Tag: Tourism Advertising View All Tags
Tags: Tourism Boards / Facebook / Tourism Advertising / → All Tags
Be New Hampshire's Facebook Friend, Save Money On Your Vacation
We certainly thought that Forest County's "Become Our Facebook Friend" campaign was kind of cute. The local tourism board's idea was very Web 2.0: get people invested in the product, have them activate their social network, and hope the campaign gets traction. New Hampshire's approach to Facebook-driven advertising is a little more old fashioned. Their Visit NH Facebook Page makes that most basic of all tourism appeals: "come to our page, get discounts."
It's not the most innovative approach to getting a following, but it's apparently the more effective one. After almost a year, the Forest County page—pushing a similar kind of "come be rustic" message—has 917 friends. Just a couple months into the New Hampshire campaign they're already close to 2,000 fans. Here are some more details on how they get the word out about the Facebook-related deals:
Tags: Tourism Advertising / Tourism Boards / Tourism Marketing / Travel Ads / → All Tags
Tourism Boards Say Their Failed Tourism Slogans Are Your Fault
It's been a season of rebranding throughout Nevada, as city and tourism board officials have hired PR companies to create new slogans for them and their municipalities. Or more accurately, it's been a season of attempted rebranding, as the contracted firms came back with one hilariously bad proposal after another. The city of Sparks and the Reno-Sparks Convention and Visitors Authority both had to reject new slogans after $100,000 efforts. Even Las Vegas was having problems, until they finally decided to dump their new slogans and go back to to "What Happens Here Stays Here."
Naturally the tourism boards and ad firms have undertaken a full review of these failures. They're taking fresh looks at their selection criteria, their talent evaluations, and their overall approach to PR. By which we mean they're blaming Nevada's citizens for being so gosh darn judgmental:
Tags: Tourism Boards / Tourism Board Travel / Travel Media / Hawaii Travel / Tourism Advertising / → All Tags
As If We Didn't Already Know: Vacations Make People Happier, More Productive
Every few months another one of these "vacation deprivation" studies comes out and promptly gets picked up as Science! by the same tourism boards that commissioned it. The term seems to go back to a contest for free hotel rooms that Hyatt ran in the mid-1990s, and it's been circulating as this kind of pseudo-scientific fake medical term ever since.
The latest version puts everything in terms of economic productivity, because that's what people care about right now. If people cared about something else, that's what vacations would be good for. And so, we are stuck with this drivel:
Tags: Tourism Advertising / Tourism Boards / Tourism Marketing / Travel Ads / Wisconsin Travel / → All Tags
WTF, Wisconsin?
WTF, yo? Poor Wisconsin; their tourism board obviously doesn't employ any youngsters who are familiar with the hip, internet lingo of the day. Perhaps they should have run their name by an intern first? The "Wisconsin Tourism Federation," or WTF, is a little late to realize that their own acronym is also a popular abbreviation for "what the f*ck."
So instead of continue on the path to permanent jokedom, the WTF sat down and decided to give in to the web change their name to the Tourism Federation of Wisconsin, or TFW. CNET has the scoop on their reasoning: "'We didn't want it to detract from our mission,' said Julia Hertel, a spokeswoman for the newly renamed TFW."
Aw, isn't that cute? But you see, what they didn't count on and probably still haven't realized the value of, is all this publicity. Now, thanks to their slip-up and unfortunate association with a cussing internet slang term, the WTF TFW is known outside of Milwaukee. The jury is still out on whether or not this incident will attract tourists to the dairy state.
Related Stories:
· WTF? Bloggers cause Wisconsin Tourism Federation to change name [CNET]
· Wisconsin Travel [Jaunted]
[Photo: WTF or is it TFW?]
Tags: Tourism Advertising / Tourism Boards / Tourism Marketing / Travel Ads / Panama Travel / → All Tags
Panama Picks A Tourism Slogan Reminiscent Of Childhood Trauma, STDs
The good folks at the Panama Investor Blog are befuddled as to why the country has settled on "Panama - It Will Never Leave You" as their new tourism slogan. Great question! They attempt to work out the meaning behind the slogan-change:
I have caught wind of the new slogan they will be using to promote tourism in Panama and it is not so good... 'Panama - It Will Never Leave You.' Unlike your friends, your girlfriend or your spouse, Panama will always be there. Sounds to me like a HIV or malaria, neither of which I believe will help us attract tourists.
We were going to go with a herpes punchline because HIV is a total downer, and for the record, malaria can indeed be cured with the right battery of anti-parasite drugs. But the point nonetheless remains. This is not, in the strictest sense, the most attractive slogan ever produced by an ad agency.
Tags: NYC-In-The-1950s / Retro Travel / New York City / Tourism Advertising / Clubs / Burlesque / Night Clubs / → All Tags
New York 1953 To Today: Times Square Is For The Girly-Shows
Times Square and Central Park attract tourists to New York City in droves, but what were the most exciting sights back in the 1950s? Thanks to an old tourist brochure from 1953, we're exploring back in the day versus today, for NYC tourists.
Here's a quick trivia question: How does the leggy advertisement for the Latin Quarter nightclub relate to Barbara Walters? It was run by her father! We doubt that Barbara enjoys being connected back to this notorious club, especially since it embodied the seedy side of Times Square from the late 1960s through 1980s by showing soft-core pornography and being a popular fight spot.
Oh boy but back in the day, especially in 1953 when the lights of Times Square were still glamorous and not all red. Lou Walter's Latin Quarter hosted the big names alongside a little nudie chorus girl show. Think Frank Sinatra, Milton Berle and Mae West.
Tags: NYC-In-The-1950s / Retro Travel / New York City / Tourism Advertising / Restaurants / Sports Travel / Food Travel / → All Tags
New York 1953 To Today: Can We Resurrect The $1.95 Steak Dinner?
Times Square and Central Park attract tourists to New York City in droves, but what were the most exciting sights back in the 1950s? Thanks to an old tourist brochure from 1953, we're exploring back in the day versus today, for NYC tourists.
If you visiting New York in 1953 and you weren't going out for lobster at some place like the Grand Central Oyster Bar, then you were probably licking your chops for a visit to East 52nd Street. And there, setting itself apart from $1.95 steak dinners advertised all around Times Square, was Al Schacht's Restaurant, owned by the baseball player-turned-comedian.
Tags: NYC-In-The-1950s / Retro Travel / New York City / Tourism Advertising / Ships / Cruise Travel / → All Tags
New York 1953 To Today: Transatlantic Liners Versus Cruise Ships
Times Square and Central Park attract tourists to New York City in droves, but what were the most exciting sights back in the 1950s? Thanks to an old tourist brochure from 1953, we're exploring back in the day versus today, for NYC tourists.
While no tourism brochure these days would use the phrase "your gay entree" unless we're talking about Damron or another gay-focused guidebook, this ad for transatlantic crossing on the storied French Line causes us to conjure up sepia-tinged fantasies of sailing out of New York harbor on a great ship, with goodbye party streamers flying all around and cocktails in a piano lounge.
By 1953, travelers had already mostly forgotten about the Normandie burning at dock in NY in 1942, and they would continue to sail until the early 1960s, when airplanes finally got the hang of elegant travel.
Tags: NYC-In-The-1950s / Retro Travel / New York City / Tourism Advertising / Travel Photography / → All Tags
New York 1953 To Today: Going 'Kodaking'
Times Square and Central Park attract tourists to New York City in droves, but what were the most exciting sights back in the 1950s? Thanks to an old tourist brochure from 1953, we're exploring back in the day versus today, for NYC tourists.
According to the brochure, "there are almost as many cameras enthusiasts in America as there are residents." We don't know what kind of Kodak film they were sniffing back in the '50s, but we beg to differ. Nonetheless, NYC is like a hyper picturebook, and tourists definitely take advantage of the urban grit just as much as the picturesque skyline when it comes to photography.
Hoping to snap a few pictures of the local color along with The Statue of Liberty for your New York vacation album? Let's see what the old 1953 guidebook recommends for "Kodaking in Gotham..."
Tags: NYC-In-The-1950s / Retro Travel / New York City / Restaurants / Food Travel / Tourism Advertising / → All Tags
New York 1953 To Today: Grand Central's Oyster Bar
Times Square and Central Park attract tourists to New York City in droves, but what were the most exciting sights back in the 1950s? Thanks to an old tourist brochure from 1953, we're exploring back in the day versus today, for NYC tourists.
Walk past a Starbucks on every block and shiny Apple stores around the city, and you might believe for a second that city has change completely in the past 50+ years, but a quick visit to Grand Central Station will reveal that some things are held too sacred to ever change.
Tags: Japan Travel / Tourism Advertising / Tourism Marketing / → All Tags
Hello Japan: Hello Kitty
Japan is a magical place, really, where grown-ups can love kiddy cartoon characters without being embarrassed. And that's the angle Japan is about to use to promote itself to potential visitors from China and Hong Kong, because like the Japanese, they also love Hello Kitty.
Yep, the cartoon cat has just become an official tourism ambassador. It's all part of the simply-named "Visit Japan" campaign that hopes to increase tourist numbers to 10 million a year from the 8.35 million that visited last year.
It seems a pity, almost, that a country so rich in interesting culture and history resorts to a thirty-something-year-old cartoon kitty to bring in the tourists, but if it works, it works. And we admit we'd be persuaded to return to Japan if we got a free Hello Kitty key chain at passport control.
Related Stories:
· Hello Kitty Named Japan Tourism Ambassador [MSNBC]
· Japan Travel coverage [Jaunted]
[Photo: colodio]
Tags: Travel Snapshots / Tourism Advertising / Tourism Marketing / Contests / → All Tags
Travel Snapshot: Tourism Marketing Edition
We were on the way home from our geeky weekend in Philadelphia when we cell phone snapped this ad. It's touting the new Take Pity on Me! contest from the Scottsdale Convention and Visitors Bureau.
If you find yourself buried under snow, frozen and fatigued, Scottsdale can help. The CVB is giving away a four-day trip to Southern Arizona. All you have to do is submit a photo or video of you suffering from the winter blues.
Starting March 3, the top 10 photos and top 10 videos will go online and website visitors will pick the best of the best. Our advice? Go all out for this thing. No video has ever been a smash-hit on the web thanks to its being unoriginal and boring. Let us know if you enter, and we'll vote for you!
Related Stories:
· Scottsdale Take Pity on Me! contest [Official Site]
· Scottsdale Spas coverage [Jaunted]
· Tourism Marketing coverage [Jaunted]
