Nicole Mahoney

Hello listeners of Destination on the Left. I am so excited to talk with you today because this is our 100^th episode! This milestone would not be possible without our great guests who have been free with sharing their knowledge and experience and without our wonderful listeners who provide us with encouragement and lots of feedback to keep us motivated to continue on this path. To celebrate this milestone, I thought I would spend this episode reflecting on the last 100 and sharing the journey from my perspective with all of you who have helped make this happen.

We launched “Destination on the Left,” in October 2016. The vision for the podcast was to focus on destination marketing by exploring successful collaborations, creative marketing ideas and best practices. We wanted to provide an opportunity for professionals in the travel & tourism industry to share what they have learned and successes that they have achieved.

The podcast was born out of my desire to showcase the true business of tourism. It is something I had been thinking about for quite some time. The federal government doesn’t recognize tourism as an official industry, many local and state governments struggle to understand the true impact of the industry and my friends and colleagues in the industry were often treated like step-children when it came to getting their fair share of the pie.  The spark of the idea began in 2013 when I co-hosted an internet radio show with Bruce Peters on WCEO Hour and invited tourism leaders on as my guests. I convinced Bruce that tourism leaders were important business leaders and needed a platform for sharing their ideas. Bruce obliged, and we had Carol Eaton from Visit Syracuse and Don Jeffries from Visit Rochester on the show. The conversation was fun and informative and from that point on, I wanted a platform for continuing to showcase business leaders in the tourism industry.

Fast forward to the first quarter of 2016, when I was interviewed on Onward Nation, a podcast that focuses on how top business owners think, act and achieve. The experience inspired me to dig out that idea from 2013 and use the podcast as a platform for sharing stories of success from the tourism industry.

With the help of Predictive ROI, a marketing agency specializing in podcast production, planning for my own podcast began in June 2016. This included establishing interview questions, designing a logo and website, creating a scheduling protocol, testing technology and working on a social media strategy. With all of the groundwork laid, we launched our first episode with Dan Fenton from JLL consultants as the first guest.

Since that first episode aired, we have had guests on from all over the world including Germany, India, Canada, UK and Ireland. We have enjoyed conversations with guests from New York State where we are based to Oregon to California and many others. We have interviewed professionals from DMO’s, museums and attractions to PR firms and ad agencies specializing in the tourism industry to tour operators to national travel association leaders. We have covered topics on regional marketing, influencer marketing, travel trade marketing, Travel PR, digital marketing, programmatic buying, grassroots efforts, food tourism, research and trends and so much more. It is amazing to think about all of the topics we have covered and the beautiful library of shared knowledge that lives in the first one hundred episodes.

After 100 episodes, we are now listened to in 53 countries are available on 33 platforms including itunes, stitcher, google play and even on Alexa – Hey Alexa – play Destination on the Left.” We even won a Prism award from the Rochester PRSA chapter earlier this year.

Another fun element that was unexpected is the addition of our Podcast Roadshow this year. We attended the Museum Association of NYS annual conference in Rochester, I interviewed attendees from all over New York State representing all types of museums and cultural institutions for this podcast. The conversations were enlightening and inspiring and provided new perspective on this important segment of the tourism industry. Many themes stood out during these conversations related to museum marketing. These included how museums and cultural institutions are working to build community, reaching audiences beyond their local markets and creating new programming and events that enhance the visitor experience. From this collection of interviews we launched a 5 part series focused on museums. We hope to do more roadshows in the coming year. If you have an idea for an event that we should attend please let me know.

The ratings and reviews that you have left as listeners of the show are very much appreciated. It has been very gratifying to read how we are making an impact. I want to share a few with you:

★★★★★5 out of 5 stars.

SDR4

• 4 months ago

For any tourism pro!

This podcast is a must-listen for any tourism professional looking to glean insights from some of the top people in the industry. The emphasis on collaboration should provide listeners plenty of inspiration to help expand and improve their own efforts!

★★★★★★★★★★5 out of 5 stars.

Nostagia

• 5 months ago

All of them

Informative, exciting, people passionate about their jobs and sharing their adventures. You are in tourism, this is the one pod cast you have to listen too every week! Keep our amazing world coming at us, thanks Nicole

★★★★★★★★★★5 out of 5 stars.

dg716

• 6 months ago

Really insightful and informative

As a volunteer in a leadership position at a museum, and hence a non-professional novice, I found Destination on the Left a great source of education in how to think about cultivating audiences and being relevant.

Keep the ratings and reviews coming, it helps other people find us through their favorite distribution service. Please feel free to reach out to me at anytime with ideas for show topics, guest suggestions or feedback on how we can make this show better. You can email me at Nicole@breaktheicemedia.com. I am looking forward to our next 100 episodes and you will be an important part of the journey to the next milestone. Thank you for listening and we will be back next week with another fantastic guest!