Apple announces iPod Nano and iTunes Upgrades

Apple transformed the marketing of tourism when the iPhone became the connected device of choice among digital travelers. Today, Apple announced a number of new enhancements to iTunes and their most importantly the Apple iPod nano music device.

iPod Nano – Video

iPod Nano, the small little music player that fits into the smallest of Christmas stockings will bring video into the hands of everyone. Last year I wrote about how the Flip Video camera could be an important tool for getting video to market your tourism business.

The current Flip Video has 4 gigabytes of memory.

The new iPod nano will record video on a flash drive with up to 16 gigabytes for less than $200!

Couple that with a device that is syncs with your computer via iTunes and has one click upload to Youtube capability and you are making it easier than ever for anyone to create and share video.

The device will clearly be marketed to youth – it has no still camera capability, nevertheless, there are important implications for travel and tourism businesses.

With Video on iPod Nano, Video will be Ubiquitous

91% of people who have cell phones have them with them within arms reach 24 hours a day. Stats aren’t available on how in-touch people are with their Flip Video camera, but its a safe bet that they have their portable music player a lot closer, a lot more often (most are iPods of course).

What that means: It will be as convenient for iPod nano owners to shoot video as it is for cell phone users to make phone calls.

Get it?

iPod Nano spurs questions for Tourism

iPod Nano announcement means it’s time for a few important questions the tourism industry needs to start thinking about (if you aren’t already):

• How are you going to encourage your guests to share video that inspires other travelers?
• How are you going to monitor social media for video representation of your region, property or experience?
• How can you include the needs of digitally connected travelers to make sharing of content easier? Think wifi and power needs. (Please tell me you are still not charging for wifi access?)

What questions come to mind for your region or business?

Links:

• Get video from your guests
• Flip Video & social media post

What are conference attendees are looking for?

• inspiration,
• motivation, and
• connections.

The benefits of a great event from the attendees point of view – a few of the many twitter responses I received:

Twitter followers were consistent in identifying the benefits that matter to conference attendees.

Is your event promoting the right benefits?

Inspirational and motivational speakers give away their material online all the time. The best ones share their presentations by video, audio recordings and slideshare to those not even at your event in both live and recorded formats. AND THAT”S A GOOD THING!

Don’t confuse the value of your conference with the information that is being presented.

In general,

• information is free.
• ability to communicate information is also basically free.

What are attendees paying for?

• inspiration,
• motivation, and
• connections!

4 ideas for conference and event planners:

1. Give away the free stuff: You will not only encourage presenters to share their material beyond the walls, you’ll prepare for it by providing support for live and recorded streaming of your event, publicizing twitter hashtags and sharing presentations on your conference Web site. Non-attendees can peak into the window on what they are missing! Their thirst for what attendees are getting will inspire future attendance.
2. Provide ample time and space for chit-chat before and after conference sessions. If you know the value of your event is in the motivation, inspiration and personal connections between attendees you will provide a conference schedule that encourages informal dialogue between attendees.
3. Use conference facilities that provide free or almost free Internet access and ample places to plug-in or recharge connected devices. Your attendees will help your event reach an audience beyond the walls and help your event grow by leaps and bounds. Remember, your fans are your best marketers!
4. Educate conference attendees and presenters about live streaming and twittering. Help presenters feel comfortable without continuous eye contact with attendees and publicize hashtags and backchannel conversation. See @pistachio‘s post on the matter of Twittering during presentations.

What do you see as the real value of your favourite conference or event?

ps. MANY THANKS to my Twitter followers for taking the time to share your thoughts! You continue to inspire and motivate me. I value our connection.

Leaders in the Tourism Industry are gaining control of their online communications by establishing a solid CRM plan.

I had a brief chat this week with Gary at the Algonquin Inn, who was asking a question about their tourism Web presence. Refreshingly, he fully understands that what he needs is a communication plan!

Indeed, the Internet is a collection of tools for communication. What every tourism business needs to do is understand what their ideal guests’ preferred methods of communication are, and develop a plan for Web communications.

Gary has done the work identifying who his ideal guest is, now he just needs a plan for communicating with them on a regular basis.

CRM – Customer Relationship Management is the traditional way this acronym is explained. I’m suggesting we change our description of this acronym to Communications & Relationship Management. What is needed is a CRM plan that focuses on using Web 2.0 tools for effective communications with our ideal guests.

Swim in the Stream, not the Lake: Don’t think about content, think about being creative – as often as you can.

Another important consideration is that communication is a two way street. Not only do tourism regions and businesses need to put together a plan for outgoing communications, they also have to develop a strategy for keeping tuned to incoming communications from prospective travelers, guests and fans. More than just reputation management, tuning to the conversations that are already happening across a variety of platforms can give your region or business a leg up on the competition, by providing an opportunity to engage with folks in an online dialogue.

I use http://www.google.com/alerts to keep track of Web discussions that matter. I also monitor keywords in Twitter with Tweetscan and get incoming email from each of these whenever our organization or brand-related news hits the Web. Backtype has a great search tool for tracking Blog comments for people or keywords.

You’ll never run out of creative communications ideas if you think about the opportunities:

• Real Time, Scheduled, Posted ideas on your blog and in the comments on the blogs of others
• Both Private & Public messaging
• MultiMedia – video, audio, photos, text
• A combination of Personal vs. Corporate (informal / formal) information exchange
• Follow vs Lead – Do a bit of both, on your own blog posts & the comments sections of others’ blogs.
• Scheduled Communication: Commenting on videos, blog posts, photos, podcasts is a great way to get exposure for your tourism business.
• Instant Communication: tools like Skype , Google Video Chat, Seesmic and others enable your clients to exchange ideas by live video. Got a video cam on your computer, add your comment on my video above?
• Communication can also occur in real time or near real time using print and video (as we saw in Davos, Switzerland this week).

What are your thoughts on CRM? Do you have the time to develop a plan, or are you doing something more important with your time?

I just reviewed Chris Brogan’s smart e-book – how to use the social Web to get a job and it inspired me to think about hiring.
Last spring I wrote a post about hiring a twit to get your Internet Marketing program in order for your tourism business.

The Winter holidays might be a good time to start thinking about how you can re-craft your job application form to include some of the categories in these two documents.

Hiring in the tourism sector is going to get very competitive in 2009 as your organization gets into competition with others in tourism looking to hire the best and brightest. With an eye to enhancing your business by recruiting someone with a strong Web 2.0 profile (aka – the social Web) make hiring Twits a priority.

And make sure you give your twits an opportunity to expose your business to new opportunities on the social Web by giving them time each day to document your business with video, audio, photos and text and promote your biz on your social outposts all over the Web…

After all, if you had a chance to work for one of two tourism businesses: one that was Web savvy and one that wasn’t; and you were a twit, which job would you take?

(updated post – June 13, 2009)

Use the same account name for all Web 2.0 Services

The Facebook url land grab this weekend, brought to mind the importance of cleaning up your Web 2.0 brand and making it easy for your fans to find you where ever you are. Use the same account name for every account you create in the future.

Yesterday I added a new Facebook url to my account. Now you can find me at http://www.facebook.com/toddlucier. Now my username matches most of my Web 2.0 most used accounts.

Back in December, I changed my twitter username to @toddlucier which matches my gmail address toddlucier@gmail.com. It was just the start of a much bigger and much more important project, anchoring my Web 2.0 presence in the most important brand I have – me.

We didn’t know it would be this way:

When I signed up for youtube, twitter, flickr and a host of other Web 2.0 services I didn’t take much time to consider the importance of my username. As a result I’ve got more than a few different usernames in play. Providing links across my Web 2.0 presence to fans can be a bit of a chore as each service uses my username to setup a personal home page.

At the time I was creating my accounts, I had no idea I’d be using them as brand identifiers. So I’ve stuck myself with a wide array of useless personal brands (Seesmic, Youtube and a few other services still do not allow updates or changes to account usernames). Here are just a few:

• http://www.youtube.com/toddlesbycanoe
• http://edge.libsyn.com/
• http://offthegrid.blip.tv
• http://pressroom.prlog.org/NorthernEdge
• http://www.picasaweb.google.com/northernedgealgonquin
• http://delicious.com/tourismkey
• http://feeds.feedburner.com/internetmarketingfortourism
• skype user: toddles_by_canoe
  

I didn’t think I’d be putting any of these addresses on my business card, but it’s time to rethink that (if you use business cards!). Even the idea of putting your email address on your business card was once considered avant-garde.

If I had it to do all over again, I’d either use our complete incorporated name for our business I.D. or my personal name for every Web 2.0 service I use. Wouldn’t this be cleaner and make it easier for fans to find my content?

• http://www.youtube.com/toddlucier
• http://toddlucier.libsyn.com/
• http://toddlucier.blip.tv
• http://pressroom.prlog.org/toddlucier
• http://www.picasaweb.google.com/toddlucier
• http://delicious.com/toddlucier
• http://feeds.feedburner.com/toddlucier
• skype user: toddlucier

You can do it all over again!

It may take a bit of time, but putting a new shine on your Web presence will be good for your brand.

A few tips for Anchoring your Brand in Web 2.0

• stick with your name as your username if at all possible! Web 2.0 is more and more about your personal brand than about your business name. Business names may change, careers may change, but in most cases, your name will stay the same for the rest of your life.
• think long term. Last week I picked up a follow on Twitter from the current Canadian Prime Minister, Steven Harper who goes by the username: @pmharper. As fate will have it, Harper won’t likely be prime minister for his entire career. In such a case, he may have to change his username to something like @looharper (leader of the official opposition) if he wants to keep the title abbreviation in front of his name (hint: not too sure this new brand would have much caché).

• redirect your fans. If you do change your username in Twitter, set up an account to catch strays with your original username and inform visitors who stumble across older links to your @oldtwitterid where to find you (You’ll need to use a different email address for each account). Visit this second account from time to time to find stray followers and get them back into your main account. Put notes on Web 2.0 services in the settings or description tags letting fans know where to find your most recent updates.

• What is the brand for your blog? Should I also consider moving this blog to a personally branded domain name like http://chrisbrogan.com does? Thinking about it. . .
• Get started cleaning up your online brand today. Start with a spreadsheet and record all the Web 2.0 services you use, the homepages, rss feed links, etc. and rebrand them together under one shiny new brand – YOU!

If we each take the time to clean our little corner of the Web, we’ll have a nice neat and tidy Internet, where connecting with our fans will be easier and more fulfilling.

The brothers, Rodd and Todd Lucier are back chatting about the way ordinary people are transforming news and politics by commenting on news web sites and blogs and making their voices heard.

Learn about the Telemegaphone Project in a short clip from CBC’s Spark and Rodd has an idea for what could be a really excellent Website. Anyone want to invest?
Also check out the politics of Web 2.0 at mibazaar.com