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by Albert Barra of Tourismo 2.0 can be completed here for those who haven’t already read about it on his own blog, Facebook or another T-List blog.

It’s a topic of interest to me. I’ve been advocating for quite some time that not only hotels but any organization in travel & tourism should be actively engaged in the conversation about them that takes place in social media. There are a number of tools that are now available to keep track and stay on top of your reputation, a necessity in the marketplace today.

it’s called 50 Ways Marketers Can use Social Media to Improve Their Marketing by Chris Brogan. You can’t go wrong trying to understand the subject and start using at least some, if not all, of these suggestions.

might be a future reality according to this Real Time column in WSJ.com by Jason Fry. He raises a number of interesting points that will indeed make this a general reality as it is already for a fast increasing number of people who can easily be found on the web today. In the networked world we live in today, where radical transparency is another fact of life I can imagine this scenario.

I found this quote by Curt Monash particularly poignant: “The Internet WILL tell stories about you, true or otherwise. Make sure your own version is out there too.” It’s a necessity for companies today and might become one for everybody in future, who knows.

One thing seems obvious to me, this new reality will have a profound impact on how to market products and services effectively.

is their entry into the virtual world until now the pretty much limited to Second Life. Although I’ve never been a fan of Second Life and their numbers haven’t shown strong growth lately, the Google effort might renew the interest.

How it will affect the way businesses are marketing themselves remains to be seen. Seems to me at least another medium competing for people’s already limited time and attention.

reported in this latest survey revealing that Stressed Americans Leave 460 Million Vacation Days Unused. It used to be that the Japanese were the workaholics but now they seem to have been replaced by Americans. By international comparison the amount of vacation days in the U.S. is already very low and it seems many people don’t even take those in full.

It’s quite a loss to the travel industry as a whole when we imagine that at least a certain percentage of these people would spend their days away from home. Not a statistic of which we should be proud!

Technorati Tags: vacation, travel, tourism

“Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.” - Arthur C. Clarke

This quote somehow reminds me how far we still are from making the travel planning - researching and buying process on the web truly an easy and enjoyable experience based on the technology understanding and correctly interpreting customer needs and preferences. It’s certainly far from being magic!

of online travel, to find that Independent Hotels’ Online Presence Lagging according to this recent study by GuestCentric. The gap between the larger chains and smaller independent hotels is significant when it comes to an effective presence online and the use of web based marketing and distribution tools.

The web was supposed to have leveled the playing field for large and small players but it seems that hasn’t entirely happened in the accommodation sector yet, although according to the latest PhoCusWright Consumer Travel Trends Survey Hotel stays were the most popular component with U.S. online leisure travel buyers in 2007.

This is proof of the growth opportunity for the accommodation sector and poses a challenge to those who haven’t yet focused on how to best use the web as a key tool to assure their future success and do so fast or very likely continue to decline and eventually disappear. No supplier in the travel industry can any longer afford to stay on the sidelines when it comes to the effective use of the web.

Technorati Tags: hotels, accommodation,

that the old argument still brought up by some marketers that all this new web 2.0 stuff is only for kids no longer holds true, is presented in Step Away From The Computer, Kids: Baby Boomers Embrace Social Media an article in MediaPost Publications about a recent AARP study that covers web use by boomers. It shows some very high usage rates, like 70% of consumers age 50+ saying that their online community was “very” or “extremely” important to them. Again, it looks like the web behavior of this audience makes it a necessity to focus on effective, integrated marketing that makes smart use of the latest web tools available.

Technorati Tags: AARP, social media, marketing, boomers

The Opinion Research Corporation just published a report revealing some very important insight into how people research products and services online. 61% of respondents read “online reviews, blogs and other sources of online customer feedback before purchasing. More importantly, 83% said that online product evaluations and reviews had at least some level of influence on their purchasing decisions, although only 32% reported posting online feedback themselves.

A most revealing comment was made by Linda Shea, SVP and Global Managing Director of Customer Strategis for ORC:

“Businesses today exist in an era in which it’s nearly impossible to escape the likelihood of being
evaluated…there’s nowhere to hide. Companies must be extremely mindful of the power of proliferating online forums and their ability to shape consumer’s perceptions about brands. Even a single negative review, when posted in a very public forum, can have a significant impact on a prospective buyer’s decision to purchase.”

And finally, here are the most researched product and service categories:

* Travel/Recreation/Lesiure (82%)
* Electronic goods (80%)
* Household products/services (66%)
* Clothing (55%)
* Automotive (55%)
* Personal care (40%)
* Food (24%)

Technorati Tags: product research, online reviews,

Social Influence Marketing: The New Way to Win Customers contains a number of very useful suggestions of how to be actively engaged in the conversation about your brand rather than just a passive bystander. While these ideas are certainly useful, I just wonder how many organizations have the right marketing structure in place to implement these activities. Looking at the large majority of travel sites out there, I haven’t noticed anyone in particular being at the leading edge of what’s called here social influence marketing. It will require a change in mindset that allows this happen and it can’t come too soon.

Technorati Tags: chief marketer, social influence marketing, social media