This document discusses the increasing importance of images in online communications and social media. It notes that photography is a powerful form of storytelling that can evoke memories and emotions. Networks like Instagram, Pinterest, and Tumblr are driving this trend, as people now share hundreds of thousands of photos daily on subjects like travel. The document then provides two case studies of successful image-based campaigns for travel brands: a Pinterest lottery campaign for bmi and an Instagram photo challenge for bmibaby that engaged users and drove media coverage. It concludes by advising businesses to register accounts on these visual networks and encourage customers to take and share photos.

1. “A picture shows me
at a glance what it
takes dozens of
pages of a book to
expound”
Ivan Turgenev
Leica M8.2 by Photoyong
Image-sharing and online engagement
Eyefortravel Webinar 10 July 2012

2. On Instagram - My blog -
On Twtter - dirktherabbit liesdamnedliesstatistics.com
dirktherabbit
Some of the places you can find me
(and where I work - www.therabbitagency.com)

3. What I’m going to
talk about
• The importance of the
“imagesphere” in social media
• The networks to be aware of
• Two examples of what we did
for bmibaby (Instagram), and
bmi (Pinterest)
• What you should do about it
• Some resources to find out
more
The Camera - Jose Paulo Carvalho Pereira

4. “A noticeable trend this year
is beautiful apps or websites.
It's all part of a larger trend
that I'm calling The Visual
Web, meaning that images and
video are becoming an
increasingly important part of
what we consume online.”
(Richard McManus, Read Write
Web)
“Welcome to the
imagesphere”
(Luminate)
Images are an increasingly important part
of online communications

5. #airport - 300k #hotel - 301k #beach -
images on images 471k images
Instagram
@diegobeyro @instafifini @gunjon
Especially in travel, photography evokes memories,
emotions. It’s a powerful form of story-telling
And now, it can be shared with thousands with a single click

6. Instagram is
now the
world’s argest
(international)
mobile social
network at 56
million users
Digital camera sales are down
29% over the past five years
(Mintel) - especially hard hit,
A year ago
entry level cameras
Pinterest
accounted for
0.68% of social
media referrals to
e-commerce sites.
Now it accounts
for 26%
This is happening - has your business caught up with
the trend?

7. These should be on your radar
Instagram - Flickr - still the Pinterest - the
Tumblr - the
world’s largest world’s largest social media story
world’s largest
mobile social photo sharing of 2012. Pin
blogging platform,
network, 56 network images from
high visual +
million users anywhere around
accessible
the web to boards
Also
Socialcam and
Jux - new Tumblr Streamzoo and
Viddy -
alternative Tadaa- two niche
‘Instagram of Instagram
video’ versions

8. The bmi Pinterest lottery

9. 2 - Users re-
1 - We created 3 - Every week we
pinned up to six
destination boards chose a winning
‘numbers’ (pins)
and numbered number, which got
to their own
‘pins’ free flights
boards
The bmi Pinterest lottery - how did it work?

10. “Considering the novelty of the
social network and the fact that
most images are automatically re-
shared on the users’ twitter and
facebook profiles, the level of
engagement represented by these
numbers is considerable, especially
for a niche carrier like BMI.”
(Simpliflying)
The bmi Pinterest lottery - Outcome

11. bmibaby MyEurope

12. 1 - Challenges, 2 - Real world 3 - Visual
launched by local ‘instameets’ inspiration guides
influencers, where we brought on the bmibaby
around bmibaby super-fans from site pulling in the
destinations different countries challenge hash-
together tags
My Europe - how did it work?

13. 1 - 50,000 unique
pieces of visual
content submitted
2 - Extensive
media coverage,
one of the most
successful
Instagram
campaigns ever
3 - Award winning,
2x winners, 2x
short listed digital
industry awards
Outcome

14. So what now?
• Register your profiles, think about
what you are going to do with
them
• Carry out an audit to see what
your customers / passengers /
guests are doing online now
• Educate your staff so they
understand the potential benefit
of customer + smartphone camera
• Positively encourage and channel
customers to take and share
images - for example via physical
prompts

15. More on those stats (see slideshare.net/therabbitagency later)
• @brideyrae’s presentation on My Europe http://www.slideshare.net/therabbitagency/my-
europe-an-instagram-campaign-for-bmibaby
• Digital camera sales down 29% http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/digital-camera-
sales-slump-as-more-944296
• Socialcam and Viddy users - http://www.forbes.com/sites/anthonykosner/2012/06/24/
socialcam-vs-viddy-and-the-curious-calculus-of-picking-the-most-popular-app/
• Tumblr to overtake blog as a search term - http://thenextweb.com/media/2012/04/17/
whod-have-thought-tumblr-to-soon-overtake-blog-on-google-searches/
• Has Pinterest overtaken Tumblr? http://royal.pingdom.com/2012/06/28/pinterest-
overtaken-tumblr-united-states/
• Facebook posts that include an album have 180%+ engagement http://www.adverblog.com/
2012/04/28/visual-social-network-infographic/
• Six reasons why images are important - http://www.business2community.com/marketing/6-
powerful-reasons-why-you-should-include-images-in-your-marketing-infographic-0185560#
• Pinterest now accounts for 26% of social media e-commerce referrals http://
liesdamnedliesstatistics.com/2012/06/facebook-still-dominant-in-numbers-less-so-in-
referrals.html

16. Thanks for your time!
Dirk Singer
dirk@therabbitagency.com
Twitter / Instagram -
@dirktherabbit
Rabbit -
www.therabbitagency.com