Social Mediarology

Technology doesn’t come naturally to me, but I realize that the Internet offers one of the most effective, most targeted and most cost-efficient ways to reach visitors. For about six months, I’ve been buying keywords through Google Adwords for the Columbus Visitors Center.

Google Adwords is an online advertising product that allows you to identify keywords that visitors might be using to find your products when they search on Google.  When a user “googles” your keyword, your short text ad appears on the page with search results. Users can click through to your website.  At this point, your account is charged.

The click-thru rate depends on the popularity of the keyword.  I find that I am paying an average of 0.84 per click.  You can put limits on how much you are willing to spend.  For just a few hundred dollars a month, our ads are getting tens of thousands of impressions.

You can also refine your campaign to a geographic area to keep a more regional focus. I have focused on the Midwest where most of our traffic originates.

I am currently running two campaigns on Google Adwords.  In the first campaign, I have purchased words that are related to modern architecture. Architecture is a niche market so I was excited about the possibilities of reaching out to fans of modern architecture using the internet.  I selected the names of the architects who have buildings in Columbus.  I also picked some generic terms like “modern architecture” and “mid-century modern.”

In the second campaign, I have purchased terms that someone looking for Edinburgh Premium Outlets might use.  The outlet mall is one of our biggest attractions.  Since it’s on the outer edge of our county, many visitors don’t know about all the great things they can do when they are in the community. My campaign featuring Edinburgh Premium Outlets has outperformed my starter campaign.  Here I selected “discount shopping,”  “outlet shopping,” and “Edinburgh.”

There is no limit on the number of keywords you select.  You can always delete and ad words as you wish to make changes.

I have a few tips for folks who want to give this program a try.

1. Think like a visitor. Pretend you know nothing about your destination.  I decided that most visitors probably can’t spell Edinburgh.  Why would it end in an “h”?  So, I signed up for keywords that include “Edinburg.”  Four of my top five best-performing keywords have a variation of Edinburgh that is incorrectly spelled.
2. Fish where the fish are. Remember the competition.  We offer a popular architecture tour.  So, does the Chicago Architecture Foundation.  I added ”Chicago Architecture Foundation” as one of my keywords.
3. Edit, edit, edit. Your ad can only be two lines long with a short headline and your URL. Say what you need to say with small number of potent words.  This requires tremendous discipline and creativity.
4. Be flexible. You can change your ad or your keywords as often as you wish, unlike those print ads that have a long shelf life.   So, mix it up.  Test different messages.  Find out what works.  If you set it and forget it, you’ll be missing out on one of the great advantages Google Adwords offers.

Digg, SumbleUpon, del.icio.us, ma.gnolia, reddit, addthis…What in the world are these websites? You may have heard of one or several of these recently, or you may have no idea what they are. Have no fear, the Tourism Tech Corner is here to help you out.

These are all social bookmarking sites. Have you ever come across a website or an article that you really enjoyed, and wanted to share it with a friend? If you’re like many people, you probably copy and paste the website address into an email and shoot it out to the friends who you think might enjoy the article. This works just fine if you have a small group of friends to share that link with. What happens if you wanted to share that article with more than just that small group of friends? That’s where social bookmarking comes in.

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I found a great article on how to get the most out of Flickr. Enjoy!

Flickr is a popular online photo-sharing community that allows anyone to share and organize their digital photos with friends, family, colleagues, and the rest of the world. While many people use Flickr recreationally, it can also be a powerful tool for organizations, including nonprofits.

There are many ways that Flickr can help nonprofits share photos online and accomplish their goals. For example:

• An international organization sends volunteer doctors to developing countries around the world to perform medical services. The physicians document the impact of their work through photos that they upload to the organization’s private Flickr group. Not only does Flickr help the volunteers exchange photos and information, it also creates an image bank from which the organization can select photos for its Web site and blog.
• An environmental organization that supports organic farmers had literally thousands of amazing photographs documenting the development of organic farming techniques over the last decade. Before using Flickr, no one had organized or categorized the photos, which were scattered on various hard drives in the office and on volunteers’ computers. The organization uploaded the photos to Flickr and were able to enlist the help of volunteers and members to document the techniques.
• A museum was mounting a special collaborative exhibition with institutions located in five cities around the world. As the group prepared the installation, they used Flickr to share photos with one another, allowing them to see what a “textured plaster” wall finish looked like before approving the contracting work; get a visual reference of the exhibition space when selecting picture frames; and see work completed to date. Flickr provided a way for the collaborators to easily upload and share photos publicly and privately.
• An executive director wanted to use photos to make her points during a presentation, but disliked clip art and lacked the budget for stock photography. Using Flickr’s Creative Commons licensing search feature, she was to find appropriate photos that she could use for free with attribution.
• Volunteers and talented photographers for an animal shelter had taken beautiful photos of some the dogs and cats at their facility. The organization wanted to create special cards featuring the pets that they could use as thank-you notes. Uploading the photos into Flickr, they were able to order cards and other items.

Flickr is a fun, creative, and very useful way to share your organization’s photos and images with other people, whether privately or publicly. It offers an amazing online community, and it is also fairly easy to use. Many nonprofits are discovering that Flickr can be an important part of the organizational communications strategy. Below, we’ll show you what Flickr is, and how your nonprofit can best use it to share photos and connect with others.

How Nonprofits Can Get the Most out of Flickr – Beth Kanter – TechSoup.org

While this article specifically mentions the use of Flickr for nonprofit organizations, these same principals can easily be used by any organization, attraction, or hotel. Click here for the full article