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