The Travel PR Blog - Latest Comments in Discount travel for bloggers

Re: Discount travel for bloggers

Neil MacLean — Sat, 14 Jan 2006 01:24:06 -0000

http://feeds.feedburner.com/Techcrunch?m=531) make it easier for purchasers to consult bloggers opinions before they buy.
I have seen lots of statistics which show how important prosumer content is to travellers when they are deciding where and how to go.
This is not something companies should leave to chance. The way I see it, my job is to show them how to tilt the balance in their own favour.

Re: Discount travel for bloggers

Morgan McLintic — Fri, 13 Jan 2006 22:36:07 -0000

Ah well - don't ask, you don't get. I'm certainly not complaining about life in SF. The only ones who do are from Southern California, since they think it's too cold.

Interesting about the discount idea. As a parallel, when I buy a new gadget like a TV or camera, I review it on my blog. When others Google to research the product, my impressions frequently pop up. I'm therefore influencing in some small way their reputation and the perceptions of their prospects. The same will be true of travel, so to do your best to make those impressions favorable would seem an excellent idea.

Re: Discount travel for bloggers

Neil MacLean — Fri, 13 Jan 2006 18:40:38 -0000

Thanks Morgan and sorry I spammed your site with extra double trackbacks.
My thought is to do away with press trips altogether where they are not economically viable. So, sorry, there wouldn't be press trips for bloggers either. (and anyway, you're whole life sounds like one big holiday out there in the sun) :-)
Instead the idea of blogger discounts is for a travel company (we're talking niche here rather than cheap sun, sea and sand) to offer a deal on the total price, or maybe an upgraded room at the other end, in exchange for a bit of linkage in the resulting blog entries.
Of course they can say what they like when they get there - they are bloggers after all - but that's the risk you take with hacks as well. If they are well-enough loved bloggers, their holiday will pop up in the search engines and hang around on Google a long time after a newspaper travel section has been turned to back to pulp.

Re: Discount travel for bloggers

Morgan McLintic — Fri, 13 Jan 2006 18:23:28 -0000

I can't see any reason why you wouldn't include bloggers in the 'press trips' if you know they are influential. Communiations is all about reaching your target audience. Whether they read the print press, online media or blogs, doesn't matter per se. Many blogs have higher readerships than monthly publications or local press, so should certainly be included in the comms plan. Heck, The White House even included a blogger in its briefing recently.

Any free trips for tech PR bloggers going, will be gratefully recieved (ahem).