It can be difficult to keep up with current trends in tourism, hospitality, travel and technology….unless, of course, sleep is optional for you.

For the rest of us mere mortals, fast-paced Twitter chats are invaluable.  They are some of THE most useful hours I spend online researching industry happenings and discussions.  You’ll get help from peers and network with fellow professionals around the world (here are 9 tips for following hashtags.)

I offer my own list of resources below that I use for speaking and Tourism Currents online training.

I’d love to hear more ideas from you down in the comments.

If you follow no other chat….

New chats pop up all the time – some Scotland-based tourism businesses just launched the #ScotlandHour travel chat, for example – but for tried and true value, don’t miss #tourismchat.

It’s usually biweekly, at 2 pm CST on Thursdays. Check the #tourismchat Facebook Page for dates and topics.

Chat co-founder Anne Hornyak summarizes a #tourismchat session here, if you want a sense of how it works.

Other good tourism chats

Keep an eye out for the hashtags for conferences like ESTO, #SoMeT (this hashtag is active year-round,) PRSA Travel, eTourismSummit and the annual state/province Governor’s conferences.

The conference calendar on DMOPro can help you keep up with these.

Get some hybrid vigor

Following non-tourism hashtags ensures that I don’t get stuck in a stale echo chamber listening to the same people over and over. Mixing it up fosters what my Tourism Currents business partner Becky McCray calls “the hybrid vigor of ideas.”

Some of these chats include:

**  Crazy-fast #blogchat on Sunday nights, 8 pm CST.

**  Tech conference hashtags like #BWEchat (year-round for BlogWorld and New Media Expo East and West)  #SXSWi (mostly active January through March for South by Southwest Interactive) and #SOBCon (year-round for the SOBCon business blogging conferences.)

**  Since search engines are so integral to online activities, I keep an eye on hashtags for Search Marketing Expo / #SMX events worldwide, especially #SMXEast and #SMXWest.

**  I’m not a gadget person, but the annual Mobile World Congress in Barcelona / #MWC12 for 2012 and the CES (Consumer Electronics Show) / #CES in Las Vegas are worth a look, if only to find links to good event round-up blog posts towards the end.

How to keep track of all this chatter

You can follow and participate in chats with regular web-based Twitter, but I prefer a dashboard to keep things sorted. I use columns in TweetDeck for each hashtag, adding and removing as events come and go.

Others are fans of HootSuite;  since it’s cloud-based you can get around any IT download restrictions in your office, and multi-person team accounts seem to like it.

When the chat is actually in progress, I log into TweetChat to keep up with the conversation flow and add the hashtag to my tweets automatically.

Which chats or tools am I forgetting? Let us know in the comments….

Still a bit unsure of the value?  Here’s 60 seconds with Beth Conway from the St. Joseph, Missouri CVB on how she uses Twitter (direct link to the video on YouTube if you can’t see the embed box below.)

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At the national conference for the AWC (Association for Women in Communications) I was excited to speak at a session with Maria Henneberry about creating and conducting online training through webinars.

AWC organizes and runs a webinar series about a variety of communications topics (I’m on the Tech Committee that finds topics and speakers) plus we run webinars at Tourism Currents related to social media, technology and tourism/hospitality.

So, I have webinars on the brain these days. What are the main things to remember?

Do NOT make boring slide decks, take advantage of the web and multimedia tools, remember that your voice must show the enthusiasm you feel (since in many cases attendees can’t see you) and keep an eye on online presentation tools like Zipcast that easily and cheaply bring video into the mix.

Here’s the direct link to the webinar how-to presentation on my SlideShare channel, and let me know in the comments below if you have questions or feedback.

From the beginning, business partner Becky McCray and I talked about developing not only our Tourism Currents course, but eventually an online “mall of services and products” tied to social media education for tourism-related organizations. Most would be ours, some might be from affiliates who we trust and recommend.

I think I first heard the term from Glenda Watson Hyatt, who has her own educational offerings on accessibility.

The first step in that direction is now live; in addition to our full six-week online course, you can buy one or more individual lessons in social media for tourism.

It’s learning materials that you want, when you need them.  We talked about it (plus some other goodies) in our June 2011 newsletter.

Thanks, as always, for your support.

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In 60 seconds, Beth Conway from the St. Joseph, Missouri CVB – @StJoMo on Twitter – explains why Twitter is NOT about what she had for lunch….

(Here’s the direct link to Beth’s video on YouTube, and here’s the Tourism Currents YouTube channel.)

Thanks Signalfire for featuring the video in their blog post about why social media works for CVBs and DMOs….this demonstrates why you should allow your CVB videos to be embedded on other people’s sites; it helps spread them to a wider audience.

When you make a video, always include a URL in the title or credits, so that those who see the video out on the web can find the rest of your work if they’re interested.

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A giant paper map of the world, with push pins.

Yeah, pretty analog, right?

This map of Europe with the pins represents how Dell is becoming a “socialprise“….an enterprise that is adopting social communications across the entire organization and for all employees.

The pushpins represent Dell social media training sessions and other events across the globe that are making that happen (5,000+ people trained already.)  From discussions with senior Dell folks, their plan is to….

“Embed social media and community across the fabric of the company”

This is a huge cultural shift for any corporation, the implications of which are sometimes not really even recognized by the very people that are implementing such a vision.  I’ll watch it with great interest.

In the December Tourism Currents newsletter,  we had some thoughts about what tourism and hospitality professionals can take away from Dell’s listening/engagement efforts. Here’s what we said:

**  New media is not so “new” any more. Yes, it might still be new to many, but it is most definitely a mainstream communications channel and feedback mechanism, like phones and email.  To be blunt, if you are a professional communicator in any capacity, some knowledge of social media is now a core competency.

**  Social media has value, and deserves resources and attention. You don’t necessarily have to shell out for the sophisticated (and expensive) Radian 6 suite that Dell is using. Regularly monitor a free combination of targeted Google Alerts, keywords on Facebook and Twitter plus the basics like knowing when someone links to you in a blog post, and you’ll probably be just fine. Our online course Lesson One is all about how to listen.

**  Train your entire organization. Sure, Dell has a core social media listening team that interacts with their internal customer support and technical people, but they have also held worldwide social media training for over 5,000 employees, with a lot more to come. You can do the same; bust the knowledge silos and give people the information they need to be advocates for your destination. Ensuring a “Wow!” visitor experience is everyone’s job in tourism and hospitality.

**  Not paying attention to what your visitors are saying is a major missed opportunity. Competitors are happy to take advantage of their peers who are not listening and engaging.  I can’t go into details, but you can bet that Dell is listening to what people are saying in social media about Dell’s competitors. Is the next town, city, state or province over from you connecting with visitors online and you are not?

I learned a lot from looking at a paper map yesterday.

Here is Dell’s video from the event (I have a small blurb in it) with more about what this means. Here’s the direct link on YouTube if the embed box doesn’t work.

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You might be surprised, but over the last few years I’ve noticed that once people get stuffed with Thanksgiving food and early morning shopping, a lot of folks often get online to hang out and visit with friends.

At my Tourism Currents learning community with Becky McCray, we thought we’d have some fun, throw open our own doors and invite people to chat and get smarter about tourism, hospitality and social media.

Here’s the scoop on our Black Friday tourism learning event….fun stuff we’ve planned just for you….

***  We’re going to have an Open House starting late in the day on Thanksgiving, November 25. That means anyone can view our dynamite course material (yep, all of it) without any pay wall restrictions, but only until Sunday night, November 28. Now is the time to see for yourself how much our lessons, instructional videos and Forum can help your destination marketing.

(Update:  Well, clearly I’ve lost control over Becky, because we’re keeping the Open House and sale going through today for Cyber Monday. Drop by!)

***  Inspired by Liz Strauss’ world-famous Open Mic and Open Comments nights on her Successful Blog, we’re going to have a Black Friday Open Mic (Nov 26 at 7 pm Central Time.)  It will happen either on our Tourism Currents Facebook Page or we’ll open up a blog post on the Newsletter section of the Tourism Currents website to talk about your most pressing concerns in tourism and tech/social media. Ever wanted to chat with us and your peers about those nagging questions? Come on DOWN! We’ll try not to get too rowdy.  :)

(Update:  want to see how it went? People dropped in from all over the globe! Here is the link to our Black Friday tourism open mic chat.)

***  Here’s the biggie – save 20% on the cost of our course if you sign up during Open House weekend. That’s a great deal, especially since our prices are going to increase on January 1, 2011. Details and the discount code to follow, during Open Mic.

Update:  The code for 20% off is OK1 – apply during checkout, now through Cyber Monday!

***  Share Your Pics - Show us what you’re thankful for by sharing your own tourism and hospitality pics in our Tourism Currents Flickr photo Group. We’re so grateful to all of our tourism and travel friends and supporters, so come spend a little time with us and let’s see how we can help you make sense of tech and social media.

Hope to see you sometime this weekend, even if you can “only stay for a minute.”

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I’ll cut to the chase, because BlogWorld conference pass prices go up after September 16.

Why tourism and travel professionals need to go to BlogWorld and New Media Expo at the Mandalay Bay Convention Center in Las Vegas, Oct 14-16:

1)  Because to really grasp what social media and tech can do for your marketing and communications, you need to go where the geeks are.

2)  Because our Tourism Track gives you a full day of training in social media for tourism…how to listen to the conversations that matter online, better video for tourism, blogger press trips/fam tours and more.

3)  Because it will be participatory, hands-on, no fear training with me and my Tourism Currents co-founder Becky McCray, PLUS….

***  Ann Peavey from the Seattle, Washington CVB (she’s @SeattleMaven on Twitter)

***  Mike Bersabal from the Pensacola, Florida CVB (he’s @Mike_VstPcola)

***  Jeff Hurt, meetings and conference expert, from Velvet Chainsaw Consulting (he’s @JeffHurt)

***  Stephanie Molina from the Beaumont, Texas CVB (she’s @Beaumartian)

4)  Because at BlogWorld, you’ll be able to get your tourism organization in front of thousands of bloggers, podcasters and video bloggers from around the world.  Denise Wakeman from The Blog Squad calls it THE social marketing event of the season. Wired PR Works calls it one of her must-attend events.

If you want attention from online content creators (travel, food, parenting and every other sort of blogger) you have to know who’s who, speak their language and be where they can find you.

That means be in Las Vegas October 14-16.

If you use code TC20 you can knock 20% off of the price of any pass.

Click here to check it out and register – we would absolutely love to see you there!

We are excited to announce that doors are now open for another round of online classes at Tourism Currents.

There are usually three problems with most social media training:

• It is too basic and generic
• It is too advanced and nerdy
• ….or it is well-balanced, but not tailored to a specific industry

Tourism Currents is different. Here are more details about why we get straight to the heart of real tourism results.

My co-founder Becky McCray and I run a unique, high-energy learning community that is hyper-focused on teaching tourism and hospitality industry professionals how to use that big pile of social media tools (blogs, Twitter, Facebook, Flickr, YouTube, etc.) to more effectively tell the stories of their destinations and attractions.

We get specific about topics like how to use Twitter for fall foliage reports, how to use Facebook to promote your festival and what’s important for a successful blogger press trip/fam tour.

Compelling stories convince people to visit your town. The social Web is the ideal place to tell those stories (it’s made for the tourism little guy, too) and it connects with others who love and support you….we call them your “online champions network.”

Our courses help you make sense of it all.

They are organized to provide basic social media overview information to those who need it (through a quick Intro Workshop or a three-part All the Basics course) or more advanced how-to specifics to those who are ready for it through the three-part Results Multipliers class (which dives deep into unique destination marketing topics like mobile-friendly tours.)

If you are geared up to really make things happen for the long haul, the Tourism Currents six month Full Course combines the Basic and Multipliers, then throws in the Intro Workshop as a bonus.

Every course is a combination of multi-part lessons, exclusive videos with experts and a wrap-up printable checklist, plus there’s a member forum for detailed discussions.

We hope you’ll join us soon at Tourism Currents!

Over at our Tourism Currents learning site (are y’all reading our monthly free newsletter on social media for tourism?) Becky McCray and I are PUMPED to announce a new initiative….

The two of us will teach a one-day workshop for CVB, DMO and other tourism folks on October 13, 2010 as part of the BlogWorld and New Media Expo tech conference at the Mandalay Bay Convention Center in Las Vegas, Nevada.

This is a big deal because we’re always telling clients and Tourism Currents members that to really understand what’s going on with tech and social media, you have to “go where the geeks are” – events like South by Southwest Interactive (SXSWi,) BlogHer, SOBCon and BlogWorld – and be immersed in how they communicate.  I’m always chuckling when I listen in on non-geek conferences via Twitter hashtag and hear them exclaiming over tools and methods that they’re hearing about for the first time, but I was exposed to 12-24 months earlier at some nerd fest.

Tech and social media stuff moves fast; you need to keep up in order to make intelligent decisions about whether to incorporate something into your marketing efforts.

We wanted tourism people to check out BlogWorld because it gives them a chance to connect with thousands of bloggers, podcasters and other online content creators (plus there’s a travel blogger track kicking off the day after our workshop in addition to food bloggers, sports bloggers and more.) These are your potential online champions; the people who are fans and supporters of your destination or attraction and who can help spread the word about you online.

Rather than have people come to such a huge event and be rather overwhelmed, we’re working with BlogWorld founder Rick Calvert (a travel enthusiast himself) to design a social media seminar that will introduce tourism folks to our “geek world” and how it can upgrade their communications work.

In addition to our daytime classes on the best ways to connect with online influencers, we’re planning networking meetings, tweetups and possibly “speed dating” sessions to help destination marketers network with the people who can provide them with online coverage.

This is still in the very early stages so I’ll let you know when we get more details worked out, but put October 13, 2010 on your calendars!

Last week I enjoyed spending 30 minutes on Blog Talk Radio with Australian entrepreneur and coach Des Walsh.  He has a regular program called Des Walsh and Friends, with a wide variety of guests all discussing some aspect of technology and business.

The noteworthy advantage of Blog Talk Radio (or any “Internet radio” service) is that not only can you listen live, but the shows are usually archived if you can’t be there at broadcast time, plus they’re also downloadable for later listening on your iPod or other digital audio player.

It gives radio/audio the worldwide reach that it never had before, as I discussed in this post about online radio and destination marketing for the Beaumont (TX) CVB.

Des and I talked about my background in travel, how Becky McCray and I launched Tourism Currents to teach tourism professionals about social media, and why businesses need to ensure a strong Web presence as customer search and interaction preferences shift online.

I loved having a fun chat with someone halfway around the world, and the time zones worked in my favor since it was afternoon my time, but very early morning for Des.  :)

Here is our episode:  talking social media, travel and tourism with Des Walsh.

(This is cross-posted on my BootsnAll Family Travel Logue.)