Today, Canada announced a tightening of the border with Mexico. Effective immediately tourists traveling from Mexico must hold a visa. The move by the Canadian Immigration minister , Jason Kenney late Monday, will be felt most acutely by the Canadian Tourism Industry. Visas were also re-applied to citizens entering Canada from the Czech Republic. Both decisions were based on a growing number of refugee claims.

Mexican tourism visits to Canada grew a healthy 8% in 2008. As Canada’s 5th largest source of International travelers to Canada this is a market that is significant. The move threatens to shut the taps on visits that are already planned for this summer. A 48-hour grace period for Mexicans with imminent travel expires at 10 p.m. ET Tuesday. After that, all bets are off.

“What really hurts about this is that there’s was no warning at all … and all of a sudden, basically the day the doors were supposed to open on the beginning of the peak season, they’re being shut in our face a little bit,” said Hume Rogers, of Ottawa’s Capital Hotel and Suites.

Rogers had 25 rooms booked for 10 days this month with a Mexican tour group.

The Canadian government chose early July to immediately enforce the new Visa measures, another dagger in the coffin of Canadian Tourism operators already suffering significantly from the economic slump and other tourism crises, not the least of which just came in effect June 1, 2009 in the United States. The Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative requires all US citizens to present passports or the equivalent document upon returning to the US for the first time ever. A 2005 survey of US border crossers showed just 35% of US border crossers to Canada had such documentation.

As a representative of the Canadian Tourism Industry, I am calling on the Conservative government to delay the visa requirement until year end, to allow our industry to cope with the change.

How do you feel? Call Stephen Harper’s office directly and voice your concern. Prime Minister’s office: 613-992-4211

Links:

• Canadian Press New Visa Requirements
• Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative
• Video at Northern Edge Algonquin features Mexican guests last summer

There is a new podcast on the Web today – TourismCafe.ca

We’re dedicating this version of the Tourism Keys podcast to this new project which aims to strengthen tourism industry understanding of the benefits of experiential tourism.

Todd Lucier, Nancy Arsenault and Celes Davar invite you into the café for a chat about tourism. They represent tourism development from a Canadian perspective and introduce you to their background as operators, share interesting tourism development projects they’re involved in and introduce the Canadian Tourism Commission’s Explorer Quotient. It’s 15 minutes to introduce you to Tourism Café. We’re sure you’ll want to bookmark the site so you can to catch future episodes of the Tourism Cafe, as well as insights on tourism by reading their experiential tourism blog posts.

Check it out!

In Canada, we celebrated Thanksgiving a few weeks back but our U.S. neighbours will soon be embarking on their traditional Turkey Day.

Every get tired after finishing your turkey dinner?

Internet Marketers and those marketing tourism often talk about SEO. Search Engine Optimization might be easiest to understand if you think about answering questions people are looking for answers to. Today, I was asking Kate if she was feeling a bit tired or sluggish this afternoon. (We each had pot pies – I had the turkey pot pie!)

“Gobble, Gobble…”

Upon reflecting of course we agreed that there was something in turkey that was making me tired, but we couldn’t recall the protein found in turkey that was responsible for the fatigue.

Google to the Rescue to this tired turkey eater in Canada!

After keying in her two word question, Tired Turkey? Google responded with the answer in the first search result…. it’s the amino acid – l-tryptophan that makes you sleepy when you eat turkey!

The lesson for getting your business to the top of the search results in Google? Discover your inner tired turkey!

Google will come to the rescue of your ideal client as they search for answers to their questions. By thinking about the questions your ideal client is typing into google, you can create a blog post or Web page that answers that question. There must be dozens of questions your ideal guest asks that you have answers for. Spend a bit of time answering these questions. You’ll naturally use relevant words in your answer.

For each question you’ll identify a keyword phrase. Use the keyword phrase in the title, a subheading and in the body text of your post. Then, put a link in your post to other information that connects or links to this subject. Below I’ll link to a few of the search results for Tired Turkey on Google just in case this post finds its way up the search results page!

• A chemistry site has the number one link for Tired Turkey search results.
• How stuff works answers – “Is there something in Turkey that makes you sleepy?
• Profile of the Canadian Turkey Industry.

The Myth of SEO says it’s the words that matter most.

But like some research into the turkey question which actually attributes the fatigue factor to heavy meals (which restrict blood flow and oxygenation to the brain) or by too much wine consumed with the holiday meal, SEO is more about the links than the page content!

Take the time to link to content that is most relevant to each keyword question you answer.

What are the chances of this post making it into the search results? With over 2 Million relevant pages for “tired turkey canada” it’s not at all likely. Or is it?

Movember (the month formerly known as November) is a moustache growing charity event held during November each year that raises funds and awareness for men’s health. Put your facial hair growing efforts to support a worthy cause. Register in Canada for Movember at http://ca.movember.com

In Canada, funds raised go towards the Prostate Cancer Research Foundation of Canada.

For those a bit more bashful in the facial hair department, consider a visit to Build a Beard. http://buildabeard.helloatto.com

For every bearded photo in the Build a Beard project, Helloatto.com will make a $1 donation to Kiva, a microlending charity that seeds the development of micro-enterprise in developing nations.

For more on Loans that change lives, visit: http://kiva.org/

Upcoming Conferences

I’m delighted to be hosting Ontario’s Digital Economy in Huntsville, Ontario – October 1-3, 2008. While there are no Tourism Keys workshop events scheduled this autumn, I’m keeping busy with some exciting projects this fall. It all kicks off with this conference that will showcase inspiring ways technology is transforming communities. I’m really looking forward to the sustainability and community transformation threads that run through this conference.

I’ve never hosted a conference before, so if you’ve got any tips I’d be happy to learn from readers of Tourism Keys.

Ontario’s Digital Economy Conference will be of particular interest to business and sector associations, community and economic development organizations, all levels of government and their agencies, academics, SME’s and ICT companies. If you represent one or more of these groups in Ontario, join me at Deerhurst for this event.

After that I join my pal, Celes Davar for My Manitoulin Experience, Oct 7-9, 2008. Later in October, Nancy Arsenault from Royal Roads, University Faculty of Tourism & Hospitality Management join us in Newfoundland for two more GMIST Edge of the Wedge training workshops.  Holy cow, this will be the 15th and 16th times we’ve taught this course over the past four years! These three day workshops promise business and tourism community transformation with Tourism Experience Development and E-Marketing at their core.  Yes, anyone in the tourism industry in Canada can attend these 3 day courses in Gros Morne National Park.  Of course we keep making the content current, how else could we call it Edge of the Wedge!

I’ve also got a stop in Digby, Nova Scotia for a two day economic development and e-marketing workshop at the end of November.

What I love about these events is that they are hands-on, inspiring and for many people and communities transformational!

So as you see, it’s a busy fall. If you can’t join me at one of these events, I hope you are finding a few things to tinker with as you enhance your Web presence.

ps. I’m presenting An Inconvenient Truth, at the Regional Conservation Exhibition in Callander, Ontario this weekend, September 11th to the 13th. If you are near North Bay this weekend, come out and learn a bit about sustainability and climate change.  Living off-the-grid, you’ve got to know this topic is near and dear to my heart.