How Marketers Will Address Tone Now and 8 Other Top Tourism Stories This Week

Tourism Marketers Enter Wait-and-See Mode to Avoid Tone-Deaf Campaigns: Tourism marketers can’t run their campaigns as usual right now. But that doesn’t mean they can’t do anything. The challenge lies in finding the right tone — and the right timing

Travel’s Big Disruption Came Ahead of Schedule: It Wasn’t the One We Expected: For the travel industry, coronavirus has upended everything, kind of like how we expected climate change to — just much faster. Recovery, when it comes, will require taking the lessons from this thoroughly global disruption on board.

Asia’s Travel Advisors Caught in the Middle of Cancellation Quandary: The coronavirus crisis accentuates the value of travel advisors as much as it highlights their plight as go-betweens in the tourism sector. But a bigger question looms: Will these travel intermediaries in Asia survive the onslaught of this latest crisis?

U.S. Travelers Rush to Cancel Domestic Travel Plans: New Skift Research Poll: This was the week that broke the camel’s back. Skift Research believes that effectively all short-term bookings in the U.S. have been canceled at this point. Three weeks ago that would’ve been a shocking statement; today not so much.

Will Travel Advisors Be Last in Line for Bailouts?: Airlines, cruise ships, and hotels rely on travel advisors to book a lot of their business. A lobbying effort is afoot to make sure that thousands of these small businesses don’t get left out of recovery measures.

No, It’s Not Fine to Keep Hosting Live Events: Mixed messages are still coming from the industry about the safety of meetings and traveling despite travel bans and national emergencies that have led to lockdowns. It’s time to take responsibility for our industry and cancel your meeting.

What You Can Learn From This Tourism Exec in Lockdown in Italy: Be in it. Don’t be afraid to feel what’s going on around you. And don’t try to play the business-as-usual approach. Nothing about these days are that. Don’t pretend to have all the answers.

What Is Going to Happen to All Postponed Events? The events industry is living through one of the most difficult times of its existence. The coronavirus outbreak has forced an incredible number of events to be postponed. But postponed until when? And what will happen in the fourth quarter of 2020?

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