(1888PressRelease)
April 20, 2008 - “I have created videos for numerous companies over the years and most of them report considerable increases in both enquiries and booking conversion, but there is still a certain resistance from a majority of tourism businesses to use this technology,” Mr. Reissmann, the managing director of Authentic Holidays Films, reports.
Indeed those who have used video find that it has certainly helped their business grow. The Adventure Company in the UK was able to double their enquiries and sales through responsibletravel.com for their popular family holiday in Egypt, over a 2-year period, after employing a video in 2006.
Caserio del Mirador, a villa in Spain, received six times as many enquiries and quadrupled its sales from 2006 to 2008, compared to the previous two years, while a small walking company in Spain, Walk Andalucia, managed a 6-fold increase in sales, in the same 2-year period, thanks to a video on responsibletravel.com.
Hank Renzenbrink from Sea All Dolphin Swims near Melbourne reports: "We are having our best season yet. I know definitely that whenever we have referred inquiries to the video on the site it has had a positive result.”
And Kingfisher Bay Resort on Fraser Island ordered videos for all of their companies, including Fraser Explorer Tours, Eurong Resort and Cool Dingo Tours, after noting the attractiveness of having a video on their main resort website.
This kind of success is hardly surprising given that more than 3000,000 people have watched promotional videos produced by Authentic Holiday Films on YouTube alone and given that a 2007 nationwide survey by Taylor Nelson Sofres (TNS) for Google and AOL found that more than 75% of respondents said online video was as good as television for learning about advertisers, with more than 6 in 10 respondents saying they had taken some action after watching an online video ad.
“It’s essentially free advertisement and if it’s done well and people like it they will share these videos with others, but also these videos will show up on Google when people search for keywords such as Fraser Island tours or Tasmania trekking holidays. Plus businesses can open groups on Facebook and just share videos with interested people, who will pass it around because that’s how these social networs work,” Thomas explains.
Yet despite these success stories and the possibilities of reaching a wider audience only a very small minority of tourism companies use video to make their holidays more tangible to potential customers. Most websites advertising tours or accommodations don’t offer a video and stick with the traditional approach of using still images and blocks of text.
“I think much of it has to do with not understanding the real benefits of video, but also not understanding the technology, because a lot of people think customers have to download videos, and that it will slow down their server, whereas it’s all streaming video these days, running on external servers,” Thomas goes on to say.
Another issues may be cost and the fact that advertising dollars are tied up with more traditional forms of advertising, such as print media, radio and brochures. However, it may come as a surprise to many companies that having a video created may not be such a big investment, a professional video can be produced for as little as $699 and companies can even get away with offering free holidays, discounts and other incentives to get people to film their accommodations and tours. They may even decide to film their own holidays and send off the footage for editing.
“We want to make it as easy and inexpensive as possible for businesses to get video on their website, and cater to a variety of budgets and needs, because I would like to see video become the standard for tourism businesses, in the same way websites have become the norm. I think this is very new approach to marketing and people are always somewhat skeptical of its benefits initially, but I would like to prove to businesses that video is an exciting and inexpensive new way to advertise and that it quickly pays for itself. I believe soon every tourist and traveler will want to see in advance what they are paying for. After all a holiday is a very important part in people’s lives and many can only afford to go on holiday once a year so they want to make sure they choose the right holiday,” Thomas says.
Companies may now list themselves on a database (http://www.authenticholidayfilms.com/31.html) and chose what they are willing to offer for a video, so that Authentic Holiday Films can match their budget and location with a database of videographers operating worldwide.
Mr. Reissmann, the founder and managing director of Authentic Holiday Films, holds a degree in tourism and worked in the industry for many years. He began shooting online video three years ago while working for Responsibletravel.com in Brighton, England, and has filmed extensively throughout Europe and Africa. Since moving to Australia he has been filming in Queensland, Victoria and Tasmania. His clients have included Kingfisher Bay Resort, The Adventure Company, Neilson Active Holidays, Baobab Travel and Ocean Hotels.
His videos can be viewed at http://www.authenticholidayfilms.com.
For more information please contact:
Thomas Reissmann
Tel: 0061 432 899 247
Email: tom ( @ ) authenticholidayfilms dot com
Site: www.authenticholidayfilms.com
