How to build interest and excitement about your community Web presence

by Todd Lucier on January 16, 2009

On this 35 minute version of the Tourism Keys podcast, Todd chats with Darren Cronian (@travelrants) about the nature of his consumer-focused blogsite www.travel-rants.com, how it got started and the power of blogging and how to stimulate community storytelling to enhance the web presence of your community.

Value of community storytelling:

  • a community blog can provide in depth information that trip planning Web sites can’t match
  • there are people in your community with expertise that can help you grow the exposure of tourism in your region with their writing, video, audio and photography.
  • destination focused comment can be home grown.
  • shift budgets from paying web designers for design to developing great content and telling the stories from your region
  • find people who are passionate about your community and find out the incentive that would make it attractive for them to help create content for your region
  • visitors would rather read local consumer-oriented stories rather than professionally produced content for trip-planning sites
  • the value of blog commenting to find and grow your community
  • blogging creates links a lot easier than a traditional Web site
  • organizations that promote travel can use their blog to interact with their ideal clients and build niche brand expertise
  • blogger meet-ups / travel blog camp and community new media events as ways of engaging the community
  • community blogging projects: ideas on getting the whole community engaged in promoting the undiscovered treasures in your communit

The Value of Blogging

  • the value of feedback, negative or positive on your blog and how it helps enhance your business
  • the good thing about negative comments on your blog is that you can control the conversation and be aware when customers are disappointed.
  • the value of blogs: media attention, easy edits, community

Blogsites and Websites mentioned in the podcast:

Got any great grassroots community projects going on in your region. Take a few minutes and share the links in the comments below.
My Podcast Alley feed! {pca-bf7abceda1b90c91ab4bfd132833f537}

  • Graham Ketcheson
    Community organized mapping idea is great - would love to organize something like this with other tourism operators in Parry Sound to promote the town and region and what it has to offer. Great to be able to hear audio versions of these ideas - I listen to them while i'm working on on other online content!!
  • I agree with Darren that, given the size of the market - both travel providers and travel consumers - in the UK, it's astonishing how few bloggers and podcasters we have over here.

    I make podcast clips for a handful of tour operators largely through the enthusiasm of one travel PR company in particular, but they don't really use them effectively, and that's just one PR company. (There are roughly 235 PR companies in the UK with travel & tourism clients, and I keep tabs on around 2000 travel providers.) So there's no doubt audio & video are far from being mainstream tools in the UK travel sector.
  • Heather, couldn't agree more with our comments. Thanks for stopping by.

    Somehow, it's ok for bloggers to post advertising to earn a dollar. I just think there are so many stories waiting to be written that would not be tainted by the dollars attached to the task.
    Travel bloggers are important assets in any community. There are untapped opportunities to tell local stories and help local CVB's understand and use WP blogs to share multimedia of all sorts.
  • Hi Todd and Darren

    I enjoyed listening to your podcast. I agree with Darren that there are not so many of us UK based Travel bloggers compared to the US. I write about the different places I travel to but in between I blog about interesting things in my home town of Bristol, that a visitor might enjoy but not find in the guidebooks. Many city tourism websites would benefit from expanding to include a community orientated blog.

    I predict that blogging and especially Wordpress will become more popularas a tool of self-expression in a younger age group that love Facebook & Bebo. Only the other day I spent half an hour setting up my friend\'s 10 yr old daughter up with a Wordpress.com account and she is now ready to record the things she enjoys. I think Wordpress should be taught in schools along with Excel & Powerpoint.

    I agree that we bloggers shouldn\'t be so shy about payment for our hard work, but the thing that makes blogs powerful is their independent voice, which we often worry will be tainted by money. On the other hand PR businesses should realise that they can get plenty of coverage for relatively small sums if they approach it the right way.
  • Hey Craig,
    Thanks for stopping by.
    Yes, there is an iTunes link in the middle side bar. (just above the twitter what am I doing box) I'll try to make it more prominent as well as add link for other rss podcast tools. Although I'm not sure what the most frequently used non-itunes podcast catchers are?
  • Hi Todd,

    I'd love a download or "subscribe in iTunes" link to go with this online streaming. Any chance of the mp3 being linked? (Or am I blind? It's happened before.)

    Thanks heaps!
  • Tom
    Great interview! Thanks so much for the shout-out, as we've never actually discussed this walking/mapping event in-person. We're always on to the next thing.
    You're doing important work with this blog/podcast brother.
    Very proud of you.
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