IC TRAVEL AGENT April 2014 | Page 36

REPRINTED WITH KIND PERMISSION FROM CT MAGAZINE SELLING TRAVEL WITH STEVE The Power Of WOW by Steve Crowhurst, CTC A 3-Letter Word To Help Your Commissions Rise Beyond Your Wildest Dreams H AVE you noticed how much WOW we use in our conversations? The WOW word has become the word to describe any and all of the destinations featured in each issue of CT magazine. Not only the country as a whole but also the cities, towns, the buildings, the people, the cuisine… the beer! So many places so many WOWs to shout out. Where’s this “Why WOW?” going you ask? Why WOW? What the WOW! It’s time to rev up your WOW Marketing Plan and factor in the WOW word. Let me explain starting here…well back in the 1500s actually. Och Aye The WOW! Marketing With WOW If you’ve travelled far and wide or just close and narrow you would have seen more than a few sights to behold anyone’s eyes. Before the 1500s you might have heard those hardy explorers as they came upon a glorious sight, say something akin to “I say Nigel…would you take look at that… must tell mummy when we get home…” How times, things and language have changed. I like the WOW word and it just seems to be emitted constantly. I hear it from others and on TV, too. It’s a common word now and so, to the marketing mind it says: use it. You can use the word by itself to push the beauty of a special place in the world World of Water, Week of Welcome, What’s on Where?, Wide Open World, Wish Only Well, Walk Our Way, Wise Older Women, World Ocean Watch, Women Organising the World, Warriors of Wellness, Writers on Writing and Wonders of Wildlife. WOW With Images What’s a WOW without an image to support it? And what’s an image without a WOW? The two go together. It’s the way it is. So look for your best imagery and add a WOW to it. If you’re not sure how to do that check in at The Travel Agent’s Store, and join their mailing list. Then you’ll be able to review the various how-to eGuides on marketing with WOW. www.thetravelagentsstore.com. For now, you can simply copy and paste your image into a Word document by opening a text box and inserting your image, then open another text box over your image and type in your text. “You have to capture the WOW moment Yes most people would end that statement with ‘noo’ – but not I! We needed a WOW in there as the reason was you see, it appears that the word WOW (not always written or pronounced in caps…) was born in bonnie Scotland. Here’s the skinny: The word ‘wow’, a Scottish interjection, was coined sometime in the 1510s as a natural expression of amazement. It was borrowed in 1924 by American English slang as a verb meaning “overwhelm, delight or amazement”, but has been used as a noun since 1920