Why take a blog trip? Some personal musings

I’m heading to Alicante today for a five day blog trip that culminates in attending the F1 Grand Prix race in Valencia on Sunday. My trip is courtesy of an invitation from Land of Valencia, the Valencia Region Tourist Board, with flights organised by the Spanish Tourist Office. I’m packing for a few days in the sun and looking forward to what should be an interesting time in a part of Spain that I can’t claim to know much about.

It’s the first time I will be attending such an event, and will get to meet around 20 other bloggers from around the world; some I have met before, others I’ve got to know through sharing our blog stories, and most who I have yet to meet. We have a busy itinerary and while I certainly won’t look for any sympathy for a paid-for trip to southern Spain, I imagine that our hosts will want us to experience as much as possible in the shortest time. We will visit Benidorm and Denia before arriving in Valencia for the qualifying round of the race and the race itself. There’s also time in our itinerary for activities and visits that have a personal interest to us and our blog readers.

I’ve watched with some interest in how other such trips have come and gone: bloggers travelling to places near and far, occasionally alone but usually in groups, and then posting at every step of their journey on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and on their blogs. For the blogger it is the chance to generate content for their blogs and raise their profile, usually with a view to increasing the advertising pull of their blog. It is also the opportunity to visit somewhere new without having to put their hand in their pocket. For the sponsors it is a chance to showcase their destination to a wider market; the organisers of this event expect to reach an audience of 1.7 million people through our collective blogging, posting and tweeting.

These are impressive numbers on the face of it and certainly make an argument for those who say that social media is now where destinations should be focussing their efforts, rather than the traditional print media.

But what’s in it for me as one of the bloggers? I was very pleased to be invited on this trip, but there needs to be a good reason for me to take the time to travel to Valencia. If I take a trip for pleasure I’ll normally travel with my wife; however impressive this itinerary looks and however good the company will doubtless be, there have to be benefits to my business. So what are they?

Well, if I consider my income at the moment it is split between three main sources: copywriting, freelance writing (corporate magazines) and third party blogging. The mix is roughly 50%, 25%, 25% with the largest share of my earnings coming from copywriting (website content, information and marketing brochures, etc). What’s missing here? Anyone who runs a blog will see I haven’t mentioned my own blog as an income source. I don’t consider myself a professional travel blogger and have no desire to become one. Aside from a few pennies for ads, my blog serves as a shop window for my work, and indeed most new clients have browsed 501 Places at some point before I’ve started working with them. Yes, it’s a glorified portfolio. (It’s also hugely enjoyable and a chance to experiment freely with my writing; the two main reasons I invest so much of my time in it).

Here are my main objectives from the trip:

1. Networking. The chance to meet other bloggers and tourism officials and spend time learning from them and sharing our stories. I have found work from the most unlikely and indirect sources in the past, and have learned to remain open to new possibilities when they arise. Besides which, it’s always a pleasure to make new friends with a shared interest.

2. Material for 501 Places. There is a danger that a dozen or more bloggers might write the same material if they are spending days at a time together. I’d like to think I’ll take my own perspective on what I see and experience, and create my posts in my own style. I’m not very good at writing destination or product reviews, nor very interested in all honesty; I’ll leave that to others. I’ll be looking for stories that fit in with the theme of my blog, and expect that I’ll find these from chatting with other bloggers as well as from the destination itself. After all, I don’t want to experience Blogger’s Dip, as my friend and fellow blogger Andy Hayes so eloquently describes.

3. Personal curiosity. I have never been to an F1 race and have to admit to never watching a full race on the TV. I’m a football and cricket man myself. But the chance to see a race at close quarters is a rare opportunity to witness a spectacular event, and I didn’t want to pass it up. Then there’s the whole idea of a bloggers’ trip. I have a dark vision of it being like a prolonged episode of Big Brother. I guess I’ll find out – that would certainly provide a lot of stories to share later.

Yes, I’m away from my desk for a few days, but the world will still be here when I get back. I’ve worked hard in the last few days to be on top of my ongoing and immediate work deadlines, and am still contactable by clients in any case; for me this flexibility is the greatest benefit of freelancing.

So for the next few days I’ll enjoy the hospitality that’s offered to me, take the opportunity to meet the many people with whom I’m spending the trip and ensure I gather plenty of material for the the benefit of the Valencia Tourist Board, and my own. I’m looking forward to the experience, and learning at first hand what a blog trip is all about; bring it on!

(If interested you can follow the progress of the trip on Twitter by searching the hashtag #blogtripf1, and I’ll post on here if the opportunity arises).