CONTENT IS KEY: HOW Y! TRAVEL IS REMAKING A TRANSACTIONAL SITE INTO A MEDIA HUB
In this conference session Deborah Hopewell, Travel Editor for Yahoo! Travel talked to us about internet content and ways in which Y! Travel is transitioning into a media hub.
Below are some tips, quotes and other helpful information that Deborah shared with us during this NYT Travel Show conference session:
– Try to get content SEO right in the headline, and make it less about keywords in the body.
– Posts pictures on Facebook – Create challenges for your Facebook friends/fans (i.e.: Yahoo! Travel currently does a “Where on Earth” picture every Tuesday).
– iPad users can download LiveStand from Yahoo! where you can explore news and stories as well as photos and videos. I personally love this app, it is user friendly and very inviting.
– Deborah also spoke about Associated Content – a site I used very often back in 2005-2006, to get information and useful articles. Yahoo! purchased Associated Content and renamed it Yahoo! Contributor Network, and in December 2011 it got renamed again to Yahoo! Voices.
– Ways in which you can figure out what theme is good for your site or blog is by looking at the most commonly searched keywords.
– Select new themes based on these searches. Yahoo! Travel currently has 9 themes.
– Deborah was asked if Yahoo! Travel had triple the budget what would they do with it? She stated, if they had triple the budget they would invest in more videos. Down the road they would like to see more user generated videos.
Tomorrow, I’ll post a really fantastic blog post about Video Blogging/Video Traveling by Robert Reid of LonelyPlanet.com. So Stay Tuned!
Image source: Yahoo Facebook