Social media for travel writers | Calls for pitches | New webinar

There's a strange grey area around social media coverage for travel writers.

Today’s the deadline to apply for this Intrepid Diversifying Travel Media press trip to Portugal! Aspiring travel writers from diverse and underrepresented backgrounds — head this way before midnight BST! 👇

Intrepid Travel launches second press trip for aspiring travel writers

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The ever excellent Meera Dattani of Travel Writing Webinars has a brand new webinar incoming for June. This month, you’ll learn how to address the difficult conversations we need to have about destinations and cultures we explore through our writing, and come away with actionable tips on making your features zingy but informative.

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Social media: are we all influencers now?

It used to be that travel writers were often expected to send a few pictures along with their copy when filing stories. I’ve certainly done so in the past — sending a couple of my phone snaps so the piece has extra context. I’m often not compensated for them, either, which is frustrating but when I am only taking photos on my phone with very little effort, I don’t feel too bitter about it. But there’s a new trend afoot: video. And the compensation really varies.

“Can you take some portrait videos, too, on your travels?” an editor recently asked me. Sure, I thought — I’m taking my own videos for Instagram anyway, so a few extras for this piece is no big deal. But then when I got home, there were extra requests. Specific videos with specific content, and a voice-over for which I had to write the script and record myself.

There was no discussion of compensation, and while I’ve asked the question in retrospect (response pending), I really should have had the conversation upfront before creating the content.

This isn’t an isolated incident. I also recently created some video for another national paper who, alongside my article running in print and online, want to run something on their own native video player on their website. (I was actually offered payment for this upfront, too.) And another freelancer I know of has recently been asked to provide video to a digital-only publication to sit alongside their piece.

So what’s going on? Reels, that’s what. In fact, it’s Reels and Tiktok. Newspapers, magazines and digital publications with travel sections are finally joining the world of short-form video for social media, and we freelancers are often being asked to provide the content for their channels.

We are no longer just travel writers — we are videographers, presenters, photographers and scriptwriters, it seems. We are, in some instances, being treated more like influencers than just the writing correspondents many of us would rather be.

Although this has been the case for some time. For as long as I can remember in my career, tourist boards and PRs have been optimistically providing us with hashtags and handles to use while we’re tweeting / Instagramming our way around a press trip. I’ve often ignored these — I’m not an influencer, I’m not being paid to tweet about it or post about it, and I don’t have a significant enough following for it to be of any use to anyone anyway.

Sometimes, when filling in forms to access press trips, you’ll find a box asking for your social media following and an indication of how many posts you might provide during the trip. Again, I try to be as cagey as possible here — I have no idea if I’ll even want to tweet / Instagram it, because what if it’s awful? What if it’s not living up to expectations?

There’s also an ethical question to be asked. Is it right that, as journalists who should really be approaching our stories about destinations, tours, attractions or hotels in as impartial a way as possible, we are being asked to essentially promote these products using hashtags on social media?

There are myriad ethical conundrums within this industry as it is, and so this might seem like small fry compared with the ethics around taking comped travel (which we wrote about here), but it seems to be becoming more common and as social media increasingly gains traction as a serious source for information on everything — not just travel — among Gen Z, perhaps it’s something we need to consider more.

After all, research suggests that 41% of consumers have used TikTok as a search engine (up to 64% among Gen Z) and, according to Google’s Senior VP, “something like almost 40% of young people, when they’re looking for a place for lunch, they don’t go to Google Maps or Search. They go to TikTok or Instagram.”

So has an Instagram Reel or TikTok video become more valuable than the words we carefully craft on a page? Right now, I think we’re safe, but social media’s encroachment on our jobs might well be advancing.

That’s why this month we’re exploring how we can use social media to help our careers. We’ll delve into making quick, easy Reels, deep-dive into TikTok trends, and explore how using social media in the right way can impact your earnings.

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Calls for pitches

There have been a few exciting calls for pitches lately — here’s what we’ve spotted:

• Laura O’Ratliff is commissioning for Travel & Leisure

• AFAR have updated pitching guidelines here

• Claire Köksal needs a Madrid writer

• Eva Sandoval wants pitches for BBC Travel’s SpeciaList

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Tweet of the week

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Who to follow

Seeing as we’re talking TikTok, let’s follow Telegraph Travel’s channel where they’re sharing news, tips and fancy AF hotel suites:

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Industry must-reads

Our list of non-paying publications has had some attention this past few weeks, but we need to make a correction: Bradt Guides has sent us a response to their inclusion, and clarified that they do pay. Abi King told TTW: “Bradt does pay freelancers for online work, as well as for writing books, at least since I’ve been working there. On the very rare occasions when we don’t, that’s usually in response to a writer (or photographer’s) request that we run the piece without a fee as it helps them secure a press trip or has some other value to them. With that said, sending in unsolicited pitches is rarely likely to line up with our editorial calendar and publishing needs, which are mostly based around our books and other partnerships.”

She asks that, instead of pitching, you send a CV and cover letter with your expertise so they can assign pieces / projects to you as they come up.

Now, onto the fun stuff: Jamie Lafferty wrote this deliciously scathing hotel review of House of Gods in Glasgow for the FT. A masterclass in writing balanced, honest reviews.

Really interesting, topical piece here on Instagrammers causing chaos for snaps of Mt Fuji on Adventure.com. Also, we love this piece Meera Dattani wrote on why diversifying the travel media really matters.

Skift has an interesting piece on how booking platforms are experimenting with, and making use of, AI.

Finally, don’t forget about this treasure trove of useful travel webinars by Meera Dattani, all available to download for just £6.

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This is the first in our series on social media. Become a paid subscriber to access the rest of our content, and the full archive.