As a member of UpTake‘s Marketing Board, I wrote an UpTake Travel Industry blog post on the advantages of getting information about your product or service (not necessarily just tourism-related ones, either) into the hands of travelers who use social media tools….

Smart marketing with giveaways 2.0

In it, I describe and link to some of the online reactions (particularly on Twitter) of people who got a travel-related gift/giveaway swag bag during my South by Southwest Interactive (SXSWi) travel blogging panel with fellow writer Pam Mandel.

Every link in the post is one more effort to land a roundhouse punch against “there’s not enough ROI (Return on Investment) in social media marketing.”

For example:

• “Many liked the sample pralines from local Austin company Lammes Candies – traveler CouchSurfingOri talked about the Lammes habanero praline, and so did hedge fund talent recruiter Kim Haynes and Download Squad tech writer CJClark.
• Krista Parry (Park City, Utah resorts PR and marketing) cheered the stickers provided by the Alltop.com Travel topic channel.
• Canadian travel internet marketing guru Todd Lucier was ready to cash in his bag’s Blue Bell Ice Cream free pint certificate, and he told his friends about it.”

I’d love to hear your comments on the post; thanks!