What was most popular on Facebook, Twitter and Google in 2012?

by Mark Frary

As the end of the year approaches, social networks like to sum up the year that has just passed.

Google creates its annual Zeitgeist site which this year is more comprehensive than ever, featuring 838 top 10 lists from 55 countries to see what people there have been searching for.

Three UK events dominated search during 2012. Perhaps surprisingly, the Olympics was not the most searched-for term but instead that accolade went to the Euro 2012 football championships, which topped both the general search and news search tables. The Olympics - and “Olympic tickets” in particular - came in at number two. The third event dominating search in the year was the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee. All three events had implications for the travel sector. (As an aside, the Department for Transport just released statistics that showed that the number of air passengers coming to the UK fell by 500,000 in July and 300,000 in August compared to the previous year. So much for an Olympics tourism boom.)

Each year, Google also reveals which travel destinations have been most popular in search. Can you guess which it is this year?

Presumably driven by excitement from the London 2012 Olympics, this year’s most searched destination is Rio de Janeiro while Brazil came in at number three. The second most popular – perhaps for fiscal rather than travel reasons – was Greece. The top domestic destination was London with Cornwall the next highest placed travel search term.

The search engine also reveals the most searched for categories in Google Maps. Hotels come in first place, meaning that hoteliers should do more to ensure that their presence on Google Maps is up to date. Interestingly, the budget hotel chain Premier Inn came in eighth place on the full list. Camping was the fourth most searched for place term in the full list of place terms searched for on Google Maps. The top three cities searched for in Google’s mapping service were London, Bristol and Manchester.

Twitter has also shared its Year in Review. The microblogging network reveals that the most retweeted tweet of the year was from a certain B Obama sharing the news that he was going to be around for “four more years”. Interesting, Twitter used its review to promote a service called Vizify, which lets you see your own Twitter year in review – showing you your best follower and the tweet that got the most engagement from your followers, as well as analysing what you tweeted about during the past 12 months.

Facebook reveals its 2012 trends on its Facebook Stories site and you can use it to see trends from your own timeline for the last 12 months. The Olympics were the biggest trending subject during the year in the UK but Facebook also reveals that the three locations where users checked in most in the UK were Alton Towers, Thorpe Park and Manchester’s Trafford Centre.

Five things bosses need to understand in social media

 
By Steve Keenan

Back when the days were long and warm (September), I was invited by blogger Ana Silva O’Reilly to hear a visiting speaker in London as part of Social Media Week.

Ana promised that the speaker, Mark Schaefer, (pictured) was one of the most influential she had heard when it comes to social media. So I went. And she was right.

He is very American, so some of the jokes predictably faltered. But that’s an aside. In any language, he argues common sense and a considered approach to SM (he also argues this in two books which you can find on his website). His latest post, An experiment in social influence, is equally thought-provoking.

Apologies for the delay in writing this post, but I’ve only just found my notes from his talk in a pre-Christmas blitz on the shed which doubles as my writing empire. In re-reading the notes, I remembered how spot-on Mark is. So I’m sharing the gist of his talk, which is the best I have heard in 2012.

 
FIVE THINGS BOSSES NEED TO UNDERSTAND SOCIAL MEDIA

“Bosses think ‘It’s like trying to drink water from a firehose. Where do I start?’”

1. Human imperative – it is back to intimate human contact after decline of traditional media. “It is a terrible time to be a control freak: the deer have guns.” SM is two-way, free, global, instantaneous, real-time – there are opportunities to humanize the company.

2. Social media takes place with one small interaction at a time. You go to them, comment on their blogs and eventually they’ll come to you because they’ve got to know your name. And they bring their friends. You can’t stop SM because your goal is business benefits.

3. People do things the same way they have always done it. People are sick of being advertised to – so the message should be, come waste time with me. So… it’s connects, help, network: that’s the ROI. Many benefits are qualitative, not quantative. It is part of the cultural change. The companies who understand qualitative will toast the companies that don’t.

4. Are you a shareable company, with meaningful content? Targeted actions, authentic helpfulness? And it’s not just a content strategy, but a network strategy. Surround yourself with people and companies who have a disposition to be interested in you.

Case history: Mark spoke of a plastic surgeon in Knoxville, USA, who uses SM to give video answers to questions on a weekly basis, has a ‘Truthometer’, a blog and downloads of health features – all with a link to his surgery at the end. He and his wife also produced a cookbook for the community with no mention of his practice. The results: conversion rate up, FB engaged with referral rates up from FB, also SEO as good original content – he creates useful content.

5. If you can measure moving content, you can quantify one aspect of online influence. ROI technology is still in the silent movie stage but people are using it. Look at Appinions.com – the latest firm to analyze linking and semantic search.

To summarise – spend time on your SM, focus, re-evaulate where to spend time and money on your market. Be relevant, timely and entertaining and you will get Return on Influence…

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A Spanish social media conference in London

by Steve Keenan

This week, there was a conference in London organised by Spanish social media enthusiast Juan Otero. It was called turismo.as and was the first of its type outside Spain. I was asked to moderate one of the four sessions but didn’t really know what to expect. This is what I discovered:

1. Two new acronyms
Sofia Panaylotaki of MediaCo started it - PROI. You can work it out. Then it was Nigel Huddleston, Industry Head Travel at Google, with the rise and rise of hotel enquiries on mobile (phone and tablet) - the fablet.

2. Video on the up
No surprise there - but lots of love at the conference. Pedro Jareno of Spanish travel planner site Minube: “There is nothing like video to inspire.”

3. Late bookings are in - but industry not up to speed
Annie Wilson, UK managing director of Kayak said 90% of bookings for one online travel agent she knows are within seven days of arrival - but that many OTAs don’t have an online app.

4. And mobile on the up
Joel Brandon-Bravo, CEO UK of Travelzoo, said recent surveys showed 6% of searches were on mobile. That has risen to 18% - and on the day, he checked and found the figure had risen to 27%. “We are inspired to go there - and then find a reduced version of a website that is the worst experience imaginable.” Kayak and Travelzoo are having to sit down with suppliers to sort out their mobile websites. Google’s Huddlestone added that 30% of enquiries of hotel enquiries are now on phone or tablet (Fablet) - but that people still prefer to book on desktop or tablet (Fablet). And he went on to say that 65% of enquiries on a phone for hotels are within 24 hours of arrival.

5. Call to Click
Travelzoo’s Joel pointed out a neat trick: with all that action on mobile, many sites - including NH Hotels, the hosts - put a Call to Click button on mobile as a better alternative to having to click through to an aggregator site like Hotels.com. (Travelzoo also using Feefo.com for customer feedback on trips).

6. Email marketing
Travelzoo again - now making emails better targeted., such as putting relevant deals from local airports - eg., not giving email subscribers in Manchester departures from Gatwick.

7. Maps
On the rise on mobile. Huddlestone said people are checking to see where the hotel or apartment is when sourcing places to stay on mobile. “We are in the early stages of mapping - we are now looking at maps of airports, for example.”

8. Augmented reality
Lots of chat about this - why has it taken years for Layar to get going? Talk of Google Goggles. But the slow progress, agreed by everybody, has put many off. “Put your money in actual reality - not augmented,” added Brandon-Bravo.

10 ways to create video on a budget

by Steve Keenan

1. Do it yourself - slowly
Colm Hanratty of Hostelworld (pictured, above) started visiting London in 2008 and, over the course of a year or two, filmed himself speaking outside capital highlights including Camden, Carnaby Street and the Tower of London with money-saving tips and good common sense for backpackers heading to town. ‘London - 10 things you need to know’ is warm, informative and obviously useful - type London into YouTube search and it’s the first video you’ll see (and has been seen by more than one million).

2. Do it yourself - quickly
I was speaking at the Association of Independent Tour Operators (Aito) conference in Maderia in the spring, promoting video. Jono Vernon-Powell of tour operator Nomadic Thoughts liked the idea - so set off that afternoon for a pre-planned walk across the top of the island with his smart phone and took video of the walk. He obviously has an eye for a photo because the film (edited by his 13-year-old son) is beautiful, and would compel anybody to book a holiday.

3. Get your staff to do it
Expert Africa have a lot of safari lodges. But they also have ‘themed’ holidays, such as walking holidays. So we briefed three staff who travel extensively to Africa, worked out the story line and gave them basic training in cameras, light and sound. The film they brought back wasn’t perfect (watch that wind!) but we edited it professionally and the film gives a strong favour of a walking safari. Cost? Just two training and editing - way under £1k (and will get cheaper and better as staff progress).

4. Run a competition
InsideJapan Tours had no video. So they decided to run a competition for bloggers and writer who hadn’t visited Japan, asking them to submit some multimedia to say why they should. Nearly 100 entered, the company posted three finalists on Facebook and opened it to votes (earning some £5k in SEO along the way), found a winner (who displayed an ability to video) and sent him and a partner to Japan for 15 days with a brief to blog - and video daily. Virgin provided flights. Cost? Under £1k.

5. Hire a (good) vlogger
Intrepid Travel wanted to promote its food tours of Vietnam. And they found The Perennial Plate, a blogging duo from North America who combine writing with video. Intrepid paid for their trip and, in return, got a highly professional video which they could use on their site, with a credit on the video. The target was 20k views - it got 300k, thanks to exposure on HuffPost, Vimeo and the New York Times. Intrepid have since sent PP to China and Japan. Cost? Under £4k each film, all-inclusive.

6. Video a blog trip
MSC Cruises invited six bloggers along to a jaunt around the Med - and then invited Media Ark to film their story suggestions, such as using the spa, mixing a cocktail etc., The company got nearly 20 videos out of the trip, in different languages, to use as an awareness raising campaign about the diversity of cruising. All targets were achieved - and MSC plans another project in 2013. Cost? Under six figures - but for that they got a huge library of (well-watched) video.

7. Think retro
OK, what’s the next big thing!! Oh, lots, and always changing. But DON’T forget where you’ve come from, your past. Erna Low marks it’s 80th anniversary this winter and is still a ski leader - but happily, the firm unearthed 33 rolls of 16mm film shot by its founder, which we could digitalise and turn into a series of films celebrating ski style, school - and gear - from the 1950s-70s. If you had to choose between two firms on price, and one had video to show its pedigree, which would you choose? Cost? Under £4k all-in for five videos.

8. Timelapse video
Not new, but so effective. There has been a spurt of enthusiasm in the UK this year for timelapse, with strong showings from Yorkshire and Dorset. Take a look at this blogpost to get a list of our favourites - I particularly recommend the Dorset by Night film, showing off the night sky and coastline to stunning effect. Cost? Nothing, but your time and patience.

9. User-generated content
The elephant in the room, this. But 2012 was another year where Content is King became the mantra following changes to Google’s algorithms creating panic among spammed sites. They, and everybody else, is now turning to UGC as creating fresh content for thousands of pages is proving too costly. Several large online travel sites are starting to play with UGC and I say nothing - except you have to think about how to get it, ask for the rights to use and tag/host it. Big subject.

10. Google Hangouts
I’ve just started to use these but can see big potential. Get up to 10 people together to chat about a subject - let’s say, the temples of Laos, or the Amazon river boats or restaurants in Florence. Tell clients about to go on one of these trips to watch the hangout and join in with questions - or get clients who have already been on one of the trips to talk. See the potential? And the best thing - the hangout recording is posted straight to YouTube, so you can start to build a library of specialist subjects….