Blogging: Going places, getting followed, money spinner
Visiting bloggers at a National Park.
Blogging has become a hit among readers who follow the growing number of travel writers touring the world and selling their story on their blog sites that has now become a lucrative venture. This new vocation saw youngsters and keen adults gather in Colombo for the second Travel Bloggers Conference Asia hosted by Cinnamon Hotels and Resorts on Tuesday to seek information about the industry and share knowledge on how to become a blogger. Talking about digital storytelling National Geographic Travel Senior Producer Sarah Polger told the gathering of bloggers and local industry participants during the opening session that this would mean that people would be sharing their real experiences through digital technology like multimedia innovations and coming up with original digital assignments.
Like the American bike project posted on the website the digital story would be how the biker takes to the road and captures images to tell the story of travelling around through the social media. Another method would be to plan a strategy for the creation of an idea that could be promoted that could effectively be picked up by the viewers, Ms. Polger said. Being part of the Your Shot Community helps bloggers to get their messages across where a huge travel community is already found within this forum Moreover, from then picture to motion pictures the bloggers were asked to move into the next form of storytelling through digital content by using videos that could be taken up on the Facebook accounts where users could “go live” and experiment more. The latest way to post videos would be through snapchat where it has become a popular place to find new videos and chat with others, Ms. Polger noted.
Laurence Norah and Liz Carlson Pix by Athula Devapriya
Influencing Digitally
Digital influencers can help take businesses to the next level by getting the assistance of bloggers who could be used to promote products and services including destinations by writing about it to their large number of followers. In this context snapchat is the big thing now, travel blogger Laurence Norah and Liz Carlson said in their presentation on “Walking with Digital Influencers to take your business to the Next Level.”
Businesses can get bloggers that would have a significant online presence who can influence through the digital content posted on their sites that have a large following to sell a company brand.
The reason why a digital influencer is important was because they were more authentic and would give their honest opinion and create content across multiple mediums with a potentially incredible reach and is cost effective. Bloggers influence followers through their posts that are considered genuine as they display an authentic experience and give out information and in this respect, businesses could trust them but first the industry needs to work out the manner in which they plan their agreement with the blogger correctly.
Going audio
A one minute sound bite in a 20 minute podcast could give travellers the opportunity to not read but simply listen to their host talking about places they have travelled to or even hear out the people from the destinations give out their views on what to look for in a particular area, travel podcast Producer and Travel Journalist of Audiotravels Henry Barchet highlighted at the conference. Audio has a market where it has been found that about 21 per cent of Americans had listened to a podcast last month alone, he said. Podcasts need to have an emotional address with a reasonable access for which mobile accessibility is required that would allow people to listen while they surf that given an additional value to the website, Mr. Barchet said.
Sarah Polger – Senior Digital Producer, NatGeo Traveller
Video Blogging
On the other hand video blogging would be something that a person would need to find in a niche segment by communicating what you need to the audience out there, Steve Hanisch, who hosts blogs as a backpacker, said at the conference. In posting videos, he too explained how snapchat would be a platform to find some raw content with unedited videos online adding that today the video explosion has been taken over by storm with Facebook live increasingly in competition with Google. Music, audio content and a sound microphone could help in giving good sound content to the videos that would become more appealing to followers, it was pointed out.
Making a living blogging
Blogging has helped many travel writers to go around the world posting their digital content that has gained them many followers in a number of different aspects of blog sites. Today it has become a lucrative venture, whereby the travel writers get paid by large corporations and multinationals to write about their product or sell a destination through stays at their hotels by featuring these brands on their blog posts.
This brings in the money for which a large and growing number of bloggers today are earning a decent living enough to pay off their mortgages and bills until they make it to the next trip, bloggers speaking at the event said.
Earning money with YouTube depends on how much is negotiated when working with brands and destinations, Mr. Hanisch said explaining that however, it would be difficult in the first year until one gets sufficiently recognized. Mr. Barchet explained that he started out with getting paid from Queensland Tourism to promoting them through his podcasts. Most bloggers seek out work by advertising themselves at trade fairs by meeting the travel and tourism industry like the World Travel Mart (WTM) in London or the ITB travel fair in Germany.
Issues in selling destination Sri Lanka
Environment Science Prof. Sarath Kotagama addressing a panel discussion highlighted the importance of sustainable tourism and how the national parks need to be conserved demarcated specifically for animals. The first sanctuary he believes was found in Sri Lanka when King Devanampiyatissa designated a certain area for animals and national parks today have stood the test of time since the 1900s. Cinnamon Hotels and Resorts Nature Trails Head Chitral Jayatilake addressing the discussion said that Sri Lankan authorities have taken several measures to restore Yala to its original pristine glory as there were previously traffic jams at the park to view leopards.
Sri Lanka, he noted has been marketing the destination from time to time on its wildlife from the elephant gathering at Minneriya, to viewing the blue whales off Mirissa and later the Sperm whales in addition to bird watching. But in this regard, he pointed out certain bad practices were adopted by the guides to ensure their clients would be able to see these birds by attracting the bird through bird calls. Mr. Jayatilaka explained this could be a disturbance to the birds looking for mates adding that they were currently working with the authorities to bring about new legal and regulatory measures that could be strengthened.
Blogging, travelling and kids
During the final round of the panel discussion certain key factors that came up were how the bloggers market could be taken advantage of by the travel and tourism industry to advertise their product and display the destination. It was noted that these bloggers who have earned a reputation that could be evident through the growing number of followers could be a reason to link up with them to market a brand or destination as they have been able to build trust and word about the product is sent out through a third party. The Chinese market is considered the new stop compared to the more mature Japanese market with most next generation and FIT travelers onboard touring the world, which currently also has a growing presence in Sri Lanka.
Some bloggers speaking during the discussion raised awareness on how to travel with kids that will not leave them away from family and at least two of them present at the conference, highlighted that this was an enriching experience as it was fascinating to write about their travel through the eyes of their children. Sustainability has become a major part of the articles that National Geographic has been posting and it was also noted that this is being communicated through their writers. In this respect, the sustainable tourism aspect was covered since the bloggers would be able to address these issues and influence their readers to be more responsible in their travels and were generally creating awareness on the subject on their blog posts.