Travel Content Creation

TikTok just rolled out a feature that could disrupt the whole hospitality industry. Meet TikTok Go: The first major step toward social platforms becoming full-fledged booking engines. We've been saying it for years, social media has become the primary discovery engine for modern travelers. 81% of travelers use social for travel inspiration. Gen Z and millennials aren't starting on Booking.com or Expedia - they're scrolling through Instagram and TikTok, getting inspired by content. But until now, there's been massive friction in the discovery-to-booking journey. A potential guest discovers your property on social media, gets excited, wants to book, but then has to click through your profile, find your website, navigate to booking pages, and enter dates. At each step, you lose potential guests. But TikTok Go changes this completely. Here's how it works: Eligible creators can partner with hotels to create content and earn commissions when that content drives bookings. Users can now book hotels directly inside TikTok through a Booking.com integration. Each participating hotel gets a dedicated landing page showing prices, amenities, reviews, nearby attractions, and related TikTok videos. This is a fundamental shift creating several massive advantages: 1. Seamless Discovery-to-Booking: Guests inspired by your content can book immediately, eliminating the friction that kills most social media conversions. 2. Potentially Better Attribution: For the first time, we could have clear tracking from social content to actual bookings, solving the attribution blindspots that have plagued social media ROI calculations. 3. Creator Economy Leverage: You can tap into established creator audiences without building your own following from scratch. The program is already active in Indonesia and Japan, now rolling out across the U.S., with plans to expand beyond hotels into food, wellness, and other local services. We're witnessing social media platforms taking their first major step toward overtaking OTAs. The exact mechanics will evolve, but the change has been set in motion. Every major shift in hospitality creates a brief window where early adopters capture outsized returns. Websites in the 90s. Mobile booking in the 2010s. Social commerce in the 2020s. The hotels building serious social media followings today will be best positioned when these booking features become standard across all platforms. While most properties post occasional content and hope for the best, smart operators are treating social media as their primary guest acquisition engine. TikTok Go is just the beginning. What are your thoughts?

The travel industry is leaving serious money and impact on the table. Hotels, airlines, and tourism boards still lean heavily on traditional editorial coverage when it comes to media or FAM trips. Journalism will always matter (I’m a freelance journalist myself), but the data is undeniable: most travelers are booking trips because of what they see on social media. I have worked in this space from every angle: ✈️ as a journalist telling destination stories 📸 as a content creator with a loyal, engaged audience 🌏 and as the founder of a travel community that physically brings travelers to destinations, directly impacting tourism dollars From where I stand, one thing is clear. Creators and community founders are not just a “nice-to-have” in your marketing mix. They are one of the most powerful, conversion-driving tools a destination can have. Yet somehow, we are still being asked to work for free. The same brands who will spend tens of thousands on a glossy print ad will hesitate to invest in the people actually driving bookings. Here is why that mindset needs to change: Recently, I worked with a tourism board as an influencer on a media trip and at the same time, I hosted a private trip there. While on the FAM, I brought 5 paying travelers booked in 24 hours, two weeks before departure. Those travelers posted content too, even though they are not influencers. The tourism board was shocked at both the speed of sales and the ripple effect of organic content created by everyday people. Next month, I am hosting a trip to Bali. Seventy Americans are flying across the world for this experience. That is over $300,000 in tourism dollars generated from one trip. That is 70 travelers capturing moments, telling their own stories, and inspiring their own networks. That is 70 sources of user-generated content, plus my own, plus the long-tail impact when their friends and followers start planning their own Bali trips. This is not hypothetical ROI….It’s real and measurable right now. Travel brands, this is your sign. Stop asking creators to work for free. Start seeing the value of influencer and community-led travel, and pay accordingly. The future is not just about one campaign or article posted once. It is about the social ripple effect that drives bookings, loyalty, and lasting brand love. If you want travelers to choose you, you need to meet them where they are already planning and booking. Right now, that is on social media and in communities they trust. #travel #tourism #hospitality #communitybuilding #creatoreconomy #hotels #airlines #tourismboards #journalism

A lot of destinations are spending big money on marketing and still blending into the background. Not because the places aren’t incredible, but because the content feels completely lifeless. I visit roughly 15 countries per year, I see it every single day, drives me crazy. Every destination says the same things. Hidden gem. Authentic culture. World class hospitality. Breathtaking views...blah blah blah. Once you’ve seen it a thousand times, it all becomes wallpaper. The problem is that most destination marketing is built around what executives want to approve instead of what travelers actually connect with emotionally. Real travel is messy, emotional, funny, loud, human, spontaneous, cultural, and personal. But most tourism content feels like it was written by committee inside a boardroom. Here’s the tactical part that DMOs seriously need to understand: 1. Stop marketing your destination like a brochure. Nobody opens social media hoping to read tourism slogans. 2. Put real people at the center of the content. Chefs, taxi drivers, bartenders, musicians, fishermen, hotel staff, street vendors, grandmothers cooking local food. That’s the soul of a destination. 3. Show movement and energy. Too much destination content feels static. Travel is emotion in motion. 4. Create content around moments, not landmarks. A place becomes memorable because of how it made someone feel. 5. Stop trying to make every post look luxury. Some of the best performing travel content online feels raw and immediate. 6. Think platform first. A LinkedIn audience, Instagram audience, TikTok audience, and YouTube audience consume content completely differently. Most DMOs still post the exact same thing everywhere. 7. Build long-term creator relationships. One influencer trip and 12 Instagram Stories is not a strategy. 8. Start creating content for AI discovery now. The destinations that tell deeper stories online today are going to dominate search visibility tomorrow. Tourism marketing has changed. Attention spans changed. Consumer behavior changed. The algorithm changed. AI changed discovery. But a huge part of the tourism world is still marketing destinations like it’s a printed magazine ad from the good old days. And then they wonder why engagement is flat. 🙄🙄🙄 --- If you like the way I look at the world of hospitality, let’s chat: scott@mrscotteddy.com

While the travel industry races to dominate Instagram and TikTok, many sustainable travel brands, especially those who are unbranded, local or community-driven are missing out on a quieter but incredibly powerful platform: 𝐏𝐢𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐞𝐬𝐭. Unlike traditional social media, Pinterest isn’t designed for likes or virality. It’s a visual search engine where users go to plan their lives, not scroll through them. And that’s precisely why it’s one of the most aligned platforms for sustainable tourism. Pinterest is where people search for how they want to travel, not who they want to travel with. And here’s where it gets interesting: as of now, 96% of all searches on Pinterest are unbranded. That means users are typing in things like “eco retreats in Latin America”, “cultural trips for women”, or “offbeat travel experiences” not company names. This creates a rare opportunity for grassroots, regenerative, and offbeat tour operators to be discovered without needing global recognition or massive ad budgets. 𝟏. 𝐏𝐢𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐞𝐬𝐭 𝐖𝐨𝐫𝐤𝐬 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐔𝐧𝐛𝐫𝐚𝐧𝐝𝐞𝐝 In a space where big OTAs (online travel agencies) dominate Google and social algorithms, Pinterest flips the script. The fact that almost every search is unbranded makes it the perfect discovery tool for small, community-rooted experiences from a women-led trek in Morocco to a seaweed-foraging tour in Chile. If your brand centers around values instead of volume, Pinterest is your space. 𝟐. 𝐈𝐭 𝐑𝐞𝐚𝐜𝐡𝐞𝐬 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐑𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭 𝐀𝐠𝐞 𝐆𝐫𝐨𝐮𝐩 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐒𝐮𝐬𝐭𝐚𝐢𝐧𝐚𝐛𝐥𝐞 𝐓𝐫𝐚𝐯𝐞𝐥 Pinterest’s core users are women aged 25-44, many of whom are sustainability-conscious, wellness-driven, and in a phase of life where they’re actively planning meaningful travel solo retreats, family holidays, cultural immersions or low-impact honeymoons. These women are not just dreaming, they’re deciding. This demographic is increasingly steering tourism demand toward slower, greener, and more inclusive experiences. 𝟑. 𝐘𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐂𝐨𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐧𝐭 𝐒𝐭𝐚𝐲𝐬 𝐕𝐢𝐬𝐢𝐛𝐥𝐞 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐘𝐞𝐚𝐫𝐬 One of Pinterest’s biggest advantages is how content remains evergreen. A post today about “regenerative farming stays in Portugal” can resurface six months or even six years later and still drive traffic. This is vastly different from platforms where visibility dies within hours. Plus, Pinterest doesn’t rely on followers. It's driven by visual design and keyword search, meaning anyone can get visibility with the right content strategy. If you're a sustainable travel brand or tour operator especially one focused on authenticity, culture, and community. Pinterest could be your most impactful channel. The conscious traveler is already out there, searching. Pinterest is where many of them begin that journey.

I asked AI to plan a luxury trip to Jordan last weekend. It beat every tourism board pitch I've seen this year on two layers. On the third, it was hopeless. Here's the framework I now use. The AI-versus-humans debate in travel is lazy because it's binary. The honest answer is layered. Each layer has a different winner, and most brands don't know which layer they're actually competing on. I call it the 3-Layer AI Travel Stack: → Discovery Layer: AI wins. Logistics, timing, pricing, comparison. AI does this faster and better than any human ever will. → Curation Layer: It's a tie. AI filters brilliantly but needs human taste to rank what actually matters to a specific traveller. Taste is critical and very hard for machines. I think it's the most important part of travel marketing now. → Meaning Layer: Humans win. Emotional arc, narrative, relationships, cultural nuance based on a persons unique preferences. This is where AI falls apart completely, and is where you should focus when creating content. Every CMO should be able to answer this in one sentence: which layer is my brand actually competing on, and is that layer defensible for the next three years? Which layer are my teams strongest at and where do I need help? If the answer is discovery, rebuild the strategy now. If it's meaning, protect it like capital. I think this is the most useful mental model I've developed for trying to figure out where a travel marketer stands against AI. It's not about whether AI will disrupt travel marketing (that is a given). It's about knowing exactly which part of your value proposition is safe, which part isn't and which parts you need help with 🚀 Run the 3-layer audit on your own brand this week. Which layer are you actually winning on? Reply in the comments, or DM me your answer and I'll tell you what I see.

Your travel content isn't a destination anymore. It's raw material. While most travel marketers are still optimizing for clicks, smart brands are realizing their content has become infrastructure for AI systems. Here's the shift that's happening right now: - From Traffic Driver to Training Data Your destination guides, tour descriptions, and travel tips aren't just web pages anymore. They're being retrieved, understood, and assembled into AI answers that millions of travelers will see. - New Goal: Get Included, Not Clicked Success used to mean someone clicked through to your site. Now it means your expertise gets cited, quoted, and synthesized into the AI response. The traveler might never visit your website, but they're still consuming your knowledge. - Content as Building Blocks Think of every piece of content as a LEGO brick that AI systems can snap together. Your "Best Time to Visit Santorini" blog post might get combined with someone else's flight data and hotel recommendations to create the perfect AI travel answer. The metrics that matter are changing. Instead of just tracking pageviews, ask yourself: Is my content quotable? Is it becoming part of the collective travel intelligence that AI systems rely on? Your content strategy needs to optimize for retrieval and synthesis, not just search rankings. Are you creating content that AI wants to include? DMOs... you may be in trouble if you haven't changed your reporting to focus on this over traffic.

Have you noticed how many travel companies now operate like media brands? Discovery rarely starts on a booking site anymore. It happens earlier, and more gradually. People spend weeks, sometimes months, watching, saving, and researching destinations across social platforms, search, editorial, and creator content. That shift has changed how travel companies think. Less like advertisers, more like publishers. The goal isn’t just to sell, it’s to stay relevant long enough to be considered. Some have been doing this for years. One of the earliest examples is probably Marriott International. They built an in-house content studio and brought in talent from The Walt Disney Company to run it. The focus was on films and editorial stories designed to inspire, not just promote. Turkish Airlines leaned into cinematic campaigns and long-form storytelling, using athletes, celebrities, and documentaries to position the airline within a broader cultural narrative. Accor has taken a different route, building relevance through partnerships across music, sport, and fashion, shaping a brand that sits closer to culture than traditional hospitality. Even national tourism bodies like VisitBritain have adopted this approach, using film and television-inspired storytelling to draw people into destinations. The common thread is fairly simple. Travel brands are not longer in the business of just selling flights, rooms, or itineraries anymore - they’re competing on attention. Because attention is what ultimately shapes discovery -> discovery is what shapes desire -> desire is what eventually turns into bookings.

𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗺𝗼𝘀𝘁 𝗶𝗺𝗽𝗼𝗿𝘁𝗮𝗻𝘁 𝗔𝗜 𝗮𝗻𝗻𝗼𝘂𝗻𝗰𝗲𝗺𝗲𝗻𝘁 𝗳𝗼𝗿 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝘁𝗿𝗮𝘃𝗲𝗹 𝗶𝗻𝗱𝘂𝘀𝘁𝗿𝘆 𝘁𝗵𝗶𝘀 𝘆𝗲𝗮𝗿 𝗱𝗶𝗱𝗻’𝘁 𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗲 𝗳𝗿𝗼𝗺 𝗮 𝘁𝗿𝗮𝘃𝗲𝗹 𝗼𝗿 𝗵𝗼𝘁𝗲𝗹 𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗽𝗮𝗻𝘆. 𝗔𝗻𝗱 𝗶𝘁 𝗱𝗶𝗱𝗻’𝘁 𝗵𝗮𝗽𝗽𝗲𝗻 𝗮𝘁 𝗮 𝗰𝗼𝗻𝗳𝗲𝗿𝗲𝗻𝗰𝗲. Over the past two years we’ve seen an explosion of: • AI for travel conferences • AI strategy webinars • AI transformation panels • AI consultants publishing thought leadership But here’s the uncomfortable reality: Most of the real AI disruption in travel won’t come from presentations about AI. It will come from platforms that 𝗯𝗶𝗹𝗹𝗶𝗼𝗻𝘀 of travelers already use every day. And one of the biggest just made its move. For the first time in more than a decade, Google has rolled out a major redesign of Maps and introduced “Ask Maps,” a Gemini powered conversational interface. At first glance, it looks like a helpful chatbot. But step back and the bigger shift becomes clear. Google Maps is evolving from a navigation tool into an agentic travel planning platform. Travelers can now ask things like: • “Plan a 10-day trip through Italy focused on food and small towns.” • “Design a luxury resort itinerary in the Caribbean.” • “Build a pre- and post-cruise experience around Barcelona.” And the AI assembles recommendations using Google’s enormous dataset of: • places • reviews • photos • geographic context • behavioral signals from billions of travelers But the real breakthrough may be this: The system learns continuously. Every interaction helps Ask Maps understand a traveler’s preferences, over time, the AI builds a living preference profile that improves recommendations trip after trip. And here’s the line the industry should pay attention to: The AI that helps plan the trip may ultimately control what gets discovered. Because Google Maps is already used by well over a billion people every month during travel and local discovery. 𝗡𝗼𝘄 𝗶𝗺𝗮𝗴𝗶𝗻𝗲 𝘁𝗵𝗮𝘁 𝘀𝗰𝗮𝗹𝗲 𝗽𝗮𝗶𝗿𝗲𝗱 𝘄𝗶𝘁𝗵 𝗔𝗜 𝘁𝗵𝗮𝘁 𝗵𝗲𝗹𝗽𝘀 𝗽𝗹𝗮𝗻 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗲𝗻𝘁𝗶𝗿𝗲 𝗷𝗼𝘂𝗿𝗻𝗲𝘆. That has big implications for hotels, cruise lines, resorts, and destinations. Travel discovery has shifted from: Search → websites → booking platforms to Conversation → AI recommendation → itinerary creation It’s about who helps the traveler plan the trip in the first place. And if Google Maps becomes that planning layer, it may quietly become one of the most powerful distribution and discovery platforms in travel. So while the travel industry has spent the last two years talking about AI… Google 𝗷𝘂𝘀𝘁 𝗲𝗺𝗯𝗲𝗱𝗱𝗲𝗱 𝗶𝘁 𝗱𝗶𝗿𝗲𝗰𝘁𝗹𝘆 𝗶𝗻𝘁𝗼 𝗮 𝗽𝗿𝗼𝗱𝘂𝗰𝘁 𝘂𝘀𝗲𝗱 𝗯𝘆 𝗯𝗶𝗹𝗹𝗶𝗼𝗻𝘀 𝗼𝗳 𝘁𝗿𝗮𝘃𝗲𝗹𝗲𝗿𝘀. Sometimes the biggest disruption doesn’t come from a panel discussion. It comes from a product update. Curious how others in travel, hospitality, cruise, and destination marketing are thinking about this. We are entering the era of AI-native travel planning.

𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗧𝗿𝗮𝘃𝗲𝗹 𝗜𝗻𝗱𝘂𝘀𝘁𝗿𝘆’𝘀 𝗖𝗼𝗻𝘁𝗲𝗻𝘁 𝗣𝗿𝗼𝗯𝗹𝗲𝗺 𝗡𝗼 𝗢𝗻𝗲 𝗜𝘀 𝗧𝗮𝗹𝗸𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗔𝗯𝗼𝘂𝘁 I’ve been researching travellers for over 25 years, and one thing has become glaringly obvious: Most travel brands spend millions on attracting visitors to their websites, yet they lose more than half of them in the research phase. A recent Google study found that 52% of travellers alter their destination, flight, or accommodation choices during their planning process. That means they were triggered by an ad, an email, or a referral… but then? They kept searching. And too often, they book elsewhere. This is where the real battle begins—not in getting them to your site but in keeping them there and converting them. Why Most Travel Content Fails 🚨 With the explosion of ChatGPT-generated content, we’re seeing a flood of generic, uninspired travel articles that all sound exactly the same. Large language models pull from the same data pool, so if you’re using AI out of the box, your content is blending into the noise. ❌ No original thought ❌ No deep customer insights ❌ No trust-building authority And here’s the real danger: Travellers who can’t find engaging, research-backed content will leave your site and never return. Once they go down the Google rabbit hole, you’ve lost them forever. What Actually Works ✅ After 25 years of studying high-value travellers (those over 50, rich in both money and time), I know exactly what keeps them engaged and drives them to book. These are the top 4 things influencing their decisions: 1️⃣ Google searches & general Googling 2️⃣ Referrals from friends & family 3️⃣ Emails from travel companies 4️⃣ Reviews on Google & TripAdvisor Yet most brands aren’t leveraging this insight. They’re posting content for content’s sake, without strategic intent. The Solution? Research-Backed, Customer-Driven Content 🎯 I have developed an AI-assisted process that integrates my 25 years of traveller research into every piece of content we create. This means: ✅ Your brand stands out with original, primary research ✅ Your content builds trust and authority ✅ Your website becomes a high-converting resource ✅ Your bookings double—without increasing your ad spend I work directly with travel brands, tour operators, and agencies to craft bespoke, research-backed content strategies that align with how high-value travellers actually search, research, and book. This isn't just about producing more content—it's about producing the right content that keeps travellers engaged and drives revenue. Let’s Fix Your Content & Double Your Bookings If you’re ready to create high-impact, research-backed content that speaks to your ideal traveller and keeps them engaged, let’s talk. 📩 DM me today and let’s create a strategy that turns your website into a booking machine. #AI #TravelIndustry #Travelandtourism  #TravelMarketing #DestinationMarketing #ContentMarketing  

𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝘃𝗶𝗱𝗲𝗼 𝘀𝗵𝗼𝘄𝘀 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗿𝗲𝗮𝗹 𝘀𝗵𝗶𝗳𝘁 𝗵𝗮𝗽𝗽𝗲𝗻𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗶𝗻 𝘁𝗿𝗮𝘃𝗲𝗹 𝗱𝗶𝘀𝗰𝗼𝘃𝗲𝗿𝘆. The funnel has simply changed in a way that favors OTAs at every step. Google’s new AI and Web Guide experiences move the user from Sponsored listings to Paid placements to the Meta module and then directly into OTA organic carousels. The path never returns to hotels. It reinforces the duopoly at the top of the funnel while hotels are pushed further down the page. 𝗧𝗵𝗶𝘀 𝗶𝘀 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗺𝗼𝗺𝗲𝗻𝘁 𝘁𝗼 𝗮𝘀𝗸 𝗵𝗮𝗿𝗱𝗲𝗿 𝗾𝘂𝗲𝘀𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻𝘀. If AI agents and Web Guide treat your hotel as a data endpoint, but the OTA has richer, cleaner, and more complete structured data, the system will choose them. If your guests no longer start on your website, you need a strategy for discovery through machine readable content, not just marketing. Google is shaping results from the semantic layer, and OTAs have mastered that layer with complete schemas, stable room logic, and consistent ARI signals. 𝗪𝗵𝗮𝘁 𝘀𝘁𝗼𝗿𝘆 𝗶𝘀 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗶𝗻𝘁𝗲𝗿𝗻𝗲𝘁 𝘁𝗲𝗹𝗹𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗮𝗯𝗼𝘂𝘁 𝘆𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝗵𝗼𝘁𝗲𝗹, 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝘄𝗵𝗼 𝗶𝘀 𝘁𝗲𝗹𝗹𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗶𝘁? Most hotel websites were built as brochures, not commercial systems. They rely on fragmented PMS, CRS, and channel manager setups that introduce inconsistencies. They depend on external intermediaries to present accurate room information because the hotel itself is not publishing a clean and unified source of truth. When AI surfaces the data, OTAs appear more reliable because they have already invested in the infrastructure required for structured visibility. 𝗗𝗶𝘀𝗰𝗼𝘃𝗲𝗿𝘆 𝗶𝘀 𝗻𝗼 𝗹𝗼𝗻𝗴𝗲𝗿 𝗰𝗼𝗻𝘁𝗿𝗼𝗹𝗹𝗲𝗱 𝗯𝘆 𝗯𝗿𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗮𝘄𝗮𝗿𝗲𝗻𝗲𝘀𝘀 or paid placement. It is controlled by structured data coverage and technical stability. If you want AI to choose your property, your website must function as a dataset that can be trusted. 𝗬𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝗔𝗥𝗜 𝗺𝘂𝘀𝘁 𝗯𝗲 𝗰𝗼𝗻𝘀𝗶𝘀𝘁𝗲𝗻𝘁. 𝗬𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝗰𝗼𝗻𝘁𝗲𝗻𝘁 𝗺𝘂𝘀𝘁 𝗯𝗲 𝗺𝗮𝗰𝗵𝗶𝗻𝗲 𝗿𝗲𝗮𝗱𝗮𝗯𝗹𝗲. Your commercial logic must be stable enough for agents to depend on. This is the gap Agentic Hospitality built its MCP server and API hub to close. 𝗛𝗼𝘁𝗲𝗹𝘀 𝗱𝗲𝘀𝗲𝗿𝘃𝗲 𝘁𝗼 𝗯𝗲 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗳𝗶𝗿𝘀𝘁 𝗮𝗻𝘀𝘄𝗲𝗿, not the fallback. That only happens when the hotel owns the semantic layer that powers modern search and modern booking. The open web is shifting. The funnel is changing. OTAs are ready for it. Hotels need to be ready too. #AgenticHotelDistribution at AgenticHospitality.com.