Welcome to a journey into the heart of destination marketing with industry trailblazer Josh Collins. Discover the art of captivating travelers through owned media channels, the unsung heroes in the rise and ebb of platforms like TikTok. As we unpack the PESO model, you'll learn why a solid foundation in owned media isn't just a good practice; it's essential for the resilience and consistency of your brand's message. You won't want to miss our deep dive into how balancing presence on popular platforms with strategic investment in controlled channels can future-proof your destination's marketing efforts.
Email marketing may sound like a blast from the past, but prepare to be surprised. Josh Collins and I reminisce about campaign successes, offering actionable insights into nurturing your email list, avoiding the snares of co-registration lists, and the power of personalization. This chapter is all about leveraging timeless tools in innovative ways to foster growth, even when your budget doesn't stretch to the flashy new digital trends.
Finally, let's talk strategy and the future of travel. We'll show you how to tailor your destination's allure to varied audiences through technologies that bridge language barriers and enrich user experiences. With a peek at travel trends on the rise, like the growing appeal of multi-generational trips and the impact of personal referrals, you'll understand the importance of a growth mindset in this ever-evolving industry. Josh's insights, mixed with a dash of unconventional thinking, just might inspire your next groundbreaking marketing move. So, join us as we explore these exciting opportunities, and let's shape the future of travel together!
Connect with Josh and stay in the loop on his Organic Growth Machine on LinkedIn!
Welcome to a journey into the heart of destination marketing with industry trailblazer Josh Collins. Discover the art of captivating travelers through owned media channels, the unsung heroes in the rise and ebb of platforms like TikTok. As we unpack the PESO model, you'll learn why a solid foundation in owned media isn't just a good practice; it's essential for the resilience and consistency of your brand's message. You won't want to miss our deep dive into how balancing presence on popular platforms with strategic investment in controlled channels can future-proof your destination's marketing efforts.
Email marketing may sound like a blast from the past, but prepare to be surprised. Josh Collins and I reminisce about campaign successes, offering actionable insights into nurturing your email list, avoiding the snares of co-registration lists, and the power of personalization. This chapter is all about leveraging timeless tools in innovative ways to foster growth, even when your budget doesn't stretch to the flashy new digital trends.
Finally, let's talk strategy and the future of travel. We'll show you how to tailor your destination's allure to varied audiences through technologies that bridge language barriers and enrich user experiences. With a peek at travel trends on the rise, like the growing appeal of multi-generational trips and the impact of personal referrals, you'll understand the importance of a growth mindset in this ever-evolving industry. Josh's insights, mixed with a dash of unconventional thinking, just might inspire your next groundbreaking marketing move. So, join us as we explore these exciting opportunities, and let's shape the future of travel together!
Connect with Josh and stay in the loop on his Organic Growth Machine on LinkedIn!
Well, hell, welcome back to Tech Travel and Twang. Well, hi there. Welcome back to Tech Travel and Twang. I'm Jen Barbie, ceo of Destination Innovate and your host today. We have a special guest with us today and we're going to talk about owning owned media in the Travel Space. Big welcome to Josh Collins.
Speaker 2:What's happening. Good to see you, Jen.
Speaker 1:Good to see you. Good to see you. I'm so excited to hear about what you're doing now and all that kind of good stuff. But for our listeners who don't know the illustrious Josh Ted Exalum, can you give us a nickel tour about Josh Collins?
Speaker 2:Sure gosh, a nickel tour. I have a problem of being long-winded sometimes because I like to use all the words. No, I've just been silly. But you know, yeah, I've been in the Travel Tourism industry for a long time, 10 plus years. Before that.
Speaker 2:My first career was in the entertainment industry, so I filled multiple passports, traveled in the world but had no clue that there was an actual travel industry. And so Visit Franklin came calling. That's just south of Nashville, Tennessee, Williamson County, and that's where I live and love where I live. And so they came calling and I was like, yes, let's go. And you know, I just started hustling, doing what I knew to do right, Building a brand, growing an audience, connecting with that audience and loved it, Fell in love with this industry. The people I've met along the way like yours truly, Jen, and you know, and just have loved it ever since had a couple years at an agency and then have recently had some experience at a leading a tech startup in a travel tech space and doing that and loving that. And so now I'm saddling up for the next adventure. That's what's happening.
Speaker 1:I love that. I love that it is always about the next adventure and it's so funny. You mentioned I think that's when we met, when you were at Franklin, that's right. Also, that's been a few years ago, we won't say how long because we don't want to age either. But I don't think I ever told you my husband graduated from Austin P, not too far from you. I did not know, I did not know that yes, so local that's fantastic, majored in fraternity, good guy.
Speaker 2:That's awesome. I love it. I love it.
Speaker 1:Awesome. Well, I do want to hear, like as you're embarking on the next chapter I know you and I have been able to chat a little bit back and forth and really this whole piece about owned media for destinations especially right now, like this week with the news about TikTok bands and state tourism offices already pulling some of that content Like, let's start with maybe you defining what you call owned media for destinations.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think it is such a great question and it's an important, just issue to be aware of. But I mean, for a tourism brand, for a destination brand, a place brand, your owned media is your bread and butter should be at least, I mean, it really should be your bread and butter. I personally have scribed to the Peso model and thinking about this. So that stands for paid, earned, shared and owned. And sometimes when we talk about owned media, we can think about it like organic too. What can I organically reach people through? So on and so forth.
Speaker 2:That can be sometimes less helpful, but at the same time, they can be synonymous, depending on who you're talking to or what agency you might be working with. But, yeah, owned media, it's important. When you think about your audience, you think about where they are right, what is the context or environment in which they are doing what they do, and you do the best you can to meet them in that context. Right, you go to them, you do the work to attract them in those spaces where they already are, which is why the TikTok conversation is so interesting, because there's a massive amount of people there and it is a huge right, huge opportunity to reach and connect with people, even though you don't own that audience. It's a shared platform. Social media as a category is a shared platform. So Facebook X, formerly Twitter, right Instagram, all of them, even LinkedIn that I love. That's where I spend most of my time personally, me too yeah.
Speaker 2:Right. But those are shared channels and so you rent or you are given the permission by those channel owners big tech right permission to use them. So that's an important way of thinking about it at least, and it's certainly important as we think about TikTok and what might or might not happen there.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. I want to come off that point about what might or might not happen, because we tend to, because we've had our cheese moved, whatever you want to say. So much in tourism, right, here's a new crisis, here's a weather thing, here's something else, and so when something you've taken time into starts to move, I think people start to panic. So I do think it's a mistake to pull out completely right now. Like you mentioned huge audience, 170 million Americans it may never happen. You know, depending on this, even if it goes through and the president signs it and all that, we know it may never happen. But I know right now people are thinking it might go. So there's a prime attention right now in it.
Speaker 1:So it would be a mistake to pull out too early and let that ride. In my opinion, but also, like you said, it is a shared and it's shared with any type of social media, but getting it still makes sense to spend a lot of time in that shared, because getting people to consume your website only or getting them to consume even your YouTube channel only is difficult, because travelers are going to go and consume media where they want to and that may not be your website. I think the latest stat. Even though I think, obviously and selfishly, destination websites are very important, the stat is only 15% of national travelers ever see a destination website. Yep.
Speaker 2:Well, fish where the fish are. But don't, you know, don't mistake the opportunity that you have by not only capturing but making more efficient the channels you do own right, that's important, I just think. I think most, if we also want to look at the majority of travel brands in the United States, at least North America especially, it's a very small percentage, it's less than 20%, I think that actually have paid media budgets that do anything at scale, right? So that leaves the majority of the industry with basically going what strategies do I execute, what tactics do I use here if I'm going to capture, you know, that traveler and convert them to a destination visitor? So you know, I completely and wholeheartedly subscribe to diversification.
Speaker 2:I think it's very, very important while also trying to understand at least I coach and give advice on, to you know, managing something that is, or building a strategy that is, sustainable and consistent. Right, because I know to your point, we'll say well, that means if the audience is everywhere, we're going to fit. Again, this is what happens sometimes, right, fish where the fish are. Steve Chandler I hear him in my head, right, Say that all the time too. I love the guy, but if that's what we do, then sometimes that will make us think that we need to be everywhere all the time, and that is a really bad job.
Speaker 1:I totally agree. It's diminishing results. You can't be everything to everyone, everywhere to everyone. It's diminishing results. It taxes your staff too thin. There's not a specific strategy, it's spray and pray. It's the same thing everywhere. So I agree, I mean, you know, yes, they're there, but maybe just go that little bit of data set deeper and you know, maybe one platform is more than the other. And if you think about, you know, the rise in podcasts which we're doing right now, but the rise in advertising on podcasts, that's, that's my ears. So how are they going to find you? It's easier to say find us on Pinterest and Instagram than it is to say find us on this and this and this and this and this you know hundreds, hundreds.
Speaker 2:I just think it's, you know, one of the things, areas of focus that I've kind of been developing throughout my career is what does it look like to develop vibrant communities? That is both healthy for the community, the audience, the audience and for the staff, the team. Because, to your point, what you just touched on right, there is a way things work. There are rhythms and seasons of life. We are finite human beings and we will exhaust ourselves, unintentionally, and then, therefore, that comes out in our marketing. I will tell you every single time, there is a congruence between healthy marketing, healthy cultures and healthy humans.
Speaker 1:Humans. I love that.
Speaker 2:I mean. So if you think about, I'm a brand marketer, I'm a destination marketer and I'm sitting here going, okay, well, I might be cash strapped, right, or I'm looking to the next fiscal cycle and I'm not going to see an increase in my paid media dollars, that's okay, that's absolutely okay. Like take a deep breath, it's okay. I mean email web retargeting efforts, like really basic, simple things. You can grow a massively vibrant connection with your audience. I'm telling you email is still.
Speaker 2:Don't sleep on email. Email is a powerful channel when somebody gives you permission right to opt in and lets you email them, lets you get straight into their inbox. Gosh, that is such a that is still, in my opinion, after all of these years, jen, when I built a machine at Visit Franklin. In fact, I am working on building something and launching a new product called the organic growth machine, and all of that is going to be about how do we take the tools which we have that are we're disposable, email, retargeting, right, Even the channels.
Speaker 2:There's some stuff in social that you can do there, too, to drive organic growth still, even still today, organic growth is possible through social. But in our website, the most important channel that we have apart from email how do we do that and grow Huge track record with Visit Franklin and everything else. So don't sleep on email, friends. If you're listening to this and you're wondering what you might do, there is a ton of opportunity ahead for both your website and your email in converting that inbound visitors, those eyeballs, new users. Seo Don't sleep on SEO. Here, too, I'm telling you there's so much opportunity still for the marketer that is cash strapped from a paid media strategy perspective.
Speaker 1:There is, and even if you aren't cash strapped, I think it's smart strategy to hit that first.
Speaker 1:And I love that you said email, because I agree that it's actually kind of more on the uptick now. One thing I will say about the email, even for small to medium to larger organizations, is one thing I noticed when I work with a lot of destinations is they sleep on the hygiene part of it. So you want to clean up your email, especially if you're doing co-reg lists Like I'm not a fan of those, but I know a lot of smaller DMOs get like co-registration from their state and to me, if you're dealing with a co-registration, you still have to earn the right right for that end user. So you still need to, you know, attract them, opt them in, and then you've got somebody that you know you can market to. But I completely agree on email and it's kind of fallen. It's not the new shiny right, it's not the new sexy thing, so people kind of sleep on it. But that is definitely, I think, for for destination marketers, a core thing to revive and relook at.
Speaker 2:So I, you know, obviously it's. It's really easy, it's human nature. Let's give ourselves a break, let's be kind to ourselves. It's really easy to be attracted to the new bright, shiny object. Right, yeah, we should be looking at it, we should be curious about it, we should investigate it and then we should apply some wisdom and discernment to go, okay, does this fit in our marketing mix? Does it fit into our strategy? Do we have bandwidth? Does it help us accomplish our objectives and the outcomes that we're trying to move? You know which we're trying to get to right. So all of that makes sense.
Speaker 2:But, right, I think, and I've always held belief, that you add to the mix when you have built a really sustaining engine or machine underneath, right at foundation. If you've got that flywheel moving, you're what. You're generating traffic to your website. You're not having to pay or buy that traffic, but you've got some brand awareness in certain markets and they might be the market you want to. You're trying to grow an audience and or the new audience, or hit the next audience one. Okay, then let's, let's attract that traffic, let's get them converting. Let's be sure to be using our own properties, like landing pages. That's not sleep on landing pages because, yes, websites maybe only capturing 15% of total traffic around a destination, but landing page is a great strategy to capture inbound traffic right.
Speaker 1:I am so glad you said that. Like that's something that feels foreign to a lot of people. Still about it, like you want to hear there the other, like be brief, be bright, be gone, get into the landing page, get their permission, let him out the door and then email.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and, and I'm still, I tell you, I remember you know this was the early days I say early days for me when I was MC and the tourism summit conference all those years in San Francisco and we would be doing great case studies and a lot of stuff happening with email then and I was still just then, as I am now, shocked that more people do not Do automated marketing campaigns through email, right, nurturing their audience, nurturing these connections. It's just, it's still really surprising that how many of their spray and play I'm gonna do my newsletter, I do my newsletter, and they that lack of hygiene you mentioned earlier to it's like, yeah, look, how good I'm doing. I got a hundred and thousand fifty names on my list or whatever it is. And I'm like, yeah, but how many are opening? I mean, what's, what's your engagement there? And one if you're an organization with with a tight budget and you're paying to you, right, you're paying for that list size and they're not benefiting you, let's rethink that a little bit.
Speaker 1:I like the marketing automation and also, especially if you have a tight budget, using all that piece of it. Like you know, if you're open rates, not great, why aren't you a B testing your subject lines, like there's so much you can do, but it takes Thought and it takes a lot more time into it and the setup is is significant and marketing automation can be super complex or it could be super simple, but also the personalization of those emails. Like you know, I'm a mom of four. I don't really care about your after dark. You know night spot. So if I set it for newsletter I'm gonna hit my preferences or my interest levels and I'd love to see a curated piece of that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean, it's one of the things in the organic growth machine that we cover is how, what are the simplest steps to start To begin a journey of automation, a journey of personalization? And you know my aim to, because my heart is for small destinations, rural destinations, that's just, that's my beating heart for destinations like a Franklin Tennessee with the main street, for example, right, that just. I just love those environments and culture so much so I just have. I know what it's like to be the one person shop. I know what it's like to feel totally overwhelmed by all the tasks, all the things all the time, and you're just going, I'm picking and choosing.
Speaker 2:So Doing, you know doing the job as a destination marketer in a certain way. That's been, that's hard fought for me. I've had to learn and through trial and experimentation over and over and over again, and it's okay to test and a be and find that one doesn't work. That's okay, keep doing it like that's a good, healthy way to think about marketing as A series of continuous experimentation. Continuous improvement is just necessary as you're wanting to connect with your audience and grow that audience. Because why I? At the end of the day, why are we doing that was because we want to drive foot traffic for our small businesses to increase the quality of life, that positive economic impact, right? What an incredible, fun mission to get to belong to, right, to get to be a part of, for a place Our neighbors can even like thrive. Their small businesses can thrive where people can love, where they live. I don't. There's few things I've again, I mentioned I've had a couple of different careers. There's few things I have found as rewarding as doing this kind of work for destinations.
Speaker 1:I so agree with you, josh. So you know, I've had a couple of my adult daughters actually work with us before and they're like you know, advertising in the kind of the Gen Z thought of it is like advertising is bad. You know, we're not doing. I was like no, no, hold on. We're doing truck tourism marketing. If you think about it, we're getting down to that mom and pop, we're getting down to that little cupcake shop that if we weren't doing our job up here, they may not be able to send their child to college or what we do up here keeps their business alive.
Speaker 1:Like that is real to me, like I don't think about. I love my destinations, but I think so far past that. I'm thinking about that one lady, that starting something up, that one guy that's you know, moving the needle and creating those authentic experiences for you know, for that piece of it so. But you're right about experimenting. Like people are scared to fail. If you're not failing, you are not growing. Fail fast, go quick, then move on to the next thing.
Speaker 2:Yeah, the fail fast thing has been a particular area of interest for my, for me personally, because you know, I don't know this is might be a minority take, but I don't know that fail fast means what it needs to mean when we use that like I agree with the concept. If, by saying the concept, it means fail fast and learn from what failed, right, absolutely, it's that last piece.
Speaker 2:I feel like that sometimes we struggle with we because it requires time, right and so yeah, I mean, if we're, if you're gonna experiment, that's great, but part of the experimentation cycle is going well. Let's evaluate Right. Let's evaluate our experiment. You can tell I'm a fan of alliteration, but you know. So we have to think about if we're gonna fail fast. Let's make sure we are learning from our failings in incorporating those learnings in the next experiment.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'm glad you added put a Jenga on it, as I call it on that, because you know the fail fast piece of it. I found especially like when social media was just coming about and paid social media was just coming about, they would say, well, we put a post, you need to talk to an older, older school CEO, and like, we tried Facebook. It doesn't work, so we're not going to do anything in Facebook. Are you kidding? It's like oh right.
Speaker 1:Can't just throw the baby out with the bathwater Like what? Why didn't it work? What was your context? What did you try? Like, you're right, fail fast and learn quicker through it so you can be that piece of it. But that to me and this was, you know, several years ago, at the peak, even before they got Instagram that to me was like crazy. So he's like I don't want to do it because you know this, that and the other, and political whatever. And I was like if it's influential enough to move that, it's an influential enough to move the travelers in your business. You just have to think about how you use that tool.
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 1:You've got a hammer, everything looks like a nail, but you know you can build a house or you can. I mean, there's just so many different nuances to it. So I love that you're out there with these destinations, with these rule destinations, coaching them to what's possible so they don't get overwhelmed. Because I think one of the one of the missteps of my, my fellow people that put out conferences which I love is is there's not a lot of practical knowledge out there for the smaller guy to apply like that, and they need that extra piece of coaching and strategy.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean, I listen, I understand, I really do. I have so much empathy for the underlying currents that have brought us to where we are right, like I get it. I have I've got a pretty big entrepreneurial background and I started a lot of things and and I have failed from a lot of things too. Let's be honest and learn from those things too. But so I understand the business model for these conferences and these things and why we need what we need and how to make them work so they can be profitable. I mean, I understand the economics here and I think, sadly, one of the unintended consequences is is it ends up becoming a place where we just ever so slightly missed the mark. It's a little bit of what's called mission drift. Right, if we end up becoming, or we have, a mission of let's educate the industry, which I love and I'm 100% all about Well, let's ensure that we're actually intentionally designing the context of the room and the content to accomplish that mission right, including types of sessions, who's on the panels and so on and so forth.
Speaker 2:I know, in my conversations with a lot of smaller destinations, just one of the common things I hear is they don't. They don't have the budget sometimes to get in the room. So, right, I mean, that's a real thing and they want to get out there more, they want to understand, they want to learn from their peers and I'm like, well gosh, I just wish I could. I wish I could get them there right. So there's a huge opportunity right there, I do. Maybe a destination can sponsor another destination. If we're about learning, growth and development, then maybe there's a program like that we could spin up or create about or think about, think about doing something like that, so we make sure that we get the right people in the room to continue to learn from each other.
Speaker 1:That's a really good point. That's one of the reasons we created Destacon, which was our second annual in January this year, but not just for the small destinations, for their stakeholders Like that. That property manager in the short-term rail can't begin to think about affording some of those conferences. So we, you know, we created an environment, a gamified online environment, where we can bring the top minds all over the nation, right down to that restaurant owner.
Speaker 2:I love that. I think there have been a few that have shared interest in that and have attempted to think about it, and I just encourage continued thought. You know, certainly I think it's. It would be a great idea to figure out how to ensure that these rural destinations, smaller destinations that are really the lifeblood of the majority. Again, if you think about percentages law of large numbers, that's the majority of what visitors experience when they go on vacation. I mean, there's plenty of major destinations, top 10, top 15, top 25 cities in America. Those are awesome, they're great. I love them, my kids love them. And then there's all the other places, right, and if we really do believe travel is a force for good, let's cooperate with that good, let's help that good grow right. I just love the mission behind it all and I love how you do it with what you've built there too, and I'm you know, we're so similar in our approach and, I think, especially with our heart and mission and passion. So, yeah, it's great.
Speaker 1:Well, I like what you say about the law of numbers on the rural destinations versus, like your, your main known destinations, because obviously there's a big push to bring down, bring back international travel in the US and when you know, when that happens and as that develops, they may go to San Francisco as their hub, but then they're going to stay longer, go further, so they're going to experience a lot of that rule piece of it. And I'm I'm curious, I'm getting to a point I promise I'm curious how you feel about, from an own media perspective, how we, how we address different cultures. You know, should that be Google translate? Should that be culturally translated? Should there be different variations? I'd really love to hear your thoughts on addressing a multicultural audience.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's a really I'm glad you're asking that. So I think about. I tend, personally, before I get to solutions, I really start to think about problems first. I want to make sure that we have clarity and alignment on the problem space before we immediately start going to solutions, right? So when I work with a destination, for example, I'm thinking of Bubba in Mississippi, right Home, of the Blues down there, and I'm like he gets a ton of international travel. He gets a ton of international travel, and I'm like they share a love for blues music, and there's all kinds of examples, right? There's just one that comes to the top of my mind.
Speaker 2:What I want to do is really understand as much as I can about the needs, both felt needs, existential needs, and everything of that audience. Are they, you know? Is their device defaulted to a certain language, right? Well, there's technology we can employ to use that to help us, right? Auto-translate technology is on the market. So there's lots of things that we can do in the solution side, but we really want to start by understanding the problem, because it's in many cases. What is also happening, though, is international visitors come here not just to be themselves in another place, but they come because they want to experience the culture. So an assumption that we would need to even translate in the first place, right, can be a missed assumption if we don't test that assumption first right. So those become just real important pieces of the puzzle.
Speaker 2:But you know, personalization is just key wherever possible. This is one of the reasons why, in my background, why I love Bound360, for example, as a tool. It's a great integration tool with any website. It's a free plug from them. They're not paying me to do this, but I've used them and I love them. There are many others out there. But when you think about meeting your audience where they are, it's also understanding where they've come from. For example, right, we're talking about meeting them on Facebook or TikTok or something like that. But personalization, whether it's on your website or through email, it's just really, really key. The numbers speak for themselves. If you're curious, look up personalization statistics on Google. You will see incredible gains. I remember a visit. Frankly, we were experiencing gains north of 100% conversion rates when we would one acknowledge where they were coming from, give them a special image that matched where they were coming from and led them down a path that just simply, it gave that felt experience of oh, I'm being welcomed, I'm truly being welcomed in this.
Speaker 1:That's very forward thinking for that time period. By the way, I've got one right back at that Miami's thing going big right now on breaking up a spring break, we worked with Panama City Beach this is 2009. Their issue also was obviously their spring break destination. But instead of going I think it's a brilliant route that Miami went we won their website contract. So instead of that, we did a personalization what's your fun sign? We did that to encourage the families and bring a different, personalized experience there. It didn't necessarily take away, but it volumed up the family spring break versus the other. That personalization of, I think the family group was called the Sandy Bottom Bunch and they got their own newsletter to what to do with the fam and all that.
Speaker 1:So personalization I've been a big fan of since then. Open source it was fully open source code.
Speaker 2:That's so cool. So when we think about to me at least translation personalization, they gravitate in similar lanes, at least from a mental model perspective. So I'm going to understand as much as I can about that audience and certainly intentionally design or in my language, like I talk about you'll look at my LinkedIn I use experience architecture. I want to intentionally architect an experience for that visitor, for that consumer, in a way that ultimately makes them I mean, here's the end goal for me. It makes them going to say you've got to check out what I just found Right, like friends and family referrals, still the most popular thing you can do. So if you're thinking about owned media or owned channels, that's your goal, because you may not convert them on the first time, but what you want to do is give them an experience that's so personal, so authentic, so in alignment with who they are, that they feel like they get me.
Speaker 2:I've been found Me too. They say a me too, they say a version of me too, and then it's like not much more empowered to tell their friend or neighbor or girlfriend or spouse or partner or whatever. And it's like we got to go check out Bubba in Clarksdale because, oh, my goodness gracious. Look at this. This is going to be so much fun. Friends and family is what you're looking to activate through really, really well executed owned media strategies.
Speaker 1:For sure, and especially with what is it? 10 years from now we'll have more 65 plus year olds than ever before in the history. So multi-generation travel so friends and family comes really big that's going to be. I mean, it already is a rise, but I see even a bigger rise in that piece of it as well 100%, 100%.
Speaker 2:There's so much opportunity. I'm a firm believer in a growth mindset, having a growth mindset, and I've gotten in front of my. We're recording this on Zoom right, so we can see each other. But right in front, underneath my camera, I have a sign on my desk. It says the best is yet to come. I just believe that with every fiber of my being right. So a lot on the horizon, a lot of change, right, we don't know what's going to happen with TikTok Maybe around, maybe not, we'll see but I still believe the best is yet to come and it's a tremendous opportunity for a destination marketer today, in 2024.
Speaker 1:I totally agree. I totally agree. Such great nuggets there. But I will say just what would you be your three top takeaways for our listeners If they're looking at? The rest of 24, maybe even to 25,. What are the three things they need to remember for owned media?
Speaker 2:This is what I would do. If you are still capturing a form that is more than three fields, time to change right On your website. Really, all you need, really all you need, is email. That's it, one field. That's really all you need. Yes, I know, I can hear the person saying but I'm not.
Speaker 2:I have zip code. I zip code and I need the name and the address and I need them to check the box on if they've got a digital visitor guide or no. No, I'm telling you there's a better strategy, right? So go to one field, okay, that might be too much. Okay. First name and email. No more than that, though, please, right. So go through some immediate shifts right now and you will see an increase in your conversion weights, conversion rates on your website, I promise you. Okay, then do this Immediately send them a thank you Immediately.
Speaker 2:Right, go into your email marketing tool of choice, your CRM tool of choice, whichever email delivery or ESP that you have out there email server provider, mailchimp, icontact, whatever it is right. So send them dozens and dozens of them and build a simple automation that says upon sign up, send a thank you. No more than that. Don't send them a page and a half long of what you can do this, this, this, and then this, this, and then no, no, no, no, that's great, just a simple thank you. That's it, right Now.
Speaker 2:To the next day, then say, hey, take a look at this and give them your best maybe list to call top five things to do on your first time visit, or something like that. Right, no more than that. Those are a couple of really, really easy tips right there, okay, and then from there, the next thing you do is just watch it. Watch it and observe, start modifying. It doesn't have to be any harder than that. Those are three things I would suggest every destination marketer doing this year, and then continuing to build from there, and I'd love to help you build from there too, but that's exactly where I would start. Simplify your form on your website, send an automated thank you and send an automated follow up with your best, best performing blog. Post something along the lines of top five things to do on your first visit, or something like that.
Speaker 1:Amen, that's the gospel according to Josh. But I'm gonna ask you a bonus question because it just occurred to me. We talk about owned media. This is maybe not owned media, but owned spaces. Yeah, like, what's going on and what's the future of the visitor center and how can people make that more? Not necessarily engaging, I'm not talking about like big screens and adding a bunch of tech in there. Like what do you see is the core role of how visitor center can think about that in their own spaces?
Speaker 2:That is, and we might need a whole another episode on that. That's a big one. Hmm, that's a good question, jen. We're talking about emails.
Speaker 1:I think that's a great opportunity to either short kiosk or whatever to grab those. So that's what may be.
Speaker 2:I mean, I think part of my lens, my brain, the way it works is. I immediately go to kind of that design thinking, experiential architecture, design, and I'm going. These spaces, they really have one job and it's about connection, human connection, and so I think that there's all kinds of opportunity, obviously, for retail featuring different things that make you unique and distinct as a place service at its core, hospitality at its core. But I'm also looking at very similar to what you mentioned this earlier. This might sound like it's coming out of left field, jen, but here's what one of the things I find that's fascinating as a visitor center is a lot of places that I work with and they get to visit with have a community of people that have dreams, ideas, things they wanna launch and so on and so forth. Right, and they may or may not have open storefronts and even if they do have open storefronts, the barrier to entry sometimes can be really high.
Speaker 2:One of the things I think that's interesting with the demographics and some of the stuff that's happening in the workplace is it'd be a great opportunity for a visitor center to feature some kind of pop up entrepreneurial kind of incubator for their destination, to do product development, specifically for product development. If I'm a destination and I'm like I want that special one-off, you can only get it here. Why not foster that? You have a space that you have that, let's be honest, usually is just filled space, usually not purposefully filled space, right. So why not take advantage of that, partner with, like, the entrepreneurial center in your community or something like that, and feature residencies to one month, two month residencies of you know new coffee shop, new business that's wanting to get planted and launched or whatever, and then all of a sudden you've become a part of that story when it's successful. I mean, there's so many things there that might sound like it's coming out of left field a little bit.
Speaker 2:But, I think about the space that a visitor center can create and how they can foster human connection, hospitality and all that kind of stuff. It's a win-win-win.
Speaker 1:I love that. You must have like teed me up perfectly for the circle back around, because you know that's something I think about with the TikTok piece of it. There's seven million small businesses on TikTok and many of those do not have storefronts. I know our destinations are normally like you don't have a physical location. We're not marketing you. I think that's a misjudgment and it comes back to what you said, because those makers also are your long tail, like ambassadors for the destination. Like you know, I got this. Like you know, the visitor center, I got this. You know very specific type of candle or type of experience yeah, chocolate maker, caramel maker, bakers, cookie.
Speaker 2:I mean, there's so many home-based businesses in our destinations that if we were to look for them on social media, they become our next massive influencers. I'm telling you it's a win-win-win. It might take a little unconventional thinking right, but unconventional thinking is gonna oftentimes lead us to the greatest you know, stuff that we didn't know otherwise. I mean, gosh, think about the history of innovation as a whole. That's where penicillin came from. I mean so it's just to me. I think about it's an opportunity of disguise and I can't wait to hear. Somebody's gonna listen to this, jen, they're gonna hear that and they're gonna go oh, that's a great idea. And I can't wait to hear that story because I can't wait to share it and celebrate it on social media with them.
Speaker 1:Absolutely, absolutely. Josh. Thank you so much for sharing your thoughts and your brain and you can't wait to watch what happens on the next path. Really excited to have you with us today.
Speaker 2:Thanks for having me it's what a gift and thanks for sharing your stage with me today. Can't wait For those that are interested. I'd love, if you're interested in the organic growth machine, I'd love for you to hit me up, Find me on LinkedIn, message me. I'd love to pilot that with you as we get ready to come to market.
Speaker 1:Awesome. Thanks so much, josh.
Speaker 2:All right, see ya Gotta get up현.