It’s taken me a while to distill my thoughts on TBEX (the annual travelbloggers conference) but with everything stripped away — the swell parties, the patio uke lessons, the “Hey, it’s awesome to see you again!”s, the stuff outside the agenda — I think it boils down to this:
I would like to us to focus a bit less on what we can get:
Lucrative sponsorship deals, trips to exotic places, fancy equipment, x100s of Facebook Friends, page views, Twitter followers, advertising contracts, yadda yadda yadda…
And more on what we might create:
Beautiful photographs that transport the viewer to a place, stories that bring our readers along with us, resources that are genuinely useful to our audiences, and thriving communities that foster participation, transparency, thoughtfulness, and progress.
Don’t get me wrong, I had a great time and it was an impressive event. But… less getting stuff, more making wonderful, lasting things.
Have nothing in your house that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful. — William Morris
Bad artists always admire each others’ work — Oscar Wilde
Your mileage may vary. It wouldn’t be the first time.
Totally related, this post on the state of blogging in travel.
Never been to one of these yet, sounds like it was a good time! (even if some parts were a bit…business oriented). Would be great to see the faces behind all the posts.
Let’s be clear, I’m FAR from anti-business. I like having money in my pocket and I like stuff.
I just think we’re not talking enough about how to make good work and who we’re making it for.
Not come across that William Morris quote before but I love it and it is now officially my new favourite!
I get what you are saying Pam. No one is going to disagree with the notion that we should focus on creating great stuff. I get it. I truly do.
However, the problem in the travel media industry isn’t a lack of quality content. Advertisers aren’t cutting back spending on travel magazines because the writing isn’t good. Newspapers aren’t dropping their travel sections because of poor photography.
The fundamental problem in 2012 is economic. The problem everyone from novice bloggers to experiences travel writers has to deal with is the business side of things.
So long as the barriers to entry of becoming a travel writer are zero (and that is where they will stay so long as the internet exists) we will have people creating crappy content. That is something we are just going to have to learn to live with.
There will never be a time where we can say “the quality of content is so good that we don’t have to worry about being better”.
We are in a transition period right now. If being a travel writer/photographer/blogger is going to be possible as a full time occupation for people, then the discussion of how to do it is going to be at the top of most people’s agenda.
I agree that there should be more time spent on content creation at TBEX, however, the business side of things is ALWAYS going to take priority at these sort of conferences. Getting trips and freelance assignments was always the primary purpose of organizations like SATW. Not much has changed.
See you at Book Passage! 🙂
Gary, just so it’s clear, I’m going to say it *again*: I’m not anti-business. I didn’t say “No business! All art!”
Thanks for getting the rest of it. Weirdly, I think we agree. Or maybe that’s no so weird.
No, wait — an additional thought — there’s also the assumption that the ONLY motivation for having a travelblog is as a business model. It’s not, that’s simply not always the case. Some folks build blogs as portfolio sites and their goal is to publish in other places. Some folks do them purely for fun. Some are building communities — they want to connect with fellow travelers — this is how I started. Some are trying to learn to write or hone their web skills. Some folks are bloggers for hire on network sites. The folks who gave me a ride to Denver said, “If I can get a few of my friends off the couch to see the world, my blog is a success.” Some people want to be skilled hobbyists and some really just want to share their trip with their friends and family back home.
So creating a space where the dominant discussion is business driven leaves a lot of folks with… not much meat, really. It’s a one size fits all approach to providing a path for bloggers when really, there are a lot of different ways to be successful.
Can I be the politician and agree with you both?
You are not alone in your sentiment Pam. Spud and I discussed this briefly at the show. If there is one consistent bit of feedback we received that would improve the show it was the need for more sessions focusing on how to create better content. Be that writing skills, photography, video etc.
We hear you and there will be more of that going forward.
I have to also agree with Gary. I really wish we had added another question to the attendee survey that just went out to everyone (please fill that out and send it back asap btw).
But if you were to ask all the bloggers at TBEX if they thought they were paid less than they deserved, just the right amount or more than they deserved I guarantee you the large majority would answer less than they deserved.
Gary is right, there are tons of great travel bloggers creating fantastic content. While some are making a living, they are very few. Industry is still trying to figure out how to measure ROI and justify paying bloggers. I am sure you will agree that term is still meant as a pejorative by many in the industry and you are viewed as less than a “real” travel writer when you are “just a blogger”.
Our number one issue in the travel blogging space is educating bloggers and industry on how to connect with each other and do businesses with each other. Both sides have a lot to learn in this area.
I think the 200,000 page views and 2,000 appointments set on the speed dating site in less than three weeks and standing room only sessions in the monetization track are proof of that.
Art is important, but a very successful author told me recently that he spent twice as much time promoting his books as he did writing them.
I think that formula applies to all successful artists be they writers, photographers, painters, musicians etc.
By the way I think this is important to mention. In traditional media most journalists were sheltered from doing the dirty work of marketing their content and business development. Many of them are having a very hard time facing the truth that someone always had to market their work for them. Those days are gone forever.
You are the creative department, the sales department, the editorial department and the marketing department. All of those topics are important for any bloggers successful professional development.
So, as with Gary, I don’t disagree with you. Good connections are important and TBEX provides a venue for that. I didn’t participate in speed dating and I STILL have a pile of follow up conversations that I believe will be good for me from a business perspective. I think that’s only part of the picture, though.
As a constituency, we *do* like to skip the line and go straight to decorating before we’ve laid a solid foundation. I’ve made people mad at me by suggesting they take for a beginning writing class, as though that was some kind of insult or outrageous idea. It is, however, the single most useful thing I’ve done in my career as a blogger.
[Next in line? Being at the conferences. SxSW changed my life, and not because of some session I sat in, but because of the people I met in between. BWE hooked me up but good, and I can’t say enough about what good TBEX has done me.]
If we do not prioritize interesting, compelling, or useful content, all the business training in the world will leave us at the edges of the marketplace selling junk.
And when we have to do everything — sales and marketing and logistics and code and and and… we have to do *content*, too. It’s not last in line, it is the foundation for everything we do. Without visual (photo, video, design) and writing skills, we make trash. You see it all over the web.
In my snarkier moments, I have taken to saying “Don’t think writing is a critical path? Let’s take a vowel off your keyboard every day until you change your mind. I’ll just pop the letter “e” off for starters… okay then! Carry on.”
We agree 8)
OK, so mandatory summer reading (pre-TBEX12 Costa Brava):
1) Elements of Style – Strunk & White
2) Art of War – Sun Tzu
3) How to Win Friends & Influence People – Dale Carnegie
Hope to see you all in Costa Brava,
JSC
Throw in some Jakob Neilsen on web design and usability and we’re done.
I would add to the list the Google Webmaster Tools SEO Guide.
Every now and then, someone will ask me out to coffee with a mind towards learning about “how to be a blogger.” And when they ask me about SEO and being found, I always ask the same thing as an answer: Why? By who? Once you know the answer to that, then we’ll talk about whether or not you need an SEO strategy. Often, they don’t know, they’re totally stopped dead by that.
So I’d argue it’s not on the pre-conference list of basics.
A few more, sure, but overall I liked the mix. Of course customer satisfaction depends on an attendee’s background — mine tilts content — and also where an attendee is on the continuum of business development.
Bears repeating because it’s my reply to Gary: Not everyone is on a blog-as-business path and we shouldn’t default to the assumption that they are.
Agreed, I saw your response.
Interesting discussion. You know the one question I’d like to know – how many of those who aren’t blog-as-business types would actually pay to attend something like TBEX? I’m curious what the mix was at the conference of people who are just doing it for fun vs. those trying to make a living. A question like that on the TBEX survey would probably go a long way to helping design the most appropriate session topics.
This is a great question, Scott. But check it out. While my blog isn’t my business per se, it is a critical part of what passes, at my house, for a business strategy. So monitization, affiliate sales, that kind of thing, take a back seat to my goals as a writer, but the role my blog plays in that is SO not trivial.
As a result, things that teach me how to make better stuff further my business goals.
Hi Pam,
Thank you for posting this. I agree wholeheartedly with you. I confess that writing and photography and CREATIVITY is what appeals to me in a travel blog–as a blogger and a reader of blogs.
As I read the thread of comments, I discovered an undercurrent of unease that’s bothered me at the two TBEX events that I attended: The idea that all blogs and bloggers are alike.
As you pointed out, there are many different reasons why people are travel blogging–each with different goals, editorial styles, readers and whatnot. It’s really similar to the diversity of travel magazines, from service-oriented to narrative to budget to whatever. Lumping us all together might be the challenge–when it comes to TBEX sessions and these kinds of discussions.
Also, I believe there are many different travel blogging opportunities out there–from the entrepreneurial to the corporate-sponsored and more. In full disclosure, as you know, I was a freelance magazine journalist hired by a hotel chain in Hawaii to write destination content for their website. I do not write promotional copy; I write purely about the destination. I cover the same kinds of topics I did as a freelancer. You could call me a paid hack now. But I can also say I have a good salary, 401k, health insurance, a home office (the dogs Nickel and Lulu are both snoring at my feet right now) and complete say over editorial direcition of the blog and website that I edit. What’s more I am writing more than I ever did as a freelance journalist, my writing has improved ten-fold, I am traveling more and having way more fun, and my bills are getting paid. Glory be.
I offer two things to ponder:
1. One way to think about TBEX going forward is to give travel bloggers inventive ideas on how to be travel bloggers. Travel blogging doesn’t have to be just the owner-operator model. (Are you still with us, Rick Calvert?) Let’s get creative with this thing called “travel blogging.” (Wow, I just realized that one doesn’t even need to HAVE a travel blog to be a travel blogger, for what that’s worth. I was a travel writer once without having a travel magazine.)
2. And to think about travel blogs–and TBEX sessions–not so much as “beginner,” “intermediate” and “advanced” but much like the printed travel magazines do–destination/geography, budget, luxury, service, narrative, etc. This kind of thinking–and slicing and dicing TBEX break-out sessions–might help bloggers narrow their focus, position their blog and find their niche in the travel blogging world.
In the end, what’s great is that we are having these conversations. And that’s really what TBEX is all about, I think, don’t you?
A big fat YES to these conversations. Kim, it’s always GREAT to see you, too.
There was some split by narrative/not last year in Vancouver. I think good, practical writing tips trump the type of subject matter, but I think I take your point — my motivations as a narrative focused writer are SO different from that of the service writers I know.
I really appreciate that you’ve well defined that owner/operator vs. not split. That helps a lot with a point I was trying to make. Plus, even if you ARE an owner/operator, it’s not necessarily the money making arm of your plan. It certainly doesn’t HAVE to be. I mean, don’t get me wrong, a little passive income is nice, but if I were interested in sales and marketing as a goal, I’d be taking a very different path.
I want your job. That’s not a secret, is it?
Happy to leave it to you in my will. You are younger than I am, right? Well, at least, you have fewer grey hairs than I do!
Hi Pam ~
Thank you for this post. I didn’t go to TBEX this year, and part of the reason is because the things months leading up to this led me to feel like this was going to happen.
I’ve actually been in a state of flux lately where I feel like the passion that got me started in travel blogging have been heavily bogged down by “the industry” pressuring me to thing about SEO and sponsorships and partnerships and press trips and and and …
That’s not why I am a travel blogger. I write because I love to write – at least that’s why I used to do it. I’m glad I skipped the conference this year because I took the time to travel – primarily unplugged – for two weeks to think about what’s important in this job that gives me so much freedom, and I’ve decided it’s not all of those things that I’m supposed to be worked up over.
I’ve unsubscribed to many blogs as of late because they’re crammed with SEO and void of humanity. I want to read quality writing, and that’s what I’m going back to find in myself. I’m attending a couple quality travel *writing* conferences that aren’t bogged down with the business end of things because I never intended to live off my blog. I don’t need to make big bucks with it. I want to have quality experiences I can share with other people in a very real and genuine way. I’m not sure if and how the travel blogging industry as a whole can get back to that notion, nor am I sure that the vast majority of people would be interested in doing so, but I’ve made the personal decision to focus less on what I get and more on what I create, just as you’ve noted above.
I’ve whined, and yeah, it’s whining, before about the shifting focus I see in the “industry” — away from craft and towards marketing. I accept the inevitability of this, I have a good enough understanding of the market economy to see why it happens. But that doesn’t mean I have to participate, and I’m doing my best to keep my goals clear, the first one being to write well. If I wanted to live off travel writing from the get go I’d have taken a very different path, one that went directly after commercial engagement and away from writing as a craft.
So, yeah, see you at Book Passage. 🙂
Simple and straight to the point. I like it and totally share the opinion on how content should be a quality one overall. Is the main and first reason why we all probably started traveling and writing in the 1st place. Cheers! See you there