Sharing the love

Pretty much every conference speaker I hear talking about social media as a marketing tool stresses the need to ensure that 'sharability' is to the fore in the strategy. And sure enough we're seeing the increasing use of Twitter and Facebook apps on blog sites that enable readers to share content. Another growing area are websites that allow people to share their collection of favorite websites and links. I guess that Digg were to the fore in this but more recently we've seen the emergence of players that enable users to create a web-page to condense all their favourite blogs and share them.

One that's caught my eye recently is Alltop.com - if you click HERE you will be taken to The Persuaders Alltop selection - I hope you may find it useful and one that you can share with others. Why not create your own page and do send me the link too - happy to promote it.

World Travel Market WTM 2010 London

It's almost ten years since I last visited World Travel Market ( WTM ) in London. On that last visit I was accompanying a group of about 25 students taking a degree in tourism marketing from DIT, so my duties in chaperoning took somewhat from my ability to peruse the vast array of stands in the Earls Court exhibition centre. The WTM has gone from strength to strength and today is in residence in the EXCEL centre in the London Docklands area. To celebrate its 30th anniversary this year, the organisers have produced a great little video to chart the changes that have taken place in global tourism and the role that WTM has played in the sector.

What marketers need to do now

Last week I attended the Marketing Institute of Ireland annual conference. Among the speakers was author of Crowdsourcing, Martin Thomas who had some very interesting perspectives on how the marketing profession needs to adapt in a post-recessionary world. Here's a YouTube video I recorded with him....

Tourism Round Table Discussion

On 16th of June I chaired the panel discussion at the THRIC 2009 Conference organised by the School of Hospitality Management and Tourism, Dublin Institute of Technology and supported by the Tourism Research Centre.

The panel discussed the theme...

"The recession creates more opportunities than challenges for the tourism and hospitality sector in Ireland and globally"


The Panelists were

Prof David Airey (University of Surrey)
Prof Jim Deegan (University of Limerick)
Mr Bobby Kerr (Insomnia)
Mr Aidan Pender (Fáilte Ireland)

Market Research and Consultancy overlap

Yesterday I got the chance to interview Fiona Czerniawska from consultancy Arkimeda as part of the run-in to the Esomar Congress 2009 where she is a keynote speaker. Fiona's someone who had some very interesting things to say about the parallels between the market research business and the consulancy sector where she works. Among the main observations that she has made is that the recession has served to bring both closer together; market research companies are increasingly being asked by their clients 'what should I do with the data' while consultancies are more acutely aware than ever of the need to base their proposed strategies on sound market insights. Interesting times and I look forward to exploring this issue more at Congress 2009. By the way the interview we did should be on a podcast very soon at the Esomar website.

Carroll's Irish Gifts - Spokespersons for Irish Tourism? No Thanks!

Nearly chocked on my lamb chops watching the 9'o'clock news report on the decline in tourist numbers ( see earlier posting ). Of all people to choose to interview they pick Ray O'Connell from Carroll's Irish Gifts who called for more investment in tourism marketing. All for it Ray, but for some reason I don't recall seeing your ads in overseas promotion - happy to let others do all the heavy lifting! Oh and while we're at it, I'd like to see the import content of their stock. I have taken the trouble to visit in-store and was surprised to see that much of their merchandise is actually sourced outside Ireland!

The Persuaders Guest Presenters - July

I'm taking a ( well-deserved if you ask me) break for a few weeks from The Persuaders. I'm sure I won't be able to break away from my RSS addiction, but am off air. I hope you will consider giving your listening custom to the following on the next three Fridays on Dublin City FM at 1pm.

Friday July 10th, - Ron Immink and Yanky Fachtler will host a Bookbuzz special and will focus on a book from a marketing perspective.

Friday 17th and Friday 24th July - Ronan Kinahan from Vibe Marketing and Mark Byrne from Designworks will be doing an impression of a Marketing Ant and Dec show - they won't tell me what exactly they will be talking about, or who their guests might be - so long as you stay within the laws of libel, I'm cool, guys!