It's all about the right communication...

Part 2: German Tourism Brands on Facebook

2013-08-27T17:30:00.000+02:00

Here is an interesting Update on the current Tourism Brands on Facebook and their development. Just 6 months ago, I had a detailed look at all the important channels and how they were progressing. To my surprise, the picture has changed and there are a couple of new brands leading the list and top ranks.
Lets have a look:

Not only is the count way higher than 6 months ago, but it is interesting to see, that two German Cruises Lines are right at the top, MSC Kreuzfahrten with over 1,5 million fans and AIDA Cruises with just over 0,5 million. The cruises industry is booming and not only AIDA ordered two new mega ships which will cruise the seven seas from 2015 onwards. Also TripAdvisor, Ab in den Urlaub and HRS developed a big community over the last period. Very interesting is also Lidl Reisen with more than 80.000 fans, a brand which I didn't list last time. The discounter expanded their travel portfolio and developed quite a community, which might reach the 1 million in the beginning of 2014.

German travelers seem to like getting in touch with travel brands online, sharing their experience and identifying as well as profiling themselves with a certain kind of holiday. All listed channels provide an extremely good support structure for customer service and community management. TUI expanded their Social Media and customer support team up to 5 specialists and relocated them in Bremen, just recently.

The development in this area is fast and interesting to follow. The more a community grows, the more potential clients can be reached and sales could be achieved. However, a specialized support team is needed, to manage a community of size.

Any suggestions what this list might look like in 6 months time?!

Connecting YouTube with Google+

2013-07-12T17:01:00.000+02:00

About 4 weeks ago Google made it possible to connect your YouTube channel with your Google+ Profile. Many companies hope for a better rating in visibility through this measure, however, it can get quite difficult to do so. Why, I am going to describe in detail.

It is a main problem for connecting these two accounts if you have 2 different e-mail addresses and one of them is a Google Mail. Many people use a Gmail address for their Google+ Account, due to the automated process, which creates a Google+ Account for you if registering with Google Mail. On the other hand, at some point a YouTube account was created, of course with an e-mail address for authorization. This address however, cannot be a Google Mail! Why that is, I cannot tell you, but that’s the failure notice you get, if trying:

So evidently you have 2 accounts with 2 different E-Mail addresses which you are trying to connect. The connection is only possible through YouTube, so you login, go to Account Settings>>Overview and click on “Advanced” next to your profile picture. The next step asks you, which name you would like to use. A lot of companies don’t want to use a personal name for a company profile, so here is where it gets tricky. Try to use a company name with first and second name or use a representative name for your business. If you do not want a personal name to appear on any of your video content or your channel, you should make sure not to accidentally open up a new Google+ profile, because that’s what YouTube automatically will try to do and what is very difficult to undo afterwards – I do speak out of experience here.

YouTube automatically searches all Google+ accounts in order to find your e-mail address, with which you have registered. If your e-mail addresses match, YouTube shows your Google+ profile during the step of connecting these two accounts, which you only have to confirm. If not, any step that you are going to continue brings you closer to a new Google+ profile and far away from your aim of connecting your accounts. This technical problem isn’t solved yet and the only way to overcome it, is to contact YouTube or Google and ask them to connect the 2 accounts for you.

You should be absolutely sure that the connection is of value to you or your business
because the following limitations come with it:
1.    Only one profile picture - Which is automatically the one you are using
on Google+

2.    Usage of personal names with your video content

3.    Google+ will be integrated in the backend of your YouTube account with
setting options aso.

However, there are also benefits to this change as the integration of all YouTube videos on your Google+ profile or page and that you can always undo the connection between the two accounts. I am sure, Google will continue to connect its services and will further implement many tools and functions into one manageable user account. Step by step we are getting there…

Current Social Media Jobs in Germany

2013-06-28T08:16:00.000+02:00

It is very interesting to see, how Social Media becomes essential in Companies and that more and more experts find their way, also into smaller businesses. Here is a current list of interesting openings in Germany, that might interest you.

1. Social Media Manager with focus on Human Resources
Sixt Car Rental GmbH
Pullach, Germany

2. Senior Social Media Manager
Sixt Car Rental GmbH
Pullach, Germany

3. Social Media Manager
BIGPOINT GmbH
Hamburg, Germany

4. Junior Online Marketing Manager (PR & Social Media)
QUOKA.de
Lampertheim, Germany

5. Product Manager Community & Social
HolidayCheck AG
Bottighofen, Germany

6. Senior Social Media Manager
Kabel Deutschland Vertrieb & Service GmbH
Munich, Germany

7. Onlinemarketing with Social Media
DER Deutsches Reisebüro GmbH & Co. OHG
Frankfurt am Main, Germany

8. Intern Social Media
Sixt College GmbH
Pullach, Germany

Cultural Change through Customer Service & Support via Social Media

2013-06-25T18:16:00.000+02:00

Many companies, not only in the tourism sector, go through a cultural change these days, encouraging their employees as well as clients to engage on new media platforms as Facebook, Google+ and Twitter. This period is already ongoing for quite a while, however, it seems a lot of businesses do struggle with sticking to their decisions made and taking the change process to the next level.

The Customer Service and Support via Social Media and new media platforms can be seen as the beginning of a cultural change process which effects entire business operations as well as each and every employee. I would like to sum up these important steps and give reasons, why this process is so protracted and rather difficult, especially within big businesses and groups.

Step 1: Integrating the Customer Support via Social Media and creating workflows

Having introduced Social Media Support to all your platforms and channels the community learns that support is given not just through e-mail, telephone or mail, but also through new media and mostly quite quicker than on all other channels. As daily requests rise, the support process within your company needs to be optimized in security, quality and speed. Requests need to be placed right at the center of knowledge for every single topic. A structured map can help to visualize every step of a workflow to make sure all topics that might occure are covered.

Step 2: Optimizing Workflows and training

Just because you put up workflows, talked to other departments and set up guidelines doesn't mean, that your integration is bulletproof - it needs daily attending and optimization. Find out how strings in your workflow can be speeded up or simplified. Maybe one or two strings can be joined together due to overlapping of themes or structural change within the company. Also make sure that all your contacts in the workflow, know what you are doing and how you do it. Introduce them to your job as well as tasks and let them know that you try to help reduce costs and workload. Offer your help with any problem and make sure you introduce the new topic with guidelines, examples and enough wordings to choose from for the beginning. Also make sure that you know what is going on in those departments, which get confronted with social media requests. Shoulder surfing is a great way to get reasonable information in a short period of time, without annoying anyone.

Step 3: Making Customers aware of the new Service

After you set up the workflow and got to know your partners in this project, let your customers know that your company offers support via new media. Make sure you introduce all advantages on every platform, for instance in the form of website layers, integration of social plugins, a hint on your contact and service information, etc. Another great way to get the word out there is with your company newsletter.

Step 4: Getting your Employees to follow the trend

If the communication is out there with your customers but not with your employees within your company, your good intentions are lightly to fail. A cultural change is the only reasonable result to an integration of Social Media Customer Support, but why?
Every person likes to be part of something and a business is only as strong as its employees. Making Social Media available for customer or business purposes only will result in collaborative refusal of the idea by those who are essential to the success of the project. A lot of people have no contact to new media due to their business field, especially within the tourism industry. Introducing new media as part of a cultural change for all has many advantages. A innovative character that spreads through for everyone to follow generates positive attitudes towards the company and enhances loyalty. This won loyalty can be used by any business. It can be converted into word of mouth, positive influencing and even fascination. But therefore Social Media and its ways of communication must be placed right at the center of the company. It could be introduced as following:

1. Introducing Social Media Guidelines
By doing so, you make sure to let everyone know what your aim and goal with Social Media is. You automatically generate interest and give a information about this new tool.

2. Allowing employees to engage on platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, Google+ and YouTube
Of course there are many problems by allowing every employee to engage on any platform they chose, for instance server and computer security. However, these difficulties can be managed by amplifying fire walls and increasing the awareness of malware, spam and other dangerous software. Another minus point is the possibility of productivity loss. If your employees are surfing the Internet, are they still working and if they do with the same or worse intensity? This is a question you can probably only answer by researching it yourself. However there are also common solutions for this matter, by creating a certain time frame for people to use Social Media or to implementing a certain time stamp per day for every employee to use up.

3. Asking for Opinions, Input and Content
Another great way to make sure Social Media is accepted is through asking for ideas and input. Publish travelogues or favorite tips of your employees and let them be part of this project. The maximum results can be created by letting employees contribute to this process and by letting them create and develop their own ideas to drive and truly implement Social Media.

Please, let me know your ideas to drive cultural change within companies and introducing Social Media not only to customers but also to all employees of a business.

Presentation Dynamic Use of Social Media for Results

2013-05-01T08:08:00.000+02:00

Presentation Dynamic Use of Social Media for Results at ENTER 2013 Innsbruck, Austria from Juliane Saß

Social Media Guidelines - A unique Approach

2013-03-12T22:20:00.002+01:00

Creating strong, convincing and encouraging Social Media Guidelines sometimes is the hardest. Especially in big companies with many employees and a lot of different departments being involved in corporate social platforms it is difficult to manage and coordinate all activities. Social Media Guidelines help to create a certain level of understanding and support for every employee in a company, by summing up all important factors and guidelines to be followed, if communicating in the social web. Of course, Social Media Guidelines are also of interest to people in a firm, that might have no contact to any online channel at all. A very innovative and encouraging approach of a Social Media Policy has been created by an Australian Department of Justice in 2011:

German Tourism Brands on Facebook

2013-03-08T10:12:00.000+01:00

Due to my earlier interest in German Google+ pages and their performance I got searching for the German brand pages on Facebook. I must say it is pretty impressive how successful these pages are and that even new pages build up their audience quite quickly. Lets have a look at the latest ranking.

Ranking German Facebook pages in the tourism sector:

Quite interesting is that some pages that seem to do good in Community numbers do have difficulties with interacting with their fans. However, pages that don't have as much Fans as f.e. ab-in-den-urlaub or Germanwings, do generate a lot of talk and interaction as it can be seen by the Talking About count. Also impressive is the amount of Talking Abouts AIDA Cruises has, even though this might be due to the big ship christening of AIDAstella in the days to come. All together all pages do perform quite well and all provide a certain content strategy to keep the Community interested and interacting.

Any favorite pages among the Top 20 here?

The Best Job in the World - Now 6 Positions vacant!

2013-03-05T11:19:00.003+01:00

The best and probably well known touristic marketing campaign of our century is back and this time there are 6 incredible Jobs available, each and every one of them unique and for a duration of 6 months with a unbelievable pay package of a A$100.000! Also new in this marketing campaign is that this time it is not only Queensland, that is employing. Australia is favoring its 6 most visited areas through the spread out of this campaign. You could see the marketing start in 2009 with Queensland as a trial and now it is being rolled out to the entire country. Even better, that the "Jobs" are personalized to a very specific kind of tourist and that almost everyone in the world could identify with one of the 6 Travelers.

So get applying for:

1. Chief Funster (New South Wales)

Hanging around the big cities posting and tweeting about all the big events and festivals - My personal favorite ♥

2. Lifestyle Photographer (Melbourne)

Find the right angle on all there is to see and create magical city and country shoots - You might need to bring your own Camera for this one ;)

3. Outback Adventurer (Northern Territory)Now whats not to like about a Job where you travel through the gigantic Outback of Australia, find your own personal Life Adventure and get paid a reasonable sum?

4. Park Ranger (Queensland)

Get green and keep it so by patrolling through Queensland most beautiful areas and beaches - Here the marketing message stays quite similar to the one from 2009.

5. Taste Master (Western Australia)

Restaurant testing is actually a tough Job! But hey, for 6 months even I would like to discover the best wine, seafood and bars - Question is, who pays for the restaurant visits?

6. Wildlife Caretaker (South Australia)

Animal friends will be happy about this one because swimming with dolphins and taking care of kangaroos might just be a dream come true! Even for me ♥...

This marketing campaign might even get bigger than the last one, more Jobs, more applicants, a longer period of recruiting and probably more promotion during the time the 6 new "Employees" work their way through Australia.

I can't think of any better promotion for all the different kinds of vacations one can do in Australia than this one. I really get in the mood for it already...

Social Media Explained

2013-03-04T14:22:00.003+01:00

Interesting! Now I get it ;)

Published by PeterGlaser on 7. March 2012 in Social Media on blog.stuttgarter-zeitung.de

German Tourism Brands on Google+

2013-03-01T17:39:00.001+01:00

Since the launch of Google+ Pages in November 2011 the platform developed further and sometimes I had the feeling, that actually not as much has happened in terms of usage or success. That's why I wanted to have a closer look at the tourism industry and on how all the new G+ Pages in Germany have developed over time. Here is a little list with all the touristic Google+ Pages in Germany with their current Follower and +1 count.

Ranking

sonnenklar.TV 21.994
Fluege.de- Ihr Flugexperte 18.716
Opodo.de - Ihr Reiseexperte 14.632
Hotel? trivago 14.040
Expedia.de 13.924
Hotel.de 13.443
HRS - Das Hotelportal 7.766
lastminute.de 5.019
HolidayCheck 2.132
AIDA Kreuzfahrten 1.403
ab-in-de-Urlaub.de 954
L'Tur Last Minute 911
Lufthansa Group 783
Thomas Cook DE 737
Neckermann Reisen DE 706
TUI Cruises - Mein Schiff 652
ITS Reisen 387
TUI 355
TUIfly.com 164
ebookers Deutschland 156
DERTOUR 39
Rewe Touristik 18

More than half of the here listed seem to struggle with their page and also with what to do with it. During my little analysis I also had a closer look at the page appearances, corporate designs and content strategies. It seems, that because of the lack of customer interaction a lot of companies seem not to care too much about their corporate page on Google+. However, some as Trivago, Opodo and Hotel.de just know how to make use of this platform and do seem to have the right content strategy. Followers keep coming day by day and even interact with the brands through comments and +1's.

Still, movement is slow and if compared to other regional markets, as the US, Germany's travel customers are still holding back, when it comes down to the usage of Google+ pages. Let's hope that with 2013 daubts and concerns will give way to benefits as easy and enhanced information supply and that

Online Advertising and its effects on tourists

2010-07-01T17:34:00.000+02:00

During my last semester as a European Tourism Management student in Faro, Portugal, I was able to investigate tourists perceptions towards advertising on the Internet in form of a survey. Two-hundred forty-eight travelers at the Faro airport participated and were questioned at the check-in queue. Subjects of the investigation were the level of Internet usage, perception towards ads on Search Engines, perception towards pop-ups and banners, usage of promotional e-mails and e-newsletters for tourism purposes as well as social networks.

Among the outcome was an increase of elderly people using the Internet for travel or tourism related purposes. Younger generations seem to depend on online bookings due to low cost carriers building up in the area of the Algarve and due to airlines as Ryanair and easyJet being a cheap alternative and offering a weekend getaway. It can be generalised that about 88% of the tourists in this region prefer the Internet as a medium to retrieve holiday or travel information and that 87% do or did book online.

To be continued...

Social Commerce - The new way to shop

2010-06-01T18:24:00.000+02:00

What makes online shopping so dangerous and sometimes unattractive for customers?

Well, if you don't have someone to talk to you personally, give you advice and makes sure that you get what you want for the price that you want to pay, online shopping can be a risk. Today, problems like these are overcome by reviews, ratings and specialized online presentation. Without these extras consumers tend to not trust a website and probably search for one that gives them the security they need. As Shopper Approved summed it up in February this year Social Commerce is an advantage as well as necessity for websites that sell online.

Consumer Ratings help to sell, increase the conversion rate, improve the organic ranking through unique content and give the consumers the security they need. Social Commerce is definitely here to stay and will become a fundamental tool to increase sales.

Twitter as Knowledge Tool...

2010-06-01T15:19:00.000+02:00

Over the past couple of months I have been using Twitter a lot. I did send the occasional Tweet but used the platform more as a tool to up-date as well as intensify knowledge on marketing,online trends and tourism. Further, Twitter represents a great tool for job-searching. Through keyword search I found relevant members or organisations worth following. Through that I found job advertising Twitter sites for almost every sector.

Due to the real-time web up-dates knowledge can be refreshed and gained throughout the day. For me, better than reading a book or searching for information through Search Engines. So go on and try it...
www.twitter.com

Google TV

2010-05-21T21:29:00.000+02:00

Finally...

the era of combined TV and Internet arrived yesterday, 20.05.2010 with the launch of Google TV at the Google I/O Developers Conference in San Francisco, USA. (Source: YouTube.com)

About 5000 people witnessed the event live and even more were connected via YouTube that night. Made possible by Sony, Logitech and Intel, Google TV will be available through set-top boxes and Blu-ray players, which enables interactive video from the Internet to be seen on home TVs. Also implemented are Google Ads and displays as we know it from the Search Engine. Advertising will be brought to a new level with interactive Internet TV powered by Google. Marketers see great potential and increasing marketing activities in interactive video for the coming years. The only question remaining is, when will Google TV arrive in Europe and the rest of the world...??!

Germanwings Viral Marketing Campaign

2010-05-09T14:56:00.000+02:00

Something happened on an easyJet plane the other day...

Six hired people from Germanwings went on board of an easyJet flight in Hamburg, Germany. Within their hand luggage were giant speech bubbles, which they displayed during the flight in front of the passengers and which in the end suggest a flight with Germanwings. The video was successfully posted on YouTube in April where currently about 80 000 people are counted to have watched it. (QuietGlover.com 2010)

The campaign was interviewed, posted on several social networks and microblogging sites and created a huge Buzz in the German travel market. Good for Germanwings, rather mortifying for easyJet...

Tweet...

2010-03-11T14:10:00.000+01:00

Yesterday I had the fabulous idea to do something new. So I signed up at Twitter!

It is a very simple process, however I still don't know what it will give me. I am curious. So far I have added some tourism businesses that I follow, like here on blog-spot. I am able to see their tweets and can retweet (that is what sending messages is called on Twitter). Personally, I have a feeling that Twitter is mostly used by businesses to advertise products or special offers within the capacity of 3 text lines. But I also think that Chuck Norris seems to be the favorite topic of all Twitter users. What I noticed is that Google is very active in giving tips and inside infos on how to use their products as well as using certain applications to increase productivity and usability.

I think that for online marketing purposes and business relations it might be a good tool to stay updated, also in terms of competition. But if you don't have any friends or business partners it can get very lonely on Twitter. So I will find out and keep you updated on my Twitter experience.

By the way...follow me and join ;)

Join Jule Sass on Twitter!

Web 3.0

2010-03-03T19:38:00.000+01:00

Web 2.0 is now and basically has done the preliminary work for the new and future product of Web 3.0. Social networks are the basement of this new intellectual idea as it is seen on YouTube or Facebook. It has shown that there is a need of customized and highly personalized information supply on the Web.

...so whats this new thing called Web 3.0 promising to personalize all our requests from the Internet chaos world? This new browser will be able to give you personalized and ordered results to queries as 'short cheap weekend break in the Algarve, with rented car and amazing nightlife offers'. But that is not all yet, the browser will learn throughout the time you are using it which patterns of the Internet you are interested in and what products or services might be of use to you. It is an ever evolving and learning software, which in the end knows what you are looking for. A question that raises in me is how save this browser will be and how will it prevent the misuse of all the personal and highly expensive information about ourselves. Because, if already the browser knows what we want it is only a matter of time till highly personalized advertisement, pop ups and other spam haunts the web users. For me it is the first step towards artificial intelligence accessible for the commonality and if we are unprepared it might turn to abuse of privacy and information.

If looking directly to tourism related products and services it might be possible that you own your very own private and virtual shop assistant, soon. She or he will update you on any offers that will interest you and will be able to operate the entire shopping process from selection till payment - all virtual of course.

So enjoy your new intelligent Web 3.0 Browser with caution...

Online Marketing Show June 2010

2010-02-25T11:51:00.000+01:00

In late June this year the Online Marketing Show is held in London, again. Exhibitors will contribute their new ideas and technology to several workshops and conferences held by the leading marketers in Europe and the US. Topics include Social Media, Optimization, Viral Marketing, Ecommerce, Direct Marketing as well as Analytics and Measurement. Workshops will show how to make best use of your website and how to drive traffic to it. New online marketing tools and ideas are presented in the Presentations Arena. The conference programme is available online and also the registration, which is for free, can be done at the website - www.onlinemarketingshow.co.uk .This is a great opportunity to broaden your network and to get to know the finest of UK's marketing world! I already got my ticket...

Location - The Grand Hall, Olympia, Hammersmith Road, London

Date - 29.06 - 01.07. 2010

Registration is free

Book Recommendation

2010-02-24T20:14:00.000+01:00

One of the best books for gaining the theory of online marketing and advertising is eMarketing eXcellence by Chaffey and Smith. The latest edition is from 2008 and looks into the future of marketing and the use of web 3.0 as well as the current issues as social networks and user generated content. What is very useful are the special tips and tricks boxes around the topic of website design and optimization. Also the use and meaning of Pay Per Click is very well explained, not just by the example of Google.

Cost - 45 Pounds

ISBN - 0750689455