The Goss Agency proudly stands by the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe members in North Dakota who have braved tear gas, rubber bullets, and freezing temperatures to protect their drinking water and culture. The Standing Rock Sioux are currently soliciting donations for legal, sanitary, and emergency purposes to ensure the safety and well-being of the protesters.…
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Branding Process Kicks Off For Elizabeth City, NC
By Ryan Laffler, Account Manager Two weeks ago, The Goss Agency had the pleasure of visiting one of its clients, Elizabeth City, to present the results from our branding process. Located on the Pasquotank River in Eastern North Carolina, Elizabeth City truly is a gem of Southern charm and culture. The branding process uncovered Elizabeth…
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Classic Creative – Haywood County
Haywood County, after our branding workshop filtering and prioritizing all the features and visitor experiences, determined that the authentic Appalachian culture and clean natural environment were the assets that rose to the top. Thus, “Haywood County, Authentic Appalachian, pure and simple” was born. A new logo was created by illustrating the landscape in a turn-of-the-century…
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4 Ways To Attract Millennials To Your Destination
By: Courtney Jacobs, Account Intern Millennials are armed to be the driving force behind the travel industry. They use travel to go on adventures, learn other languages and study. Why are they so eager to travel? This generation was jaded by the recession and now places less importance on saving for retirement and instead values…
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Q+A: HOW TO OPTIMIZE PINTEREST FOR YOUR DESTINATION
By Gabrielle Diepenbrock, Account Coordinator and Social Media Manager 1. Why is Pinterest important for travel destinations? You may ask: Isn’t Pinterest just a website where stay-at-home moms find cool recipes and quirky DIY crafts? While there may be some truth in that, there is so much more to Pinterest that your destination can benefit…
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Why You Need to be Focusing on Native Advertising
By: Ryan Laffler, Account Manager & Digital Director Display ads, the advertisements that you see on the top and sidebars of almost every webpage nowadays, are in decline. One part of the problem is that they are rarely relevant to the user. While this has changed somewhat with Google Adsense’s targeting algorithm, it started to…
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Pin It! – The 3 Most Important Tips to Optimize Your Pinterest
By Travis LeJune, Account Intern Do you have a Pinterest yet? If you are a shopper, you should definitely get one. If you are a seller, you MUST have one! Sure, it is still a fairly young social media platform, but it has been churning up some extremely surprising statistics we think you should know…
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Sustain Your Brand using Instagram and Food
By Courtney Jacobs, Account Intern Brands are constantly looking for ways to engage with consumers on social media. However, one challenge is noticing the trends occurring on various platforms and capitalizing on them successfully before the competition. One such trend that is growing in popularity centers around food. It’s hard to find someone who doesn’t…
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Space: The Final Frontier of Tourism
Space tourism. Not in my lifetime, right? Not according to Jeff Bezos, CEO of Amazon, who believes his space exploration company Blue Origin will have thrill-seeking tourists in space as soon as 2018. Read more about this exciting development here. Learn more about this exciting project here.
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Creative History: Qualla Arts Basket Ad
[mp_row] [mp_span col="12"] Here is how we, “Turn Facts Into Visitation” in an actual campaign. In researching the history of the Cherokee and their culture in preparation of an ad campaign to be designed to transcend all media, we came across a simple fact that might be overlooked by many. After all, the fact was…
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Conclusions about Cultural Tourism by World Tourism Organization
Excerpt from our Cultural Tourism whitepaper. If you're interested in receiving this white paper, sign up for our newsletter from our homepage or our Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/thegossagency/app/100265896690345/. A set of conclusions has been offered by the World Tourism Organization with respect to planning for cultural tourism. DEFINE TOURISM PRODUCTS The process above is one way to take the sometimes historic,…
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The Cultural Tourism Discovery Process
Excerpt from our Cultural Tourism Whitepaper, available via newsletter sign-up: http://eepurl.com/bM3KBX Our Cultural Tourism Discover Process is called Culture Context™ and it depends on a thorough understanding of the local culture and the context in which a particular destination competes. That context is defined by three domains: 1) the place 2) the people 3) the peer group. We sometimes…
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World Trade Organization’s 6 Categories of Cultural Tourism
The most comprehensive view of cultural tourism comes from the World Trade Organization. Based on 2012 global survey, they identified six cultural heritage categories:
Handicrafts and visual arts
Gastronomy and culinary
Social practices, rituals, and festive events
Music and performing arts
Oral traditions and expressions
Knowledge and practices concerning nature
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The Trend Toward Post Modernism
Excerpt from our Cultural Tourism Whitepaper, available via newsletter sign-up: http://eepurl.com/bM3KBX Of equal significance is the trend driving the trend. The fact is, today’s interest in cultural tourism is really a manifestation of a larger and even more fundamental trend: post-modernism. Culturally, we crave that which is more personally relevant and less packaged or mass produced. For…
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The Real Impact of a Cultural Tourism Strategy
By John Heenan, Cultural Tourism Relations To receive our Cultural Tourism Whitepaper, sign up here: http://eepurl.com/bM3KBX Destination marketing is thriving in the US and around the world. One significant trend is emerging and is proving to be a real economic driver that DMOs and tourism offices can easily embrace and deploy today by embracing a cultural tourism…
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Cultural Traveler Demographics
Insights from our Cultural Tourism whitepaper. Read the full report by signing up for our newsletter. From our experience with destination marketing, we’ve developed a sophisticated and nuanced understanding of the cultural traveler that we use to develop cultural tourism strategies. Below are a few generalizations which transcend specific places and population groups. The market…
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What is Dark Tourism?
By Dari Mullins, Account Manager While in Savannah at the Coastal Nature, Coastal Culture: Environmental Histories of the Georgia Coast symposium last week I encountered a new tourism term–-Dark Tourism. Ironically, I had participated in this form of tourism without even knowing it by visiting two cemeteries while on a work trip. I walked through the…
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Cultural Tourism Whitepaper Introduction
Introduction to our recently released Cultural Tourism Whitepaper: Cultural tourism. It sounds like a niche. In reality it is something different. Cultural tourism is a huge opportunity and a growing trend. According to the Travel Industry Association of America, roughly eighty percent of the 150,000,000+ adults who travel more than fifty miles from their homes can…
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Cultural Tourism Insights from Our Cultural Tourism Whitepaper
by Brady Rothschild, Account Coordinator and Mars Hill University student Here we break down five important takeaways from our Cultural Tourism whitepaper to help benefit your destination. If you're interested in receiving this white paper, sign up for our newsletter from our Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/thegossagency/app/100265896690345/ or on our homepage. What is cultural tourism? The World Tourism Organization…
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Tourism Notes: Millennial Travel
Millennials are the rising generation, entering the workforce and demanding control of their travel experiences. Many have very specific needs and wants and love to travel. The Millennial generation wants to explore, but they do not want to be told what to do.
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What Is Cultural Tourism?
There are many exciting new trends in travel and tourism marketing to look forward to in 2016. Mobile, virtual reality, personalization, content, and so many more. Of all the predictions, the one that is most exciting and holds the greatest potential impact for destination marketing executives is the rise of Cultural Tourism.
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Cultural Tourism Destinations
Cultural tourism isn’t a brand new term, but the concept isn’t quite as simple to grasp as promoting, for example, a striking mountain range in your area or a Michelin rated restaurant
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New Cultural Tourism Facts Series
We've started a new Cultural Tourism Facts series on Instagram and Twitter to help raise awareness of how "We Turn Facts into Visitation" for our cultural tourism clients. Be sure to follow along at https://www.instagram.com/thegossagency/, handle @thegossagency, or on Twitter at https://twitter.com/thegossagency, handle again @thegossagency. People love these factoids that are perfect for sharing at a cocktail…
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New Cultural Tourism Division
Driving travel and tourism success is getting increasingly hard as more destination marketers search for ways to increase awareness and differentiate their offerings. At the same time, more travelers, from boomers to millennials are searching for new adventures, forgoing the traditional list of destinations to find unique, authentic, and culturally enriching experiences. I know you have many challenges that keep you…
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