BREWHOUSE TRENDS

March 2012

Tuning in to destination coverage How to work with TV companies

Television coverage can work wonders for a destinations prole, with holidaymakers, travellers and day trippers ling in to experience it for themselves. Now travel shows are few and far between, how can tourist boards get in front of potential visitors in the comfort of their own homes? Luckily, the likes of The Dales (ITV), Coast (BBC), Cornwall with Caroline Quentin (ITV) and The Great British Countryside (BBC) have stepped in and optimised stunning views of rolling countryside, historic cities and pristine beaches, creating subtle yet powerful adverts for them. Cornwall has seen a glut of lming in the last 18 months. From the aforementioned Cornwall with Caroline Quentin and The Great British Countryside to touring shows like Three Hungry Boys and The Great British Bake Off, Englands most westerly county is the place to lm. Whats the secret? Malcolm Bell, Head of Tourism at Visit Cornwall, says its a combination of things. One is that its been a slow burn for Cornwall, going back 20 years with Rick Stein. Then you have the Eden Project and Tate St Ives bringing people in and more recently you have programmes like Saturday Kitchen featuring chefs like Nathan Outlaw and Paul Ainsworth. Cornwall with Caroline Quentin, a TwoFour production on ITV, enjoyed in the region of 3.6million viewers an episode. Such a programme promotes repeat visits and attracts new
www.brewhousegroup.com |

visitors, believes Bell. I look at that programme and its quite interesting watching it on mute so you are not distracted by what people are saying. Then you just see those stunning shots of Cornwall. I know we have 89% repeat visits in ve years and 45% come more than once a year. For that group, that sort of imagery is the best sort of direct marketing you can have. It is equally, if not more important for people who havent been to Cornwall. Its a way of putting Cornwall on the must have a think about list. Visit Cornwall says web visits increased ve-fold in the 2.5hours after an episode of Cornwall with Caroline Quentin went on air, suggesting people

Brewhouse Public Relations Ltd

01273 782076

@brewhousegroup

BREWHOUSE TRENDS March 2012

searched for information on visiting Cornwall as a direct result of watching. And it works for the whole of Cornwall, says Bell. People watch that and think I must go back to Perran Sands which wasnt even on the programme. Its the best publicity you can get. Attempting to coax a production company into a carbon copy of successful destination shows like Coast or Cornwall with Caroline Quentin is unlikely to prove fruitful but there are ways to be proactive. Visit Cornwall, for example, contacts production companies and editors to let them know it is a media friendly location, giving them a name and number of someone who can help them. It can be a daunting prospect: what about coverage that shows your town, city or country in a bad light? Its a little bit like no publicity is bad publicity but there are exceptions, says Bell. If the next piece is coverage we have is a bad one, look at how many good ones weve had and how many good ones will follow. If I heard 19 people raving about Volvo and one person giving Volvo a bad review, I would still rate Volvo as a good car. I think the public are pretty shrewd and they know what television companies are about. People know that Ireland isnt like it is in Father Ted. That hasnt ruined their tourism. Bell adds a key piece of advice for any tourist organisation hoping for regular television coverage: One thing a tourism body should never try and do is shape or manipulate a programme. You have to be media and lm friendly. Director and producer Mark Stanworthworks for Boomerang, which creates entertainment,

We have 89% repeat visits in ve years and 45% come more than once a year. For that group, the sort of imagery you get on TV is the best sort of direct marketing you can have.
Malcolm Bell, Visit Cornwall

factual, sport, music, drama and children's programmes for television, radio and the web across the UK including That Paralympic Show and Ollys Secret Supper Club both examples of shows requiring a variety of locations for lming. Stanworth believes the ultimate lming partnership is all in the logistics. It works best if the location gives one person the job of speaking to the production team.This way communication is kept clear and simple with no mixed messages. So nominating a lm and media liaison ofcer well before projects arise is a good idea. Then hit the ground running when opportunity knocks. Its important to gure out how hands on you can be without interfering, says Stanworth. Face to face meetings are really important for bigger projects. We like it when people take an interest its always helpful when locations understand the TV production process. This also helps spread the understanding that nothing can ever be shot in just one hour and things can change on the day. A lming location needs to be exible. Be clear on your ground rules. Explain clearly if there are things which must NOT happen. Be exible on everything else.

Celebrity squares A six-part series shown on ITV1, Caroline Quentins Cornwall regularly pulled in audiences of over 3m. Most other programmes, such as The Dales (Adrian Edmonson) feature celebrities. Others feature celebrity chefs: Rick Steins Spain, Raymond Blancs Very Hungry Frenchman, Jamies Italy...

Five TV rules to follow

1. Let commissioning editors and production companies know you will make them welcome, from helping them to find people to interview and rooms to film in to managing road closures. 2. Extend an invite but dont hound production teams. Dont be desperate. 3. If a film crew visits, be helpful but dont interfere or try to manipulate. 4. Use TV coverage to your advantage, using clips, links and PR collaborations where possible. Plan activity around it. 5. If your destination is not shown in its best light, remember that is the nature of the beast and look for future opportunities to redress the balance.

Brewhouse Public Relations Ltd

www.brewhousegroup.com

01273 782076

@brewhousegroup

BREWHOUSE TRENDS March 2012

68% of people choose their city break destination based on friends recommendations. Just 16% browse newspaper travel sections.
Brewhouse City Breaks Survey, January 2012

How do you choose a city break? Traditional media takes a hit

We recently carried out an online survey of 125 people, of varied ages, deemed to have an interest in city breaks. The results showed that 40% of participants believe a city break should last for 3 days, with 51% rating authentic culture as the most important factor in choosing a destination. 63% said that gastronomy was important in deciding which city to visit. 52% stated that the 250-500 per person bracket would be their ideal budget, with another 22% allocating 500750 per person to a city break. This is an important point when considered alongside recent ABTA gures on the resilience of the UK travel market in 2012. The results for How do you choose a city break? revealed that 68% of people choose their city break destination based on friends recommendations. 48% use Google, and 29% use Tripadvisor. Traditional media ranks lower than you might expect, with newspapers (16%), TV (7.5%) and radio (7.5%) losing market inuence. We believe this demonstrates how travel PR has evolved in recent years. Successful campaigns are targeted at generating word-of-mouth, online search and social media conversation the ways people communicate and search for answers to their travel questions in 2012. Although the numbers may be initially smaller - its understandably difcult to justify communicating with 500 Facebook fans against targeting a national newspaper with a circulation of 500,000 - but the potential audience and reach is much higher. These are highly relevant audiences that are much more likely to act. Put a serious effort in now - its not enough to simply use social media to post updates about events and news, there has to be a real effort to engage. Its time to afford social media the same level of budget and planning as other media in your marketing & PR strategy. By building social media campaigns that encourage engagement, recommendations and referrals, destinations can inuence consumers to spread knowledge, experience and opinions. Build in an effective SEO strategy and a simple online booking experience and youll be well placed to collect bookings and referrals aplenty.
| 01273 782076 | @brewhousegroup

Brewhouse Public Relations Ltd

www.brewhousegroup.com

BREWHOUSE TRENDS March 2012

New online branding opportunities Facebook pages move to Timeline

Those of you who manage a Facebook page on behalf of your destination may have heard that you can now enable the Timeline feature. What does this mean - what do you need to do differently, and what opportunities does it bring? After Facebook updated personal proles to the new Timeline format, it was only a matter of time before corporate pages followed suit. You can upgrade anytime until March 30th, at which point Timeline will automatically become publicly visible for your page. First, visit your page and click the Preview button that appears at the top. This sets you up with a curation period where only you - and any other admins of your page - can see your page in the new Timeline format. Dont worry, everyone else will still see the old design. The main thing you will notice is the space for a giant 850 x 315 pixel banner image across the top of your page. Choose one of your very best, most striking images for this. Note, however, that the page loads with the top of the image cut off, so dont pick an image with important elements at the top. There are a few rules to adhere to: cover images may not display calls to action or references to Facebook features such as Like this Page,purchase or pricing info such as 40% off or Download at our website, or contact information such as your web address. Facebook wants you to be subtle. Below the cover image is a box for your pages standard prole picture or logo, name, and two stats: your total Likes and the number of people talking about this. The About section enables you to write a short, punchy description with a link to your website or other URL.

Make your posts visually engaging. Posts including a photo album or picture can generate twice as much engagement as other post types.
Facebook Pages Center

You can select to pin one of your best posts - new or old - to the top left spot of the Timeline feed for seven days at a time. This feature gives you valuable control as to what visitors to your page see rst. You can also highlight important posts throughout your Timeline to make them appear the full width of the page. Hover over the top right of a post and click on the star icon to highlight a post. Since this is a new start, before you decide to publish your new Timeline page, take a look through your previous posts and highlight all your best photos and links that are still relevant, and hide or delete posts that are defunct or irrelevant. Finally, if you had a landing tab for your page, this will no longer work - instead, users always land on the main Timeline view and have to click through to individual custom tabs or apps. If you have designed tabs or apps, they will still work with the new format, but you may wish to redesign them to make full use of the 810 pixelwidth now available. In short, Timeline pages seem to offer more opportunities for branding, but less opportunities for customisation. Well keep watching.

Big Brand Examples Take a look at how some big brands have adapted their pages to make the most of Timelines new features. Good examples are CocaCola, Starbucks and Coldplay.

Four ideas for travel timelines

1. Upload image galleries. The Timeline format is extremely impactful when striking images are regularly used. 2. Add key dates from your destinations history - Timeline allows you to add dates and events prior to the date you created your page. As an example, Coca-Cola has added key points from its company history. 3. As well as images, video can now be viewed in a much larger format. Link to a YouTube video, then highlight it to make it appear twice as wide as usual. 4. Make use of the new admin area, which features notications, analytics, messages and a help menu to ease your transition to the new set-up. You can also now get access to real-time analytics.

BREWHOUSE TRENDS March 2012

Thanks for reading Brewhouse Trends. Brewhouse is all about publicity, from showing travel & leisure companies how to get attention and manage their image, to running large-scale campaigns to transform a city or destination. This is where the bulk of our experience and success lies. As a creative consultancy, we look at the most innovative ways to help our clients reach their audiences. We enjoy what we do but dont just do it for fun were committed to driving tangible results. Our clients range from tourist boards like Czech Tourism, Gran Canaria Natural and the City of Valencia, to tour operators like Helpful Holidays and international brands like Rosetta Stone. And maybe you?

brewhousegroup.com | twitter.com/brewhousegroup | fb.com/brewhousegroup

Brewhouse Public Relations Ltd

hello@brewhousegroup.com | 01273 782076

www.brewhousegroup.com

01273 782076

@brewhousegroup