My daughter is a
blogger. I keep asking her to explain blogging to me, but the
generation gap is too wide. But I have learned a bit.
She says she started
her Web log (blog for short) as a highly personal journal of her
daily activities and thoughts. Eventually, she allowed a few close
friends access to the site.
They reciprocate, and
now these college kids keep track of each other via their
respective blogs.
Recently, blogging
has expanded well beyond the personal reflections of individuals.
Businesses use blogs as a kind of continuous focus group. Political
organizations use them to track consumer reactions and promote
their causes.
Bloggers organize
themselves around an infinite number of subjects. If you want to
sound off on a new movie or the use of steroids in sports, just
enter your search and then you can join the discussion.
In travel, blogging
took root as a way for travelers to record their daily experiences.
Many travelers take their laptops along and transmit regular
reports.
And travel marketers
are learning to plug into these sites to see how their customers
are responding to trips. In its travel section, Forbes.com has a
list of its favorite travel blogs.
Some marketers think
the blog will largely supplant other means of supplier-buyer
communication, but were a far cry from that day. Travel blogs are
proliferating, but the range of quality varies widely.
And theres no
assurance that some of the entries arent the handiwork of people
who have a vested interest in molding consumer opinion.
Nonetheless, it would
be foolhardy to ignore the potential of blogs in the future of
travel marketing.
One of the
unquestioned changes wrought by the Web is the steady shift of
power from seller to buyer.
The consumer began
seizing control of the buyer process early in the Web era, and the
word-of-mouth, or word-of-blog, recommendations of peers have a
degree of credibility that is hard to duplicate in paid
advertising.
Blogs can play a key
role in helping consumers, agents and suppliers identify important
trends in the marketing of travel.
Like other Internet
devices, blogs must be sorted out just as one must sort out the
difference between reading major critics views of a new movie and
the opinions of Mr. and Mrs. Jones who saw the picture last
night.
Id be inclined to
give more weight to Roger Eberts reaction, but sometimes I find
that Mr. and Mrs. Jones have insights that are extremely
useful.