A year ago I had never heard the term “zeitgeist”. In case you haven’t heard it either, it’s a German word that means “…the spirit of the time; the taste and outlook characteristic of a period or generation”.

Today’s e-marketing zeitgeist is marked with rapid change, ultra-transparency and a new(-ish) voice: the voice of the consumer. Customers are forming alliances and communities all over the internet to share information and expertise. It has become virtually impossible to contest the power of individual voices when disseminated through popular online travel related communities.

There are dozens of examples of travel community spaces that are proving to be both popular and valuable when searching and researching travel. And since I love participating in many travel related communities, I though it would be fun to create a micro-version of a social media “zeitgeist” for the Canada-e-Connect conference host hotel; the Fairmont Waterfront.

I’m local to Vancouver (and I used to work for Fairmont) so I know this hotel very well. I could list all the accolades and awards that the property has received, but one opinion doesn’t much capture the spirit of zeitgeist!

Click over to our Fairmont Waterfront Zeitgeist to see what guests are saying about the Waterfront Hotel through guest submitted images of the property and the latest reviews of the hotel on Tripadvisor.

As I find more online dialogue about the hotel, I’ll add it to the page.

I am very fortunate to be able to introduce Chris Clarke to the Canada-e-Connect project. Chris is a Vancouver-native expert blogger in the online travel and hospitality space, and is the creator of the famous hospitality blog BedJump, as well as his current blog VacantReady.

The Canada-e-Connect blog (www.canadaeconnectblog.com) is separate from the main Canada-e-Connect website (www.canadaeconnect.com), and there is an important reason for that. The blog will document “the making of Canada-e-Connect” with interviews, updates, new developments, etc. while the main website is the hub for the main information, and registration. It will not focus so much on Online Marketing and Strategy Trends in Travel, Tourism, and Hospitality, but feel free to visit my personal Tourism Internet Marketing Blog for that type of information.

We are planning to also offer our new Canadian E-Tourism Council members the opportunity to become co-bloggers. In addition, Chris is not an employee of the Canadian Tourism Commission, and even though we see him almost as part of the Canada-e-Connect team, his views are completely unbiased, un-influenced, and independent. Due to the fact that Canada-e-Connect has so many components and facets, we would like to share our experiences with the world and have you join us for the ride. As Chris told me recently, he will be as inclusive as possible. He may interview speakers, sponsors, join us on site inspections of venues, and much more. In short, we are completely transparent and have no secrets.

And…he also wants to include YOUR views and opinions. So please comment on the posts, and feel free to write him. He may interview you, or post your opinions on the post, if HE feels it is appropriate. In addition, we are launching an Online Community, where everybody - speakers, sponsors, attendees, and even online travel marketers from all over Canada and all over the world can join in the conversation - before the conference, during the conference, and after the conference.

My name is Chris Clarke, and I am delighted to say that I am attending this year’s Canada-e-Connect conference.

I’ve been blogging about hospitality industry topics for about eighteen months on various sites, including my own personal blog at VacantReady.

Through my blogging activity I have been fortunate to meet some terrific people in the blogosphere, one of whom is Jens Thraenhart. Jens is the Executive Director, Marketing Strategy & Customer Relationship Management for the CTC, and he is also the founder of the first ever Canada-e-Connect conference. Many of you probably know Jens already.

Since we’re both based in Vancouver, Jens and I get together once in a while for coffee or a beer (preferably the latter) to discuss our blogs and general goings-on within the e-marketing climate. During a recent conversation, Jens asked me whether I would be interested in writing for the CEC conference blog.

Hmm…an exciting conference program & awards, an opportunity to write about topics I feel passionate about, a chance to meet some of the smartest folks in e-travel marketing, a chance at a free t-shirt…Jens didn’t have to push too hard to get me on board.

So, please allow me to introduce myself as an eager conference co-blogger. Other than being a conference delegate and friend to the CTC, I have no particular affiliation with Canada-e-Connect. This means that I’ll be writing about the conference as an attendee rather than an organizer. I’m pretty jazzed about that.

This week I visited with Jens, Mimi, and the rest of the conference organizing team at the offices of the Canadian Tourism Commission in Vancouver. Naturally I brought my camera with me to capture some of the essence that is the CTC.

So what’s the vision for this blog space over the next months? The below images from the CTC offices helped make that decision a no-brainer:

“Through this blog we hope to Inspire you to attend, and participate. We want to Explore and reveal the conference planning process, and meet conference delegates. And we hope to Tell a Great Story along the way.”

The only way to predict the future is to invent it…

After co-founding Online Revealed Canada, and having co-chaired the first Online Revealed Canada Conference in 2006, I am excited to introduce the premier E-Tourism Strategy Conference in Canada, Canada-e-Connect.

While many Online Travel Conferences address the current issues of e-marketing and online travel distribution, or focus on hands-on training and education, Canada-e-Connect will tackle the future of travel distribution and marketing.

Enough about the present, the Future is now!

We all know what the current issues surrounding travel distribution and marketing are. Disintermediation, channel fragmentation, technology convergence, consumer power – but where are these change drivers taking us and what do they mean to players in the Canadian travel and tourism industry? How can we leverage these trends to market Canada to the world today and tomorrow?

We are now embarking on organizing the first ever Canadian E-Tourism Strategy Conference, Canada-e-Connect.

The event has a few separate components that will make Canada-e-Connect unique in the world of Online Travel Conferences. Held in Vancouver on November 7-9 right after the TIAC Canada Tourism Leadership Conference in Victoria, the event will feature some of the most intriguing speakers in the space, including the co-author of bestseller “Wikinomics”. The conference sessions are focused around the three main elements of the travel distribution life cycle - Consumer Acquisition, Consumer Experience, and Consumer Intelligence

The Canada-e-Connect Conference is held in conjunction with the first ever Canadian e-Tourism Awards. These prestigious new awards recognize excellence in website design, online campaigns and innovation for three sectors: public, private and small- and medium-sized enterprise. Recognition is also going out to travelers by showcasing the best in user-generated content with awards for the best story telling, the best photo, and the best video or short-film. Entries are being accepted from July 15 to August 31.

What makes the Awards competition unique is the fact that entries are eligible from all over the world, but every entry has to market, sell, or portrait Canada or a destination, product, attraction, or experience in Canada. Every entry will be screened to fulfill this requirement, and will receive a “Canada Experience Filter” score on its ability to market Canada , as well as a consumer-driven “Viewers Choice” score, in addition to being evaluated by an expert panel of the new Canadian e-Tourism Council. With Yahoo! Canada as one of our main partners, we will not organize another boring Awards Dinner, but plan to recognize the winners at the Science World in Vancouver, followed by an After Awards Party in historic Gastown. The award nominees will also be showcased at the TIAC Conference during the Awards Gala Dinner in Victoria.

In order to have the industry involved, the Canadian e-Tourism Council was established, which is not a CTC Committee, but a forum of around 50 marketing strategy experts and e-commerce executives from the different sectors of the Canadian Tourism Industry, including DMOs, PMOs, Hotel, Air, Rail, Tour, OTA, Media, SME, etc. This group will be involved in providing advice for the conference, and judging the awards.

Other components of Canada-e-Connect include a half-day CACVB CTC E-Marketing Summit for members of the Canadian Association of Convention Visitor Bureaus during TIAC, a half-day Canadian e-Tourism Council Summit just before Canada-e-Connect, and a Student Competition, to offer Canadian graduate and senior undergraduate students in Canada and abroad, the opportunity to win a scholarship to participate in the first Canada-e-Connect Conference. Students may enter the competition by providing a proposal of a research paper of actual program execution by October 1, 2007 to Canada-e-Connect. The topic is “how can the Internet and new emerging technologies be leveraged to market Canadian travel experiences to the world”. The successful students would be invited to come to Canada-e-Connect, engage in the event, network and learn, and use the event as their final “lab” to complete their project.

New information about Canada-e-Connect, the Canada E-Tourism Awards, and related events and initiatives are constantly updated on www.canadaeconnect.com . In addition, a unique online community that will engage interested tourism marketers in Canada and globally and connect them with attendees and speakers, will be launched shortly.

On behalf of the Canadian Tourism Commission, the Canadian e-Tourism Council, and the staff of Canada-e-Connect, we are looking forward to seeing you in Vancouver on November 7^th to 9^th, 2007, right after the TIAC Canada Tourism Leadership Conference in Victoria, BC.

Jens Thraenhart
Founder & Chair, Canada-e-Connect
Executive Director, Marketing Strategy & Customer Relationship Management, Canadian Tourism Commission