how to integrate social media into travel pr campaigns

How to integrate social media into Travel PR campaigns

Agenda

1. Tactics & tools– Social media outreach (blogs, Twitter, social networks, forums, podcasts)– Video– Widgets– SEO PR

2. Online PR strategy– Creative campaigns– Amplification

3. Reputation management– Online press office– SEO PR

4. Measurement & evaluation to demonstrate ROI

My background

Brands

Agencies

My background

Tactics & tools

Overview

• Matured - blogging has now matured as a phenomenon to cross all consumer interest areas

• Extensive - vibrant communities can be found collecting around vast ranges of topics

• Culture - blogger outreach carries with it different expectancies in regards to form of communications than traditional media

Consumer

Travel blogs

Regional

Opportunity

• ‘Link etiquette’ of the blogging world encourages quick viral dissemination of well-targeted stories and engaging content

• SEO - this ‘link etiquette’ is also responsible for blogs faring extremely well in search returns – ranking highly in Google

– As a result, blog posts can be extremely visible and influential – Impacting consumer opinion– Driving mainstream coverage

• Brand advocates - the highly focused nature of blogs – with bloggers becoming passionate opinion formers on very specific topics – offers distinct opportunity to encourage strong advocates of a product or service

Blogger outreach

Preparation

• It is vital to know who you’re pitching to. Specifically this includes:

Reading the site’s about page Reading the last week or so of posts or news stories If possible, finding a specific, concrete example and URL that

proves why the editor would be interested in writing about the campaign?

If not a URL, the site should be very specific to your client/campaign

Digging Deeper

It’s essential that you ask yourself…

Are you going after an active blogger or a fair-weather blogger?• If your blogger is very active online, chances are he or she

has received a pitch before and will at least know the drill. If not, he or she may still be a good target, but you may have to explain the process a little more in-depth.

Is the blogger is interacting only in the blogging community or if are they active elsewhere?

• Twitter? Facebook? Flickr? MySpace?

More Digging

How does the blogger interact online?• Is he or she cynical or critical? Is he or she part of a

community that is characteristically anti-PR?

Search for terms… Pitch Public Relations PR Marketing Flack Your client or the client’s product Client competitors

Blog Pitching - Ethics

Transparency• Honesty of Relationship: You say who you're speaking for• Honesty of Identity: You never obscure your identity

Specifics• No monetary exchanges• Commitment to represent blogger and client• No dodgy dealings, bribery• No pestering• No anonymous posting or commenting• No spamming

Step One: The Pre-pitch

What it does:• Ensures that a blogger is

interested in hearing from PR

Why it’s important:• One disgruntled blogger has

the power to tarnish the reputation of the agency and client with the click of a button

Step One: The Pre-pitch

Includes:• Short introduction of who you are and what you do• Opt-in clause of participation • A hint of what might be in store • Chance to be placed on a ‘Do Not Pitch’ list

Does not include:• Press releases• Hard sells• Attachments• Unsolicited advice or information

What it does:• Ensures that the blogger

understands your objectives and that you understand theirs

Why it’s important:• Each blogger is different - some want

to review products, some want Google juice, some want advertising, some don’t know what they want… This gives us all a chance to start off on the same page.

Step Two: Relationship Establishment

What it does:• Keeps an ongoing

conversation with the blogger

Why it’s important:• The blogger will be much

more likely to take your other pitches if they know you

Step Three: The Pitch & Maintenance

What it includes:• Knowing what’s going on in

the blogger’s life• Thinking before you pitch• Short, to the point,

correspondence• Follow-up• Personality

Step Three: The Pitch & Maintenance

Case study - Best Job in the World

Case study - Beck’s Canvas

Case study - Beck’s Canvas

Key Outputs• Over 120 pieces of online coverage

achieved• 40,148,733 unique users• £257,000 equivalent online media

value• ROI – 9:1

Blogger events

Overview

• Blogger events can be run in a very similar way to media events• These can either be run in tandem with mainstream media events or

independently• Successful blogger events tend to adopt very tailored methods of syncing

specific elements of an event to bloggers’ personal tastes

Opportunity

• With bloggers currently not invited to a large number of events, they offer a powerful means by which to build strong relationships and brand advocates

• Face-to-face time allows impact to be made far beyond that possible during normal email communications

• Following blogger events, bloggers frequently post detailed and well-branded reviews and posts

Disney Parks & Resorts

Keycamp Holidays

Case study - Smirnoff

• Popular London ‘Blogger Meet-up’ event sponsored by Smirnoff

• Two Smirnoff ‘mixologists’ placed at bar

• Profile book designed with detailed background information on all of the blogger invitees

• Special cocktail design for each blogger: for example Fake Plastic Noodles received a cocktail infused with twisted lemon skins for noodles

Case study - V-Jam

• ‘V-Jam’ social media day created, with 60 frequent flyers, airline staff and bloggers participating

• Focus set of come up with concepts on how social media can improve the flying experience

• Virgin Atlantic’s Vtravelled.com, was developed as an output – an online travel community where people can organise and share travel plans with friends and family

Twitter

Overview

• UK lead - over the past year Twitter has grown hugely in the UK to overtake the US in terms of take-up

• Extensive - the similarity to texts and the brief, quick nature of posts have resonated strongly with UK consumers, now spanning many demographic groups and interest areas

• Complements blogging - Twitter now has found a place alongside blogging, where it is used to share quick views and opinions. Blogging instead is used for more detailed descriptions and analysis

Twitter in Travel

Regional

Opportunity

• Influential hubs - the culture of people on Twitter ‘following’ others that they find interesting has created a number of very influential hubs

• ‘Twitter Elite’ now hold considerable sway, with their posts being seen by thousands of people instantly

• Viral - the medium, like blogging, also lends itself extremely well to quick dissemination of news. If a person following a Twitter user likes a post, they can ‘ReTweet’ further increasing the audience base that the message reaches

Twitter – Why?

• Build relationships

• Humanise/Catharsis

• Share information

• Gather information

• Showcase expertise

• Job hunting

How does it work?

1. I update

2. It shows up in my news feed and my followers’ news feed

3. I can check the updates that are directed at me (@)

4. As I update, the more my name shows up and I can expand my followers

The Twitter Dashboard

• Following• Followers• Updates• Twitter Tip• @Replies• Direct Messages• Favourites• Search• Trends

Twitter, PR and Journalism

• Sense of community

• Secret club mentality

• Way to connect• Inside information

Etiquette

Do not:• Follow indiscriminately• Pitch out in the open• Use only for self-promotion

Do:• Keep engaged daily• Move outside your circle• Follow people at a steady pace

Twitter Credibility Scale

Twitter Tools – things to know

• Hashtags – A way to track and distinguish conversations by inserting # in front of a

pre-determined term• RT (Retweet)

– Pass along a Tweet of someone else’s and give credit “RT @mseasons Check out this site!”

• DM (Direct message)– A private message to another Twitter user. Can only be sent if the user is

following you• Long URLs

– Can be shortened using services like Tiny.cc to help avoid going over the 140 character limit.

• Pictures– Use TwitPic.com to share photos easily on Twitter

• Username– Can be changed at any time without losing your followers, replies or

account

Twitter Tools - Digsby

• Updates stream to your desktop• You don’t ever have to miss an @

reply• You can update your status, return

direct messages and reply to other users

• You never have to visit Twitter.com• It’s also possible to incorporate

your email, Facebook and IM clients

Case study - First Capital Connect

• Rail travellers invited to follow FCC on Twitter (@FirstCC)

• Travellers provide information about their regular commute, stations they travel between, and times of the day

• System then updates travellers when problems occur that will affect their commute

Case study - Manchester Airport

• Value Added Discount vouchers on offer as incentive for Twitter users to follow Manchester Airport on Twitter (@manairport)

• Further chance of winning £500 for those that ‘retweet’, referring a friend to the airport’s Twitter page

• Twitter feed used to communicate flight updates to passengers

Social networks

Travel social networks

• Targeted ads – displays ads solely on users meeting the demographic profile requested

• Partner campaigns - special pages are designed to hold communities around specific topics

• Traditional PR activity - Facebook is a notoriously hard environment to engage directly with consumer as a result of its closed nature (you have to be friends with someone to see their full details)

• Facebook groups - the most accessible way to engage with communities of people on Facebook– either by setting one up or through engagement in groups already existing

Case study – Road to V

Case study – O2

• Drop in users - MySpace’s user base in recent years has dropped significantly as a result of the rise of Facebook and Bebo

• Music - the profile now of MySpace users is now very music-focused

• Targeted ads - much like on Facebook, targeted ads can be run on MySpace, set to appear only on profile pages of users that fit within a certain demographic profile

• Open - MySpace is based on a far more open environment than Facebook, and therefore enables far more extensive engagement

Case study – Road to V

• What is it?– Photo storage and photo

sharing community• How does it work?

– Users upload photos, tag them and/or submit them to groups

• Importance of tagging– Allows search functionality– SEO visibility through

Google and Google Image

• DIY - an open social network platform that allows you to easily create your own social network

• Flexibility - this can be designed to focus upon any topic imaginable

• Numbers - currently over 1 million individual networks have been created on Ning – by companies and individuals alike

• Functionality - Ning easily incorporates all of the features commonly available today on social networks – including multimedia content, and easy sharing of opinion and views

Opportunity

• Control- Ning offers complete control over who can join a social network and what they can do when they are part of it

• Moderation - constraints can thus be placed on the age of participants

• Targeted - opportunity to create niche networks that are designed to complement other marketing initiatives

Social bookmarking

• Distribution - A powerful way for stories to disseminate online

• Tags - Users ‘tag’ stories they find interesting

• Easy access - The URL for the story is saved on the web, for easy future finding (online bookmarking)

Social bookmarking

• Online influence - Very popular with news hungry web geeks

• Community - People follow friends ‘feeds’, and are kept up-to-date with stories they find interesting

• Comments – People comment and share views on stories

• Traffic – can be a major source of traffic to websites online

Social bookmarking

• User-generated news website

• No editor• Ranking of stories

decided by community• A central group of a

1000 or so users command great influence

• Major traffic driver online• SEO boost

Forums

Overview

• Well-established - forum communities were the first form of social media to take-off on the web

• Community - completely driven by community posts• ‘Forum Master’ - oversees content moderation• Threads - are either initiated by the Forum Master or by the user

community• Consumer research – very popular with consumers when

researching complex topics or making purchasing decisions• Opinion-formers –most forums provide information on the

activity of its users:– Number of posts– Number of threads

Travel forums

Opportunity & constraints

• Seeding – in the not too distant past, forums were a popular medium for viral marketers

• Legal constrictions – changes in European law two years ago, however, severely curtailed this activity, making it illegal to act under false pretence when marketing online

• Forum thread sponsorship – The main opportunity for active forum engagement is by contacting a Forum Webmaster to organise a sponsored thread

Podcasts

Overview

• Podcasts are very much a social media equivalent to radio– Blogs:journalism– Podcasts:radio

• RSS technology utilised to download straight to your iPod– Lead to podcasts being consumer on the go at times

convenient to the listener• Podcasts can now be found covering all interest areas and

industry sectors

Travel podcasts

Opportunity

• Opportunity exists to pitch in stories and content just as with radio– Interviews– Guest speaker slots

• As it is still a relatively new medium, podcast producers do not receive as many approaches from PRs – leading to increased opportunity

Overview

• Engagement - video offers tremendous opportunity to engage audience groups online

• Media thirst – traditional media sites are constantly trying to compete with the BBC’s extensive libraries of content

• PR opportunity – creates opportunity for high-profile story placement

• Creative extension – opportunity to add further depth to a story

Video-sharing

• Large and varied – more than just YouTube. Sites such as Dailymotion, Videojug, Metacafe, Blinkx and many others also have large communities

• Easy sharing – ‘embedded players’ are now offered by all video-sharing sites making it easy to pass content to journalists

• Viral spread – it is also very easy for consumers to share video content – meaning videos can spread very quickly online (e.g. recent London fire)

Communities

• Social networks – more than just video posting

• Shared interests – people connect to other users who like similar content, or post videos they like

• Channels – YouTube channels create audience bases that are informed when new content is uploaded

• Comments – people post comments and views on videos. Star ratings are a powerful determination of ranking in YouTube and whether it achieves the all-important feature on the front-page

Video production

• Affordable quality – the explosion of video consumption online has brought with it a reduction in the expectancy of video quality and resolution

• Script writer – finding a good script writer is a very valuable exercise. Substantially reduces expensive to and fro

• Production – hiring a video producers is extremely important – more often that not they will manage the whole project, including editing

• Budget – costs can be in the hundreds, depending on the scope of work

• Length – it is best if videos do not shoot past 1 minute in length online – further reducing production costs

Video seeding

• Audience reach – do use other video-sharing sites in addition to YouTube. You can easily find extensive lists of them online

• Relevance – particularly ensure your video is posted on sites with relevant focus and audience bases

• Web tools – there are a number of tools that can be used to post a video simultaneously to many video-sharing sites at once – massively reducing admin time (e.g. http://heyspread.com/)

• Monitoring – such sites also enable easy reporting of total views and comment activity across the video-sharing sites used

SEO

• SEO – when posting videos on video-sharing sites, you have complete control over the copy and content that runs alongside the video

• Keywords – by researching appropriate keywords, it is possible to ensure the video ranks well in relevant search engine returns

• URL links – use of relevant URLs and ‘anchor text’ ensures that popular videos provide an SEO boost to your website

• Traffic – Popular sites such as YouTube can be key drivers of traffic online

Moderation

• Hugely active sites such as YouTube so attract a large number of ‘spammers’ – people posting inappropriate links and content in comments to capture people’s attention

• Popular videos can also attract abusive comment as a means to scandalise and shock

• When it is your own video post, it is possible to control the following:

– Removal of inappropriate comments– Complete removal of ability to comment

Case study – Ramada Encore

Case study – Ramada Encore

Key Outputs• 12 pieces of national online

coverage • 78 actively generated pieces

of coverage across influential blog titles

• Stimulated over 20 million impressions

Case study – Virgin Mobile

Case study – Virgin Mobile

Key Outputs

• 105 pieces of online coverage

• Over 20 million impressions

• Over 95% of placements mentioned Virgin Mobile

• Over 89% of placements linked to or embedded the 30 Peas video

• Over 87% linked to virginmobilepeople.com/30p

Widgets

Overview

• Interactive web tools that can be ‘embedded’ on websites and downloaded to desktops

• Engagement – great means by which to actively engage consumers

• Rich information – powerful way to display rich and varied information

• Content – work for all means of different content, from video to games

• Stand-out – as this is still a a largely unexplored area by the PR industry generally, substantial opportunity exists to catch online influencers’ attention

Queensland Tourism

• 10-day campaign to promote Etihad Airways'’ service into Brisbane, together with experiences Queensland Tourism have to offer

• Viral game where players compete for a high score by catapulting Koalas across different terrains

• Players invited to share with family and friends online by posting on blogs and social network profiles

• More than 1.1 million koalas were catapulted

Case study – BBC 5Live

Online PR strategy

Objectives

Raising brand awareness onlineIncreasing the number of links

from quality websites

Search engine ranking boost Website traffic

Increasing customer acquisition & sales

Online PR tactics

Audience mapping

Online media promotion

Blogger outreach• Content pitching• Guest blog posts• Blogger events

Twitter promotion• Client Twitter feed set-

up• Post drafting• Twitter feed promotion

Social network promotion• Facebook groups• MySpace profile recruitment• Niche networks• Ning

Social bookmarking

Forums• Thread sponsorship

Podcasts• Production• Interview

pitching

Video production• Script writing• Filming & production• Editing

Video promotion• Search engine

optimisation• Seeding

SEO PR• Press release

optimisation• Syndication•Measurement & reporting

Widgets• Production• Promotion

Online monitoring

Online PR measurement•Online media buying value• Search engine visibility• Web analytics• Social media metrics

Creative campaigns

Creative development

• At the core of social media strategy is traditional PR

– Must be new– Must be sufficiently interesting for someone

to want to take their own personal time to talk about it

– Relevance is highly important

• Simplicity is vital– Online influencers are extremely time poor– Key messaging must come through instantly

• Attention-grabbing works– Humour– Innovation– Risqué (great example is Diesel 30 year

anniversary campaign)

Story development

• Get to the core of the story– Describe it in one sentence

• Build associations from this base• Relevance is key • Focus first on this before considering appropriate social media

platforms– Platforms should fall naturally from creative concept

• Think BIG– Creative implementation online is far, far cheaper that offline– There are some very competitively priced development suppliers out there

Use the full palette

• Never before have so many tools been available, so easily, to PRs

• Bring the story to life as much as possible

• The further you go the stronger the message, the reach, the impact

• Video is enormously powerful

Two-way

• The key feature that differentiates social media from traditional media is its facility for two-way dialogue

• This brings with it a number of important advantages:

– More powerful engagement• Improved recall

– Active involvement– Participative for both parties

• Make this principle core to a social media campaign

Competition mechanics

• Incentivise people to participate

• Make prizes relevant to resonate

• Competitions have long been a core strand of consumer PR campaigns

– Social media offers far more flexible, creative mechanics

• You have to think why would some get involved?

Case study – Hotel Chocolat

Language & tone

• ‘PR speak’ just does not work– Avoid exaggeration – people can spot it, and do not need to put up with it– Is it really ‘the world’s leading’?

• Be human– Chatty, simple language works best– Avoid jargon at all costs

• Be friendly– Relationships can be formed very quickly online

• Be open– People are largely very understanding. If issues arise be up-front and open

and maintain dialogue

• Transparency– Always state your intention– Always state who you are representing

Mechanicals

• Make it easy to share– URL links– Social media ‘share’

buttons

• Be mindful of people’s inboxes

– Make full use of online tools and sharing sites to distribute content

– YouSendIt

Amplification

Overview

• Extend – online PR can work very well as a means to ‘amplify’ or add further depth to a planned PR/marketing/advertising campaign

• Advertising – ‘amplification’ is very much a buzz term in the ad world. Represents a means by which to take the core ad message out to a wider audience base

• Media fragmentation – the fragmentation of consumer media has made it impossible for advertising to reach as large groups of people as before

• Word-of-mouth – at its core lies the ability to stimulate word-of-mouth and viral spread of key marketing messages

• Social media – the two-way, personal nature of the medium perfectly complements the prime objective of any advertising initiative

Implementation

• Core messaging – creative scope is focused upon taking campaign messaging and applying them to the online medium

• Interaction & depth – tools such as video and widgets enable softer elements to be added to a campaign – increasing levels of engagement

• Assets – content produced to-date as part of the campaign can prove extremely valuable

Implementation - timeline

• Anticipation – one core focus for amplification strategy is building momentum ahead of a campaign launch

– Early glimpses of assets– Smaller campaigns to support

major push

• Extension – an additional focus commonly is then extending interest and intrigue past the main launch dates

– Interactive elements– Competitions

Opportunity

• Extend current client PR campaigns – opportunity to pitch in amplification projects onto current client campaigns

• Extend other client marketing initiatives – opportunity to begin further supporting other agency initiatives

• Slot in aside current retained PR agencies – opportunity to get to the client table without a full re-pitch. A foot in the door

• Partnerships – scope to partner with advertising and media agencies

Case study – Sony Bravia

Case study – Tourism New Zealand

• Dedicated YouTube channel featuring video content of the destination

• Promotion of the channel has led to New Zealand’s ‘Youngest Country’ advert being viewed online over a million times

• YouTube clips are also embedded directly on the newzealand.com site

• Visitors on newzealand.com invited to share experiences through a ‘submit a memory’ tool – whereby travellers submit short accounts of their trip

Case study – Beck’s

Reputation management

Online press office

Online monitoring

• Many options – there are now a large number of monitoring services on offer

• Consultancy – value for clients is in the consultancy offered in addition to raw stats:

– Flagging crises before flaring– Prioritisation of articles for reaction– Insight to inform PR planning and campaign

creative

Managing comments

• Commenting is a necessary element of the two-way nature of social media

• Once you start the dialogue, it is important to remain involved– Reply to comments– Engage in conversation

• However, the more impersonal nature of online communications can cause people to sometimes be more offensive

– Keep a watchful eye for inappropriate comment or spam

• If this occurs on your uploaded content or site, this can be mitigated with removal as necessary

– Ensure this is an appropriate action

• YouTube allows comments to be disabled

Managing comments - prioritisation

• The proliferation of sites and commentators can be mind boggling and very difficult to manage

• Priority is key• Not all sites similar sway• Some comment at best will only

require a watchful eye to check if it spreads further

– In such circumstances, engaging is a waste of resources and may only fuel the fire

Social media press office

• Portal for reporting news and deals

• Hosts photography, videos and widgets

• Readers can comment and share views

• Links closely with Lastminute’s Twitter page, featuring recent Tweets

SEO PR

SEO PR

• Google is very much the window through which people access everything online

• Online PR and social media outreach directly impact:

1. Brand website rankings

2. Journalist and consumer endorsement rankings

• Online PR and social media outreach can also be utilised to minimise the impact of damaging articles ranking highly– Hotel Chocolat example

Implementation - keywords

• Keywords – keyword phrases are selected that are most important to the client for driving relevant traffic to their website

• Input – first check if client has list of priority keywords. Their online marketing department will definitely have focus areas

• Keyword generation – otherwise, there are numerous free, or paid-for, keyword generator tools

• Focus – build focused list of up to five keywords to focus upon

Implementation - drafting

• Careful drafting – PR collateral is fused subtly with keyword phrases

• Extend use – opportunity to extend use of press releases and other collateral already being produced for a client

• Focused content – otherwise, focused collateral can be created around keyword areas

• Anchor links – appropriate URL links to the client site are placed behind keywords

• Link choice – work with online marketing department to select most appropriate URLs

Implementation - syndication

• Syndication wires – PR collateral is posted on SEO PR wires (PRWeb, Source Wire, Real Wire)

• Mechanical costs – Each post costs around £100 (varies across wires)

• Targeted – collateral is syndicated across sites relevant to the content and keywords

• Link creation – each syndicated piece of coverage contains keywords and URL links to clients site

Online PR support

• Dual benefit – more traditional online PR activity also has a direct impact on search

• Top web real estate – achieving coverage on high ranking sites, such as BBC Online & Guardian Online, which includes URL links, creates substantial SEO boosts for a client

• PR-dependent – PR is the only mechanism by which to achieve this

• Relevant content – PR-generated articles linking to a client are likely to include relevant keyword phrases, further increasing effects

Measurement & evaluation

Social media metrics

• Unique user statistics in social media are impossible to acquire across the board• A blogger will have to

provide information personally

• Therefore, does not support overall campaign measurement

• Different social media platforms require different metrics


• Blogs• Number of actively generated posts• Number of virally generated posts• Tone of posts• Key messages• BlogScore• Number of comments• URL links• ‘Anchor text’


• Twitter• Number of actively generated Tweets• Number of Retweets• Tone of posts• Key messages• TwitterScore• URL links


• Forums• ForumScore• Tone• Key messaging

• Podcasts• Number of listeners• Tone• Key messaging


• Video• Number of views• Stars• Favourites• Comments

– Tone• Social networks

• Members/ friends• Level of active

engagement– Comments– Uploads

Search engine impact

• Ranking of actively generated posts in search returns

• Assess ranking of negative articles in search returns

• Pre and post activity keyword search returns analysed

• Work with SEO agency/online marketing department• Online PR/social media campaigning

will not be the only influence on search returns

• Note the Google PageRank of coverage generated

Traffic

Utilise web analytics to track the following:

1. Site visits encouraged as a direct result of online PR activity

2. Uplift in traffic levels

3. Conversion of traffic to sales (or other important marketing metrics, for example sign-up)

how to integrate social media into travel pr campaigns

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