We have been busy, busy bees here at InsideOut lately – or should I say not here lately! There has been quite a bit of travel in the last two months.
Wisconsin Bed & Breakfast Association Conference
November 23rd, 2009 by katie“On the road again,
Just can’t wait to get on the road again.
Goin’ places I’ve never been,
Seein’ things I may never see again,
And I can’t wait to get on the road again.”
– Willie Nelson
As the off-season rolls around for many of our clients, we set out to make contact with the innkeepers we know and love, as well as meet new members of our industry.
Steven Dunston's 15 Minute Marketing Makeover Presentation packed the room.
Going back to Wisconsin was a great treat for us. It was everyone’s second visit, at least, to the dairyland, and we were happy to see old-time clients like the Inn at Lonesome Hollow’s Nora Knapik, Honeybee Inn’s Barb Ruka, Westby House’s Marie and Mike Cimino and Naeset-Roe’s Carl Povlick, to name a few.
The Wisconsin Dells was a fun place for the conference to be held, and the whole Logan family attended to partake in the entertainment. Glacier Lodge, where the conference and trade show was held, was also home to several massive indoor water parks. It was a fun place for the kids as well as the adults. Katie made a mad dash for the watersides as soon as she had a spare hour!
Katie Pate with Innkeepers from Wissahickon Farms
There wasn’t much time to spare in the Dells, however, the InsideOut crew was quite busy. Steven Dunston, Katie Pate and Jeff Logan were all speakers at the conference. Katie and Jeff presented on Facebook and Twitter marketing, while the three worked in tandem to cover “Blogging 2.0: Finding Great Content” and share some of our favorite methods for keeping your web site and your blog an engaging and interesting location on the web.
British Columbia Bed and Breakfast Conference
November 3rd, 2009 by katieGet the flash player here: http://www.adobe.com/flashplayer
The British Columbia Bed and Breakfast Guild held their annual Conference and Trade Show last week on Vancouver Island. Pat McCauley and Katie Pate were there for day one, the trade show, and Jeff Logan took the second shift.
Pat and Katie enjoyed meeting the BC innkeepers – this was the first time InsideOut had attended their conference. There were distinct differences in the Innkeepers that we met and many of those we work with here. Smaller, more residential-based inns seemed to be the typical style, versus large historic homes turned into lodging like so many bed and breakfasts in the states.
Jeff was very busy at this conference, presenting on three different marketing subjects and presenting the Guild with their new site design that InsideOut has created. The Guild knew our great reputation for Association designs, and were excited to work with us and our great designers and programmers. Getting British Columbia’s business was compliment for us. They are our Northern neighbors. I can see Victoria from my house! This is InsideOut’s first international association web site.
Texas Bed and Breakfast Convention a Success
August 28th, 2009 by katieWe had a wonderful time in Granbury Texas for the Texas Bed and Breakfast Association Convention. Steven Dunston gave a “kick-off” keynote session to a packed, standing-room only audience, covering the success we had seen with the last year on the new TBBA web site. He also covered some important metrics for innkeepers to be able to evaluate where they actually need to focus their marketing efforts, like shoulder versus primary seasons. “15-minute Marketing Boot Camp” gave innkeepers effective tools to capture more of the travel market in their area.
On Monday, Katie Pate presented on “Internet Marketing with Facebook”. It was wonderful to see such interest in this new marketing platform, and we had another full audience. There were lots of good questions, like from our client Grover McMains, who owns a North Texas Bed and Breakfast in Fort Worth. He asked us about the important steps to having a modern web site before starting to focus time and energy into Facebook Marketing.
Texas Bed and Breakfast Convention, Here We Come!
August 20th, 2009 by katieHowdy Partners!
Steven Dunston, myself (Katie Pate) and company President Pat McCauley will be leaving this weekend to fly over to Granbury Texas for the annual Texas Bed and Breakfast Convention. We are pleased to be presenting on multiple subjects throughout the event, including Facebook marketing, blogging and general marketing makeovers. In fact, SEO Manager Steven Dunston will be presenting the kick off talk, “Web Stats Boot Camp”.
Steven will also be presenting some of the great results we have seen since launching the new Texas association site about one year ago (in September). Not only did we design the site for them, we are also helping them with their blog, and running AdWords for them.
Minnesota Bed and Breakfast Conference
April 28th, 2009 by katieOn a blustery Sunday, Katie Pate and Jeff Logan headed to Duluth Minnesota for another trade show and several presentations during the Minnesota B&B Conference. There was much to do in lovely Duluth during this short visit, including a presentation on Facebook marketing, and the debut of the new MBBA web site.
On Sunday night Jeff and Katie enjoyed a tour of several Duluth inns, including Solglimt, one of our clients. We enjoyed an evening of fantastic architecture and jaw-dropping beauty in these turn-of-the-century mansions. Our friends Anne & Niles Deneen from Deneen Pottery, had made many of the inns’ stoneware mugs that we saw on display or in use during the tours.
Monday was a busy day; Jeff Logan presented Minnesota with their new Bed and Breakfast Association web site, which will be going live in May. We have loaded the site with great features that only InsideOut is providing, such as seven different ways to search for an inn and an interactive map that will allow users to search for inns within a certain radius of their desired location. The site will help the members coordinate within each other to target market specific attractions that bring guests to their area, and administer their individual listings whenever they want.
The crowd went wild when they saw the site, and everyone hurried to follow Jeff into his presentation on Google marketing after lunch was finished. The presentation went smoothly and was very helpful and informative for the innkeepers.
It was great to see some of our current clients, such as Chuck Dougherty from the Water Street Inn, a lovely Stillwater MN waterfront inn, who’s new site had gone live only a few days before the conference. 
On Tuesday morning, Jeff and Katie did a presentation on Internet Marketing with Facebook. It was a great success, with a packed crowd and lots of good questions. Visit our facebook page to see some pictures and real-time updates. Facebook is becoming a very important space on the web, and our team is researching the newest developments and trying to keep our innkeepers informed. We look forward to updating this presentation as trends develop, and sharing it at other conventions.
Katie Pate & Jeff Logan: Internet Marketing with Facebook
As always, we enjoyed meeting new innkeepers, talking with them about their potential for online marketing and sharing with them a ranking report that indicates their position online for various search phrases. We run these ranking reports for almost all the conferences we attend, and provide them to innkeepers for their knowledge.
Now that the Hood Canal bridge will be closed up here in Northern Washington for the next month and a half or so, we will be limited to the Northwest at least for a little while. But summer conferences are just around the corner, and we look forward to seeing you at one of them!
PAII Conference for Bed and Breakfast Innkeeper
February 10th, 2009 by katieMaybe you are thinking about cutting back on some of your business-related travel in an effort to rein-in your spending this year. If so, this should be the conference you keep on your schedule. The PAII (Professional Association of Innkeepers International) conference and trade show will be held in Atlanta Georgia this year from March 30 to April 2, 2009.
There will be a variety of activities, speakers and programs during the 3-day event. PAII will be holding programs for master innkeepers as well as aspiring innkeepers. Look forward to a variety of important speakers and workshops covering valuable information for every innkeeper. Topics will vary from customer service to overcoming stress to making artisan bread!
See you in Atlanta!
Of course our own Jeff Logan will be speaking on search engine marketing. We will also be vendors at the trade show and look forward to seeing some or our current clients as well as meeting new innkeepers!
Individual Marketing Sessions
During the trade show, we are also going to be offering individual sessions for innkeepers. This will be a chance for innkeepers to speak with one of the InsideOut team (Jeff, Steven, Pat and Katie will be attending the conference) for 30 minutes about their web site and their options for Internet marketing. Look for more information soon about our one-on-one sessions and online sign ups.
The PAII Conference will be an invaluable event for every innkeeper who is looking to learn about the newest trends in the industry and collaborate with other innkeepers and vendors about making your inn a successful tourism destination!
