September 2009 Archives

I'm sympathetic to Travel Rants' complaint about innovation in travel. But it left me wondering whether the way we approach 'innovation' needs an overhaul itself. (I'm not singling Darren out here, I'm just as guilty.)

For obvious reasons, the last 10 years or so have led us to associate innovation with technology and online media.

The connection is very frequently justified, and quite frequently excites me. But perversely, it also leaves our thinking about innovation ploughing similar furrows.

Ask someone to pinpoint an innovation and they'll instinctively look for a mobile app or a website - usually one of many inspiration sites offering (often clever) thematic varaitions on the same essential model.

It's as if we're stuck in one category. An operator could come out with a genuinely fresh way to tour the Atlas mountains, and we'd ignore it because the 'tours of Morocco' category isn't a candadiate for innovation.

Likewise, innovation in marketing is now virtually synonymous with social media. Again, that isn't necessarily wrong, but it can blind us to (potential) innovation in less sexy forms.

Personally I'm still waiting for travel's Innocent. The all-conquering smoothie people admittedly found a good gap in the market, but they also talked to consumers in a fresh way - humorous, knowing, friendly and without vanity, but still consistent and instantly recognisable.

The case study on the Design Council site is a good backgrounder.

I'd argue it was very innovative stuff. Most brands don't talk like that (though more do post-Innocent) and anyone with a week of marketing work experience will tell you it's brutally hard to get right.

Moreover, tone of voice is pivotal - by it all of our social media experiments will live or die. As the British prime minister will tell you, a likeable politician on boring old BBC1 is better than an awkward one on Youtube.

(Oh, and a good answer to the consumer protection mess would be pretty innovative too. Just a thought...)

A new survey 'shows distrust of travel agents', reports Travelmole, but a deeper reading provokes some suspicion.

...over 25% of consumers who booked a holiday through a travel agent felt their trip didn't accurately reflect the description in the brochure

The creators of the survey go on to talk about review sites, saying

Now holidaymakers ... can read honest, unbiased opinions from travellers who've recently visited the hotel

Which is all true, but how specific is it to agents? I'm not about slavishly defending Travel Weekly's readership, but try asking the same question of holidaymakers who booked direct.

So while I don't dispute the 25% figure, and don't suggest that agents shouldn't take it on board, there is no meaningful comparison with other channels here.

Indeed, the issue seems to be with product description versus reality, and that affects all of consumer marketing, from direct-sell operators' websites to Big Mac adverts.

Buzz about 'real' (i.e. no funny cardboard glasses) 3D displays has been ticking away in the consumer electronics industry for a good few years - Wired wrote about it back in 2006 - but we're about to see it adopted by a travel advertiser, namely Dubai.

The destination will be running 3D films, featuring dune-surfing and 'a couple enjoying a view from a balcony', at London's St Pancras station from September 15-28.

Below is a promotional video about the Philips 3DTV technology behind it. Bear in mind that you won't see the 3D effect, because your screen doesn't feature whatever a 'lenticular lens' is.

Problems? Well, as you can see above, the 'wow' factor completely disappears when you aren't watching first-hand. So no amazing pics and videos to get the social networks buzzing.

The other question is the power of the creative. The crash-bang-pow of an action film trailer in 3D would certainly stop St Pancrites in their tracks. Will dune-surfing?

(I also asked Dubai why they chose St Pancras, but will leave it as a footnote because they're the reasons you'd expect: footfall, space, and a good mix of leisure/biz travellers.)

David Whitley started a good natter on his blog and Twitter after losing patience with loose definitions of 'budget hotel' in the media.

Why does it happen? Lazy writers, subs and editors are in the picture, but we also have to factor in the readership a mag/paper/site is targeting - as Jeremy Head pointed out in a comment.

For the Sunday Times, from which David selects an example, that audience is affluent.

The Times media site says:

The Sunday Times has a higher number and concentration of ABC1 (88%) and AB (62%) readers than any other Sunday newspaper

The readers the ST wants to attract, and which its advertisers want to reach, have a different angle on 'budget'.

Likewise, a real budget traveller is going to go straight to a hostelbookers search and ignore the Sunday Times outright.

So far so good, but we're still in Printland. Our feature is only being read by Sunday Times buyers, who, having handed over their £2, presumably know what to expect.

But glossy print products no longer exist in cosy isolation - they port their content to the web. Now our feature is available out of context to a virtually limitless audience, which makes  promising 'budget' far more problematic.

So what are the options?

1. Tailor article content to a wider audience

I.e.: Select some different hotels for the web version of your feature.
Drawback: High-spending advertisers may perceive you to be moving downmarket, and take their online spend elsewhere.

2. Carry on as you are

I.e.: Just keep porting, and be glad of the search traffic coming in from 'budget hotel' searches.
Drawback: New readers coming in from search won't stick around; you risk bad PR as people mock you on blogs and forums.

3. Use anti-SEO

I.e.: Keep the feature as it is for print, but cut back on misleading (and high search volume) words like 'budget' for the online version.
Drawback: Requires honesty. And you won't get the short-lived traffic fix you'd get from carrying on as normal.

It's a little flowery for modern tastes, I expect, but on the train this morning I came across this passage in Freya Stark's 1936 travelogue The Southern Gates of Arabia:

How few of us in Europe know silence in the night: even if we sleep alone in Alpine pastures we are comforted by the sound of running streams. But here, between one village and the next, there is nothing except the wind when it blows.

('Here' is just inland of Al Mukalla on the south coast of Yemen.)

It made me think of meeting a radio journalist on a recent trip to Norway. I was fascinated to watch him work with background noise - either recording it to edit in later, or making sure just the right amount (and the right kind) was audible during interviews.

Ambient sound is a huge part of the actual travel experience - wandering around with headphones on was one of my Seven Deadly Sins of Tourism - but, for obvious reasons, it's underworked at inspiration stage.

The exception is radio, where focus on sound is part of the medium's contract with its audience.

Resolution #2,691: With this in mind, I've resolved to check out some travel podcasts. If you know of some good ones, comment me; if not, stay tuned and I'll post some recommendations.

Just reviewing some copy that talks about 'lumber support' on an airline seat.

Here's an aide-memoire...

LUMBAR

(Public-domain pic from Wikimedia Commons.)

LUMBER

Simples.