched an interview series focused on travel industry professionals, including the founder of a tour operator, a B&B owner and a flight attendant – all of whom have brilliant stories to tell and lots of wisdom to share…
The blogger bubble is super comfy but there’s so much to learn outside of it too :)
Agree :)
I’ve got mixed feelings about this as I’m sure many others have… There’s still a feeling that the industry still doesn’t “get it”.
Things are changing, rapidly, yet I think many in the industry (not all) are still going about their business in the same traditional way that has served them well for so many years.
You only have to look at Thomas Cook:
Chief Harriet Green said about awful results: “There are great people doing good work.
“Then there are some people who don’t get it, who say, ‘We don’t do it like that.’
“Of course we don’t, look at the results.”
The barriers between the industry, their customers and the information supply to their customers are breaking down… but your example of the Travolution Submit shows that there is definitely some people with their heads in the sand with regards to this.
The freedom and speed of information is rapidly changing the travel industry landscape. If anything it’s the industry that needs to modernise, reach out (not just to bloggers but to customers), become less stuffy and realise that the game is changing.
Thought provoking article Alistair.
With a foot in both the blogger and travel industry camp I can see that sometimes they don’t speak the same language and do not yet know how to work well with each other as quite a few travel brands don’t yet appreciate how well good quality content can perform relative to pay per click and are too wedded to the old “broadcast” style of doing their marketing. They have not yet changed their back end processes to cope with the volume of comments and user generated content that blogs and social channels create.
Those bloggers with a good following are seeing the results of their hard labour but I still think they are missing opportunities to work with travel brands because they don’t know how to pitch their work in a proper proposal that a travel brand can respond to. I believe this is why we are seeing all these new types of blogger platforms where companies can pay to view thousands of blogger profiles. However my view is that you can’t select a travel blogger as if you are choosing from an Amazon catalogue. You have to invest the time to ensure that there is the right fit between their style and the community you are serving – consistency and quality are very important.
I thought I’d share an experience at a the recent London blogger event this week where the facilitator asked the audience to raise their hand if they blog for money or quality content as if writing for money was a bad, evil thing. In my view if your writing can’t earn you an income then why would you spend all your precious time doing it.
I think bloggers have to get a lot more commercial and there is a lot they can learn from those in the travel industry about how to make this transition. There are several senior travel industry leaders who are active in the blogosphere such as Peter Shanks at Cunard, Peter Heald at Carnival and Bill Marriott.
It’s just getting the travel industry and bloggers together in the right type of forum that is the hard part – I find many of the travel events I attend are quite polarised to one audience or the other and there’s rarely an even mix.
Anyone else feel that way?
Hi Kathryn,
(John Heald BTW)
Yes, I think you’re right about the way the industry should look for bloggers, but I think the driving force behind this situation getting better (ie media engaging more with industry) will be ‘niche-ism’ (just invented that).
General purpose travel bloggers are focused really only on destination and experience. They are not often going to write about the inner workings of an airline, and since they travel independently, they are rarely going to interact with mainstream tour operators. If, using an example from above, they were to visit the Bregenz Opera Festival (you know, the one with the giant floating stage) it would be through somebody at whichever tourism office they approached Eg Bregenz or Austrian Nat Tourist Office, who in turn would facilitate it through the festival PR or a local ground operator. Their visit *wouldn’t* be facilitated through Martin Randall Travel or any of the other excellent outbound specialist Music/Culture tour operators in the UK. However a UK based niche blogger who specialises in classical music & opera events, *might*.
A travel blogger who specialises in say, rail travel, (step forward Sophie Collard, Jools Stone, Michael Hodson) is much more likely to know, engage with and write about, rail tour companies and their executives, passions and products, etc.
So niche-ism is the way forward!
Hi Alastair
Oops – it helps to get names right – including yours, so thanks for the correction on John Heald.
Yes agreed on the rise of the niche blogger. Find a market niche or struggle is how I’d sum it up. Think the niches can stretch across interests (food, biking, adventure,music) and traveller type (solo, couples, gay, groups, family) or transport type or combination of both/all but best not to fall into the black hole of general travel. Same in business really – focus on your point of differentiation.
The web has enabled operators in niche markets to scale up quite cost effectively eg hostalworld, gadventures, roundtheworldflights to name a few, which are now well served by bloggers who cater to the needs of the independent traveller.
Some sites are using translation tools to make their copy that much more accessible to bigger audiences as they do on the World Travel Market and Roundtheworldflights websites. Google hangouts, scheduled Facebook virtual events and webinars are also gaining popularity as a way to interact with readers.
WordPress also now enables integration with Facebook. Sites like Techcrunch have blog comments which appear on their fan’s Facebook pages so they get much more traction and visibility of their blog comments which draws the reader in.
I would suggest that bloggers need to research their potential business clients and ensure that their proposals are really tailored to their audiences.
So tailoring your marketing to the travel trade is important too for a travel blogger. Just as you would tailor your CV and cover letter to fit a potential job description. We know it’s not about “write it and they will come”. You have to work hard and invest in persuading people to visit and interact. Bloggers with a fully profiled, active following are definitely more in demand.
Interesting article, and I definitely agree. I actually set up a site relating to this http://www.workistravel.com, although I didn’t get too far with it. I started it after going on a G Adventures tour and absolutely loving my tour guide’s knowledge and passion and realising she was more excited about travel from her 8 years at the job than any blogger I’d ever spoke to. She loved Africa and kept me entertained for hours with her stories. She was a fascinating person and she’s the type of person I wish had a blog, although she hated social media and would rather explore than sit at a computer screen. I always think the best people work in travel and I wanted to show them off!
Bloggers cover the spectrum from professional journalists to hobbyists, so bundling them all together as “the media” or even as “travel writers” is pointless.
As for engaging with the travel industry, many “traditional” travel writers have been doing that for years, but there are some writers (and some publishers) who feel that writers need to keep their distance from hoteliers, restaurateurs, tour operators, and tourist-office folk.
Other thoughts:
- It’s both unprofessional and rude to pitch sponsorships, ads, etc. when you’re wearing a press badge. Media credentials are intended to help you cover an event, not act like an exhibitor.
- Employee-written blogs aren’t uncommon in the travel industry, and they make a lot of sense. (John Heald’s blog for Carnival Cruises is a great example of an employee-written blog, and so is the Alloggi Barbaria Blog, which is written by the manager of a small hotel in Venice.) I imagine that we’ll see more such blogs in the future, and if I were recruiting personnel for a tour company or other travel business, I’d be looking to hire candidates with writing, photography, and editorial skills.
Hi Alastair,
I think your argument is a little self-contradictory in that the hardcore travel experts you highlight are a tiny minority of all travel professionals, and it feels like travel bloggers are still all lumped together as one homogeneous paste with no defining characteristics. Your points are relevant to some bloggers but certainly not all, and I’m sure you could find examples of the article types you mention if you had a decent look. I was going to gather examples but I don’t feel like it. So its a little too black and white for me, and we all know there are at least 50 shades of grey…
Also, as you mention, a blogger has to be good at blogging in the same capacity that the tour operator has to be good in their area of expertise, but can you expect the blogger to not write anything unless they are interviewing that 1 in a 1000 person? A lot of bloggers build their readership from being good at re-telling an average person’s travel experiences (i.e. themself), and the audience comes back for the storytelling, to identify with the writers values, and not just because they have in-depth knowledge.
Re: WTM, I definitely came away as a first timer thinking that most of the battle on the floor was educating people as to what a blogger is and does.
As for using a Press pass to pitch being ‘rude and unprofessional’ (Durant, above) – I strongly disagree. WTM advised bloggers to apply for Press passes knowing full well we came to network and pitch with exhibitors. Its not unprofessional to go about your business because of a bit of nomenclature.
Peter
I’m really surprised that WTM would encourage bloggers to apply for press passes under a pretense that isn’t at all what press passes are normally used for. In my experience (and I cover about a dozen conferences under press passes each year), when you have a press pass at a conference, there is an expectation that you’re there to cover the event, not that you’re there to sell your services or market yourself. In fact, many conferences don’t allow this to happen and it’s clearly stated as such. Press can’t participate in drawings or otherwise solicit work. Those on press passes are expected to be there to research and write.
That said, if WTM is changing what “press pass” means, then I think it needs to come up with a new way to identify bloggers because they surely aren’t press in the common conference definition. If I were on the convention floor and someone approached me with a press pass, I’d be confused if someone wanted to pitch. No wonder there’s discord. I hope WTM looks into this and moves back to calling journalists who are there to cover the event “press” and bloggers who are there to network either conventional conference attendees or something else.
Well, I’m not *so* bothered by it.
There’s a certain amount of semantics at play here. ‘Sourcing stories’ from WTM doesn’t *have* to mean – based on a conversation/interview at WTM alone. It could mean – arranging to go out and experience this new travel product in destination. In which case the Black Badge role is still intact.
It’s a 50 shades of grey thing, as Peter puts it.
…. and since when did the whole travel press/travel PR/travel industry relationship not involve dancing around on the head of an ethical pin! ;)
I think this helps shed light a little, but not entirely, of why this industry has such a huge rate of people with chips on their shoulders…
Thought provoking article, and enjoyed reading it. It is important to challenge bloggers and the industry.
I have been blogging and podcasting on travel at http://www.tipsfortravellers.com since 2005. It was started as a hobby to share the things I was learning from all the global travel I was doing every month for work, it was a hobby and was pleased that travellers similar to me were using it. But for 7 years I never went to or got involved with the travel blogging community and conferences, or pitched for trips until I decided this year to step back from my crazy corporate role and also spend more time on the blogging. I was quite surprised by what I discovered as with my marketing background I had expected there to be much more focus on the end traveler and what they needed, and what role blogs can add to everything that is available to travellers seeking advice, information and inspiration.
I was surprised at how the focus of the blogging community seems often to be so focused on getting free and funded travel, on driving traffic through circular commenting and community within blogging and the creation of a few blogger lead personalities (not all who are the best in terms of travel writing, content etc but are good at developing and building their personality and presence). I feel that the lure of free and funded travel is distorting the travel blogging world and its role within both the travel industry and for travelers.
I am encouraged that there is more effort being made to try and better define the role of blogs in travel by some of the organizations that are organizing bloggers through conferences, training etc. But the travel industry can also help form that discussion, and get more involved and direct by using the travel blogging events more. It is a pity that speakers at the events tend to be bloggers and not the industry about what they need.
It is an evolving industry, but I think from my professional experiences in beauty category that the beauty and fashion industry has better worked out the role of bloggers and how to engage and work with them. Perhaps this as that industry better understands and has used PR, influencers, advocates and recommendation as marketing tools/