The slew of emerging visual storytelling platforms is catnip for travel marketers, offering engaging ways to showcase destinations - and the journeys that occur in between each destination.
Carhiremarket has accelerated down this road with the help of Roadtrippers.com, Bootsnall.com, Medium and emerging Google Earth project TourBuilder.
TourBuilder is a new project at Google that allows anyone to create a series of points on a map and aggregate them into a tour - from travel to teachers, the application is already being used in many creative ways. Carhiremarket, which has been creating its own road trips as part of its marketing, jumped on the platform to offer an engaging way to explore the suggested routes.
Users can browse through the different stops on the road trip, and see photos and an updated map of the chosen destination - in this case, alongside text information pulled from Bootsnall.
The more functional piece on TourBuilder is complemented by what is framed as a creative exercise on Kevin Rose's storytelling platform Medium:
Our Great American Road Trip: a fictional take on real events and experiences...This is a story based on the real life experiences of different people who have travelled across the United States. The stories have been combined into a narrative about two characters, Neil and Josie, who were created for the purpose of this touching story by Georgina Norie https://www.facebook.com/georginanoriepoetry
The combination of fiction inspired by real-world journeys is a potent one, providing not only more color than simply a tool showing a particular route but also tying in true emotions that can translate into actual travel interest.
But wait: Is this Sponsored Content or not?
The only jagged edge is that it's not clear whether or not the fictionalized content is sponsored or not, which is required by FCC disclosure rules.
There's a direct mention in the piece:
During coffee breaks, I navigated subtly for information, I befriended Adam, I had never spoken to him at work before but he couldn’t have been more forthright in recommending www.bootsnall.com...
Mid-post, there's also the following plug for Roadtrippers.com, and a quick mention of The New Yorker:
And yet at the end of the Medium post, there's only the following note - which doesn't directly say whether or not this was a paid mention for the brands.
We’d like to thank Roadtrippers.com and Bootsnall.com for their contributions as well as all the photographers and travel writers we featured.
Tnooz has reached out to Medium on Twitter for clarification on sponsored content - the Help section is not loading - and will update with any response.
Marketers must remember that with any new...medium...comes in-built risk. Feeling out best practices in real-time is always thrilling - and sometimes extremely worthwhile. Nonetheless, remember that the platform must be ready for the message just like the message must be right for the platform.
Props for the creativity and multi-partner relationships driving the story - it's a solid effort at engaging across communities in a visual and exciting way.
NB: Road trip image courtesy Shutterstock.