Explore storytelling for tourism at Johannesburg MassiveHACK

A MassiveHACK event, titled ‘A Storytelling for Tourism’ will be held at the Women’s Jail, Constitution Hill in Johannesburg on October 26.

The event aims to showcase and unpack the benefits of storytelling as a marketing tool for the tourism industry.

At its very core, marketing is storytelling, according to Melinda Partin, Multimedia Producer and Digital Marketing Director at UW Medicine.

“The best advertising campaigns take us on an emotional journey – appealing to our wants, needs and desires – while at the same time telling us about a product or service,” explains Partin, adding: “Join us for a workshop that promises to inspire and teach you to utilise the art of storytelling in order to get that booking and increase sales.”

MassiveHACK, a partnership between Travel Massive and HACKTOURISM, will be hosted by William Price, Founder of HACKTOURISM and Mqondisi Gumede, CEO and Chief Strategy Officer at The IMG and MicroAgency, and organised by Neil Jansson, Travel Massive Coordinator and Johannesburg Chapter Leader.

Price, a digital agency veteran who has gone back into the start-up world to consult on digital marketing, social media marketing and online strategy in SA, particularly in the tourism sector; Gumede, a strategist, analyst and facilitator, has held many roles over the years with KPMG, Momentum, South African Tourism, flySAA.com, Coca-Cola and Eskom; Jansson has been active in the tourism industry for over 28 years, with experience as a product owner and marketer. He heads up Travel Massive Africa, part of the largest network of Travel Professionals Globally and the African Travel Crew.

Speaking about the event, Jansson says: “Storytelling and marketing have been getting a lot of attention and enjoying many new approaches over the past few months. This has to be one of the things that travel, tourism and hospitality providers do better than any other industry, as travel is all about experience.”

At the next #MassiveHACK event in Johannesburg, the audience will hear from a few individuals who are not in travel and, according to Jansson, they will be afforded the opportunity to experience something completely different.

Experiences and case studies will be presented by Mike Sharman, Co-founder of Retroviral, Nando’s digital agency from 2010 to 2013; Richard Rachidi, Social Media Team Lead at Cerebra working on the Ford account through the agency GTB; and Vusi Mbatha, Social Media Lead for Ford South Africa and Sub-Saharan Africa.

“You’ll walk away inspired, motivated ready to tell your story,” adds Jansson. “Purposeful storytelling isn’t show business, it’s good business,” reads the event page.

For more information, or to register, click here.

source: Tourism Update