Far Far Away

Photograph by Ande Truman

Everything is possible, but where do possibilities begin...with a slumbering white lion and a train, of course. After all, the journey of a lifetime has to start with a BIG dream ~ Dream of Africa.

While you're at it, why not start with its furthest edge. On the southernmost end of the African continent. Here mountain ranges mark the last stronghold, before this rugged land gives way to the sea. Cliffs rise like fortress walls, while enormous boulders stand sentry guarding the shoreline, unwavering against the thieving sea. Not one, but two oceans battle for more ground here. This vibrant land, South Africa,  rises spectacularly, as if it were the last vestige of land at the edge of the world.

South Africa: a land far, far away...

It should be said, while a visit to South Africa will be incredibly memorable for its beauty, this is a land deeply scarred. It is a country still trying to resolve its rocky past; a country riddled with controversy and upheaval, but through it all settlers and travelers continue to come for its spectacular beauty. The wounds of the past are glaringly evident in Cape Town, where we begin this journey. Here a huge percentage of South Africans still live in poverty. The road is long both behind, and ahead of this country, but the possibilities are great. I keep a favorite quote by Maya Angelou on the home page of this blog. It is perhaps no more suitable than here. It reads, "Perhaps travel cannot prevent bigotry, but by demonstrating that all peoples cry, laugh, eat, worry, and die, it can introduce the idea that if we try and understand each other, we may even become friends."* South Africa will hopefully become a place where all its citizens are treated and cared for equally well. Awareness is key.

Arriving in Cape Town ~

Groot Constantia Estate

As you can imagine, at this point, after the long flight, anticipation for the spectacular train trip ahead will be almost unbearable. You'll eagerly await the call, "All aboard," like mice waiting for the Pavlov's bell to ring. However, before you hop the train, give yourself a day or two to rest and explore this bustling, colorful city; a day or two to get acquainted with this country and its people. After all, this is your once-in-a-lifetime journey, so, arrive early. Why not? It is your big dream.

Kirstenbosch Botanical Garden

There are vineyards here and beautiful botanical gardens…museums, mountain ranges and oceans…penguins and, yes, even white lions. Bordered to the North by Table Bay, to the West by Signal Hill and the Atlantic, and to the South by Table Mountain National Park, it's not a place that is, "just as good as any," to start the trip of a lifetime, it is an extraordinary place to start.

The Old Biscuit Mill Market

Cape Heritage Hotel built in 1771 or the Vineyard Hotel, are both lovely places to choose as a base. South Africa's unique flavors can be found at any number of restaurants, but to truly experience an abundance of South African flavors and goods visit the markets: Greenmarket Square for traditional African arts and crafts, V&A Market on the Wharf known for fresh, organic or homemade, or at Saturday's ritual the Old Biscuit Mill. If flora is your thing don't miss Kirstenbosch Botanical Garden which boasts over 22,000 indigenous plant species, and was the first botanical garden to be declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site. There's a one of a kind "steampunk" coffee shop called Truth and more than one world class winery.
Cape Town is said to be one of the most photogenic cities in the world, so of course exploring it should be included in a trip of a lifetime to Africa.

Truth Coffee Shop

Cape Heritage Hotel

*Tourism does help support South Africans, but it's not enough. While visiting this amazing part of the world consider finding other ways to help South African's in need.

Labor of Love

Remember what it felt like when you started the project? When you purchased the space? When you first had the idea? How it filled you with joy, wonder and ideas.

With the economy the way it is today it's difficult to remember those days.

• Perhaps you're struggling to keep things going. 
• Perhaps you're feeling the effects of your regulars being less regular and more frugal. 
• Perhaps you're having to cut corners or staff. 

Now is the time to turn it around; to break the hold the economy has over you; to tap into that feeling you had when it was a labor of love. To find it within yourself.

Like swinging on musical swings, it's time to feel giddy again.
The following is inspirational. A true labor of love. Listening may just allow you to find your joy again.

Created by Daily Tous Les Jours

Musical Light Swings
on the Streets of Montreal

Copy and Paste – Hotel Marketing

If you're having difficulty getting your 'tweet' on, here's some simple assistance. 

Universal tweets for getting started or getting unstuck: 

1. Check out our fabulous... #hotel #travel
2. Make the most of your #hotel stay with our... #travel
3. Thanks for making us... #hotel #travel
4. Fantastic #hotel deal... #travel
5. Check out our awesome #vacation packages.... #hotel #travel
6. Bring man's best friend to our #pet friendly #hotel. We promise they'll be taken care of just as well as you. #travel
7. #Hotel deal of the Day: receive a ____ credit (upgrade, spa. dining, room)
8. Red Hot Deals... #hotel #travel
9. View from our #hotel window....(include photo) #travel
10. Our #hotel has recent upgraded... #travel
11. Did you know our elegant #hotel (rooms, suites) offer... #travel
12. Why stay with us?... #hotel #travel
13. Strategies to getting the most out of your stay... #hotel #travel
14. We give you the feeling of being... #hotel #travel
15. Here's a (tasty, great) reason to discover our Hotel... #hotel #travel

Hospitality has always been about building relationships – It's time to connect and stay connected online. No more excuses!

How Travelers Pick a Hotel

Southwest Florida

I can't believe how many times I come across websites for great places to stay with little or no descriptive or visual reference to what there is to see and do in the area, as if people pick hotels for the sake of seeing hotels. No matter how high the thread count of your sheets, no matter the quality of your down, or how perfect your decor, it is almost always secondary to your surroundings. 

It's what's on the outside that counts!

St. Augustine, FL

Want to seal the guest deal? Impress potential guests with your connection to your area. Show them your "out" fits their ideal. Your rooms may be the most magnificent, but guests could buy 300 thread count sheets and down comforters and stay home for the price of a couple nights stay. What makes them desire to sleep in your sheets is the setting or proximity to things they want to see and do. 

Of course they've researched the area, but dazzle them with your love of your surroundings or entice them by enhancing their perception of the area with your knowledge. Show off your best inside and out so guests know your the place and the people they want to help make their trip extraordinary. They'll pick you for your desire to enhance their stay through attention to every detail!

Tarpon Lodge view of Matlacha Pass, Pine Island, FL

Things to do in Tallahassee, FL - Maclay Gardens

Divine Destinations for the Holidays

Where was your favorite holiday vacation? Or what is your dream holiday trip? I'd love to hear.

Mine was a road trip to the Great Smoky Mountains National Park with my daughter 2 years ago. We started seeing snow in Georgia in December (very rare), but my daughter had been praying for snow. As you can see her prayers were answered. It was truly a winter wonderland – Tennessee and North Carolina were blanketed. Other than the 2 hour detour (the Blue Ridge Pkwy. was closed at dusk due to snow and ice) we had a magical white Christmas vacation. There were snowmen to be made and lots of hot chocolate to sip by the roaring fire in our mountain top suite.

We stayed at Tree Tops Resort in Gatlinburg, Tennessee as a trade out for our vacation club membership, but they also rent to non-vacation club members on a 4 night or weekly basis. Having the added room and almost always a full kitchen is a huge bonus if you ask me. Certainly worth checking out if you've never tried it before. If you prefer being catered to daily and dinning out for every meal there are plenty of hotels. The Great Smoky Mountains are a wonderful place to spend your vacation.

Recommendations - Snake Oil or Gold

I recently read a comment by Valorie Maltoni suggesting, "We are witnessing the dissolution of the traditional sales role, as recommendation commerce store fronts become wherever you happen to be, doing whatever you happen to be doing...the Storeless store and the Saleless sale." While I don't think it's entirely true or affecting every industry yet I do think the online recommendations are wildly popular, especially in the hospitality industry. The obvious reasons are convenience, instant availability, and perceived reliability. The problem is cheaters- businesses that misrepresent themselves with false information then regurgitate the information through recommendation commerce. They get away with it over and over again until it becomes a perceived truth. Most cheaters eventually get exposed, but the damage is already done to consumer and the industry making recommendations seem suspect. In order for recommendation commerce to thrive there will have to be a semi-altruistic intent of reliability within the industry. In other words it's ok to be cool, make money, and achieve notoriety; trustworthiness and reliability will need to rule. Online businesses that make recommendations must mind the store, deal with problems swiftly, and make sure snake oil sales are squashed. Even if you didn't make the recommendation, misrepresenting a product or service is unacceptable. Simply allowing it to be posted on your website is sanctioning it. Sorting it all out is a bit of a conundrum though. To insure that it does not become as severe a problem as the old acceptable margin of false advertising, recommendation commerce must police itself. It isn't possible to catch everyone cheating. Giving consumers reporting options is a good start. Its like having a neighborhood watch (at the very least a good deterrent), because it is never okay to perpetuate a falsehood when consumers have put their faith in your recommendation.

As more useful applications and social media inroads develop online recommendations will become the most powerful form of marketing hotels, restaurants, and attractions... viral word of mouth. Recommendation commerce is a great marketing tool as long as it is reliable.

What's in your backyard?

What do guests find interesting about you or the area when they visit your establishment? What do they ask about? What do you recommend? If guests have found the area intriguing, chances are it will appeal to potential guests. Use these "features" in your marketing. My daughter and I took these photographs this afternoon in "our backyard" – our area. There are at least a dozen restaurants and a handful of hotels (or lodging establishments) near these "attractions" yet, few photos like these are featured on any of their websites. Don't forget travelers visit an area, not just your place. They're interested in the complete package. So, show off your best assets, of course, but don't forget to feature some of the surrounding area as well. It can only serve to entice them further.

Now that I have your attention, visit travelvision.com and Take The Tour. See why our pick up methods work! Drop those old marketing habits for a fresh, affordable and effective way to market to your potential guests! TravelVision can help you fill more beds.

LIMITED TIME OFFER
If you sign up now you'll pay ONLY $29.95 until August 2013, so don't wait. Log on to travelvision.com now and claim or create your page.

More Ways to Build Your Brand

So, what is Pinterest? Or more to the point, How do we use it for marketing?
According to Pinterest it is: a virtual Pinboard that let's you organize and share all the beautiful things you find on the Internet. Its intent seems to be a virtual, shareable, Internet scrapbook without all the glue tape and cutting.
I know what you're thinking, Not interested! Give me a minute to explain. As often happens on the Internet, Pinterest has evolved into much more. Nothing malleable gets past the Interenet grape vine and Pinterest has set off some serious gossip. For those of us who constantly search for new and better ways to further promote businesses it screamed, Opportunity. And yes, there's still discussion as to where it will go and how long it will last. Who cares! While "they" are still figuring out it's a true value, I say, we go with it. Sometimes a thing is just a thing, but even a temporary thing can provide upward momentum.

Right now Pinterest can help you get noticed and build your brand.

Here's how it works –
You pin pictures of anything of interests to you on Pinboards (groupings) you create. Others can like or repine your pins and follow your boards. Your pins, their repins and your repines get repined again by others and so on. But here's the most important part: your pins can have a link which can lead them straight back to you - your website or blog. It's very simple and it can be fun. Don't pin junk. It will sit there on your boards collecting dust like pins of you oldest great uncle fishing, unless of course, your uncle is fishing at some fabulous destination.
Pin things about your business. Once you get started you'll find plenty to pin – interesting things to do nearby, your beautiful hotel pool or garden, your rooms, the food you serve, your chef at the local farmers market, etc. – just be creative and enjoy.

Are You On The Social Media Bandwagon?

It's not enough to jump on to social media networking, you have to own it! Marketing your business successfully through social media takes real participation. It's extremely important not to just do it because everyone else is. Your intent should be to position yourself as an influencer. It doesn't matter if you're introducing a new business or breathing new life into an established business. To be successful in today's market you have to be credible, relevant or beneficial. More important, your efforts should relate to your equally credible product or service.

An influencer is defined as someone who through knowledge, ability or position effects someone else's thought process. Does that mean you can't comment or post if you've nothing remarkable or earth shattering to say? Absolutely not, but at the very least it should be relevant and support your desire to influence.
It's also very easy to get caught up in the chatter, but if it is not relevant to your business don't talk about it. Once you've put it out there it's very hard to retract your words. Worse yet, it can spin out of control. Having your post or video go viral can be really great or really, really bad. Make it a rule not to post useless comments or hearsay. In other words, if Mitt Romney's Nascar connections or Snooki's possible pregnancy or what you ate for breakfast are not related to your specific business don't mention them or respond to others who do.
Listen to your guests. Everyday they tell you what they like, don't like and want. Remember, influencers were first good listeners. Also, resist the temptation to comment on a negative, cheap or downright awful guests or to respond negatively to their comments. It is not that one disgruntled or awful guest you have to seriously worry about. What matters in social media are those guests and potential guests who are gauging and responding to your actions and reactions. So rather than reacting badly, respond quickly and professionally using diplomacy, otherwise social media may brand you, but not in a good way.


Get great exposure on travelvision.com
Your guests are waiting!

The Silver Lining in Travel Marketing

"By the end of 2012, one billion tourists will have traveled the globe in a single year," says the Secretary-General of the World Tourism Organization, Taleb Rifai. He further states, "Behind this impressive number lies an increasingly important engine of growth and job creation. Few realize that tourism is directly responsible for 5 percent of global GDP, that one out of every twelve people worldwide are employed in tourism or that tourism accounts for 30 percent of the world's trade in services." Furthermore, President Obama unveiled a U.S. tourism initiative to increase travel and tourism in the U.S. stating, "That’s how we’re going to rebuild an economy..." His announcement calls for a national strategy to make the United States the world’s top travel and tourism destination, as part of a comprehensive effort to spur job creation. If that's not a silver lining, I don't know what is. It's astoundingly good news, but it's up to you to claim your share! If you've been thinking the economy is killing your business you could be wrong. It's more likely your marketing.

There is nothing to fear, but fear itself.

"Houston, we have a problem." When those words were first uttered by Apollo 13's crew it wasn't a humorous way to report any problem - it was a genuine report of a life threatening fault. Panicking or throwing in the towel weren't options. It was a call to action and a request for assistance. If you're struggling in this economy you may feel like an astronaut afloat without much hope. It's time to act utilizing every resource you've got including seeking help. In other words, treat it as if your life depends on it.
For those of you already marketing on the Internet and still struggling, if your online presence mirrors your offline presence, you're not much better off than the social media and internet marketing skeptics, naysayers and laggers. Traditional marketing moved on to the Internet is also ineffective. Today's consumers are smarter than that and they will quickly turn away. I'm not suggesting you should completely abandon everything you're currently doing just that you should start to move quickly in a better direction and you might need help refocusing.

HubSpot says it well, "In traditional marketing (outbound marketing), companies focus on finding customers. They use techniques that are poorly targeted and that interrupt people. They use cold-calling, print advertising, T.V. advertising, junk mail, spam, and trade shows.

Technology is making these techniques less effective and more expensive. Caller ID blocks cold calls, TiVo makes T.V. advertising less effective, spam filters block mass emails, and tools like RSS are making print and display advertising less effective. It's still possible to get a message out via these channels, but it costs more.
Inbound Marketers flip outbound marketing on its head.
Instead of interrupting people with television ads, they create videos that potential customers want to see. Instead of buying display ads in print publications, they create their own business blog that people subscribe to and look forward to reading. Instead of cold calling, they create useful content and tools so that prospects contact them looking for more information.
Instead of driving their message into a crowd over and over again like a sledgehammer, they attract highly qualified customers to their business like a magnet."* 

 “We’ve got to stop interrupting what people are interested in and be what people are interested in!” 

“Audiences everywhere are tough. They don’t have time to be bored or brow beaten by orthodox, old-fashioned advertising. We’ve got to stop interrupting what people are interested in and be what people are interested in!” said the CCO of JWT the world's 4th largest Advertising Agency. If you don't start listening to and adapting to the impact of internet marketing in your industry you may just end up in the stratosphere like space junk - barely noticeable. 

Let's have a look at internet marketing in context. Scotty Monty head of social marketing for Ford Motor Co. said, "Social marketing is the convergence of marketing, advertising and PR on the Web." True, but it's more than that. Simply put Internet marketing is networking. Unlike marketing, advertising and PR aimed at consumers, Internet marketing should be about interaction with your potential customers. When you're out networking you're putting your best foot forward, seeking out individuals or groups that matter to your business, not the masses in general, and you pitch them based on what they represent to your business; a potential customer, a lead to customers and sometimes a potential partnership. Equally important, today's customers want interaction; they want a voice and they want responses, so you need to be listening and responding well. According to HubSpot quoting an eMarketer article, these days "the expectation that a company will respond increases by age cohort from 38% of 18-24 year-olds all the way up to 65% of those in the 55+ age category. And it clearly matters in terms of satisfaction." Either percentage is a powerful message that consumers want to be heard. 

Internet marketing is networking amplified. The number of people you can potentially reach on the through it is staggering. Don't let your share go to some other hotel, restaurant or attraction. If it seems overwhelming turn to the management pro's like HubSpot. And if you need inspiration look to the shining examples like Virgin America. There's an endless amount of help out there free and subscribed (many subscriptions come with free trials), but you have to make the first move.

The airline Virgin America is a great example of a company that's doing their due diligence in social media. VA utilizes every popular form of SM from Facebook to Groupon and they're very proactive; they monitor and respond quickly. Like Virgin America be ever vigilant on monitoring especially when it comes to problems or complaints. Believe it - an appropriate response to negative remarks can result in a very positive reaction from consumers. Again, consumers want to know you're listening. Domino's Pizza is another great example of this. They're looking for suggestions and feedback through social media and outwardly admitting their flaws and mistakes - addressing them very publicly. 

If you are not completely convinced to get started today with your Internet marketing campaign, it's not likely you ever will be. If you are, here are some resources I recommend to help you get started, including our amazing marketing website travelvision.com - a showcase for lodging, restaurants and attractions. Travelvision is turning up the volume on marketing. The Internet is ever evolving and you need to keep up with new and innovative opportunities. If you truly want your full share of the silver lining you need to be on travelvision.com - we're travel marketing amplified! 

HubSpot Blog *(full article)

Flowtown - A blog about small business marketing strategies, tools and tactics.

Cheat Sheet Link

There are also helpful links in prior posts.

Overhauling Travel Marketing: To Tweet or Not to Tweet

So, you're tweeting. Dropping comments of up to 140 characters into the Twittesphere at warp speed (or so it seems) wondering, What the heck am I doing? Besides promoting your business with numbers (followers & following), what are the benefits? Well, the experts in social marketing told me tweeting was important, so I did it - like a sheep. On good days, especially early on, I was able to read about 1/2 of 1% of the tweets from those I followed if I stuck to my self allotted time frame of 15 to 30 minutes a day. And, like every good Twitter addict, I was watching my numbers. It seemed to be the point. Then I thought, OMG! Am I now participating in some sort of flash mob mentality; caught up in the fever pitch? Had I joined the Twitter cult? WOW! Am I that mindless? Where was the value in that! So, I asked myself is this good marketing or is it just a numbers craze? The answer is, yes.

In many aspects Internet marketing is a numbers game, that is to say, there are benefits to numbers both in ranking and number of followers, and Twitter can get you numbers in a hurry. But it has to go beyond the numbers game to be really beneficial. Often we use social media without first understanding it. Frankly, it's all just happening too fast. Who has time for it all? But, that's precisely why the simplicity of Twitter caught on.* 140 characters done reasonably well, for no more than 15 - 30 minutes a day is doable and can get you some decent recognition. However, it is NOT mindlessly following or tweeting that will get valuable results. Obviously what I did at first was wrong, so I had to rethink the possibilities and the purpose. I did my Twitter homework. It revealed that simple, concise, worthwhile information has marketing value on Twitter. Then, and only then, the good numbers will follow; tweet relevant, good information and consciously follow, respond to and retweet relevant, good information.

So what do YOU tweet? At first tweeting is a very foreign activity. Very much like trying to communicate in a foreign country with text book knowledge of the language; it takes practice to be fluent. I like the simple way Tech N' Marketing explained tweeting:
What to write—
“What are you thinking?”
Are you reading an interesting article? Share it!
Cool video? Link to it!
A funny picture? Tweet it!
Share share share!
Cause there to be dialog.
That is what it is all about.

If I could add just a couple additional things to their simple "how to" explanation (considering we're talking about social media marketing) they would be:
Tweet daily
ONLY tweet and retweet about things relevant to your business. 
Create a separate account for your personal interests. There you can talk politics, sports, fashion, religion or whatever, but not on your business Twitter page unless it's the business you are in.
 Proudly brag about your business or profession 
your facility, goals, accomplishments, products, offers, etc.

One last thought: you will inevitably miss a huge percentage of tweets and the opposite is true. Not to worry. No one is saying, good information can't be shared more than once and good tweets get retweeted. Within a short time you'll develop habits, then relevant patterns will emerge and it will begin to actually make some sense. Twitter is simply a networking tool. It is like dropping a rock in a pond - it will have a ripple effect. How far the ripple carries you is dependent on you. Tweet well and they will listen, follow and retweet.



*In all honesty it has gotten more complicated, but the simple premise is still there.

Overhauling Travel Marketing - Part 1

Time to get real about YOUR marketing!
Let's face it I've been blogging for a while now. Blogs are available on almost every subject and if one doesn't hold your interest you simply move on to the next. I'm one of a multitude of travel related bloggers out there and if you combined all our efforts we've worked extensively on the subject of travel. Blogs are immensely popular, yet even if we've specifically mentioned your hotel, restaurant or attraction you've probably only benefited minimally from our efforts no matter how massive the amount of information we've put out. That being said getting mentioned in a blog post is still important, but we need to address the whole travel marketing picture. If anything, most blogs serve the user (guest) and really great destinations don't get equal billing nearly enough. I'm here to change that to mutually benefit both you and potential guests.

To avoid being overly wordy we're putting hotels/lodging, restaurants and attractions (theme parks, museums, etc.) together under one term-destinations. After all, you are a destination and from a marketing perspective if you're not thinking of your place as such you should be!


Beginning at the beginning -

There are three basic challenges inherent in any destination marketing campaign:

1. They (potential guests) have to find you

2. You have to convince them to try you

3. You have to convince them to come back

The easiest marketing campaign challenge to address is #3. To get guests to come back you must provide them with an acceptable value for their money and their time; you must perform to a reasonable expectation. Do that and they will return. Don't do it and they won't. Perform above expectations and they'll SHARE. Perform below or mislead them and they will likely SHARE negatively, sometimes very negatively. Misleading guest is a huge mistake! Surprisingly this practice is still fairly common and it hurts everyone in the travel industry. Consequently there is now a website that exposes places that mislead guests. 

Performing above and beyond guests expectations, fulfilling their desires can get you a viral response and that's pure GOLD! Let's face it, positive word of mouth from your guests is the absolute best marketing and you can't buy it you have to earn it. If you are already doing this, that's fantastic! You are the destination guests are searching for. The good news is you don't have to be outrageously expensive or exotic to be that destination. Yesterday I happily tweeted, and it wasn't the first time, about an attraction just outside of Yosemite we visited a few years ago because it's such a great memory! I haven't been back to that area (six hour plane trip) but I happily tell others about Yosemite Mountain Sugar Pine Railroad - GREAT family fun! So if you didn't know about it already or stumble upon it by chance on the internet, like here, how likely are you to find them? How do potential guests find you? For this, #1on the marketing campaign list, there is help. 

Of course, traditional methods of marketing (television, radio, print and direct mail) are still available but, only minimally effective. I could spend considerable time on this subject, but for now let me just say this, These methods are akin to playing roulette; plunking your money down, picking a slot then spinning a wheel and rolling a ball hoping luck lands it in your slot. They're too unpredictable at too high a cost. Ask yourself this, When you do get lucky and get your ad in front of your potential guest  are they really paying attention? 

Fast forward to the Internet - the worldwide web. Your potential guests are using it. They are out there. Great! Right? Considering how vast the Internet is we might as well be saying, aliens do exist - they are out there - somewhere. What you want to know is, How do I communicate with them?  How do our potential guests find us? The internet is suddenly your best friend and your worst enemy. I've heard it all - lack of time, fear, frustration. It's frankly overwhelming! Help is here and I'll take you through the steps over the course of this series of posts.

So here's the first thing you should do, not the number one thing just the first thing we're going to tackle, possibly the easiest thing. Create a Twitter account and begin tweeting. It amazes me how many of my favorite places don't have twitter accounts when you can literally do this in 15 minutes! Do it! Then tweet daily for 15 minutes and you WILL increase your visibility guaranteed! Don't tell me you don't have 15 minutes, find it! If you do this I will follow you. Just copy the following in a tweet:
Hey @travelvisions I'm on #twitter now-follow me.
If you're already tweeting - awesome! Send me the same tweet from above and I'll follow you if I'm not already doing so. If you are ahead of the curve and already tweeting please don't think this series of posts isn't for you. I promise you we will improve your marketing methods in the coming weeks if you stick with me. Coming up next post I'll delve further into the simple social marketing things you MUST do! Until then, I look forward to your tweet!

Overhauling Travel Marketing - Introduction

Library of Congress Thomas Jefferson Building. Carol M. Highsmith, 2007

My daughter Googled herself the other day and, shockingly, there she was in a photo taken by a reporter in front of The Library of Congress. That day welcoming visitors to “the world’s greatest storehouse of knowledge,” the Librarian of Congress said, “This is all here for you.” On the historic occasion of its grand re-openning and launch of the Library of Congress Experience he explained that the Library, the largest in the world, and its collections are now available “to everyone in the world,” who from their computers are able to “turn pages” of the Gutenberg Bible or examine Ben Franklin’s edits of the Declaration of Independence by way of a new Web presentation portal.

As amazing as the portal launch was nothing is quite like walking through doors of this historic treasure - seeing Thomas Jefferson's handwritten draft of the Declaration of Independence with notations by Ben Franklin and having the rare privilege of walking around the Main Reading Room (seldom open to the public). This place is not just a building housing accounts of history in books, its architecture envelops you and its artifacts speak to you. It was the best part of our trip but it was not at all planned. Lucky us!
We stayed at a great boutique hotel, the Palomar, got a private tour of the US Capitol Building, toured the Smithsonian Museums, found a tavern with the largest selection of beer in the world, Bier Baron Tavern - fka Brickskeller, and discovered a terrific Mexican cocina called Oyamel. There they serve the freshest homemade guacamole and an amazing margarita topped with a salt froth. All told it was a fantastic Washington D.C. experience and easily fell into the perfect trip category.
Reminiscing prompted me to now say what I've long thought, Why is it necessary to have such a category? Why shouldn't every trip be this rewarding? Why is it so hard for people to travel like this all the time? After all this is the age of information. Why is it that with all our technology we're still not getting the right information in front of the right people? We can find just about anything on the internet, can't we?
The problem is we're on information overload and the speed and ease of the internet comes with a price. Even with specificity most of our searches yield way more information than we could possibly sort through. Mountains of it! And these places - hotels, restaurants and attractions, are lost in the mountainous pile like a needle in a haystack; an internet size haystack. These places, destinations, want us to know, "This is all here for you," if you can find them. Unfortunately, it is most often left to us, travelers, to do just that. Lucky us?

It's time for a change. Instead of information overload we need information overhaul so that everyone gets to go on the perfect trip nearly every time. TravelVision is doing just that. We're building a website that makes it easier, way easier, to discover and explore the places of interest to you. We're starting a revolution in travel marketing!
Travelvision.com launched in BETA December 2011. Take the Tour and whether you're a user or a destination we'd love for you to join us now. For users it will be a tremendous search, explore and plan tool and for destinations we promise it will be the best marketing experience you will ever have - a destination showcase. Join us over the coming weeks as we evolve and grow adding more and more exciting destinations and features.
Travelvision.com - Know Before You Go

Decking the Halls for 75 Years!

Wonderful party, wonderful historic hotel! Last night the halls were decked with ribbons and bows as Fort Lauderdale's historic Riverside Hotel celebrated it's 75th year. The Riverside, the oldest hotel in Ft. Lauderdale, has done a wonderful job of preserving it's historic charm while balancing it with modern luxury and amenities. It belongs to the Wells brother's family who in the 1930's envisioned this area as a destination and launched their dream. Originally a thoroughfare to the beach Las Olas Boulevard soon became known for its upscale shopping. The hotel sits proudly on this iconic American street and is the only hotel directly on it. Just step out the front doors and your on the boulevard alongside upscale boutiques, art galleries and restaurants or step in and you'll likely meet the neighbors of Las Olas at Prestin's Lounge.
A favorite hang of both locals and tourists today this trendy area is the perfect blend of old and new with places like The Floridian diner, Flora Ottimer's children's boutique and trendy hotspots like Rocco's Tacos. But wait there's more! Just minutes away from the Riverside Hotel by foot is Riverwalk where you can stroll along the water, eat more, explore more of Fort Laudedale's history or catch a Water Taxi. The Riverside Hotel is the perfect location!

Happy Anniversary!

View of The Riverside Hotel from the New River

Las Olas Boulevard