A primer on the setting of goals A few years ago, I was involved with the organization of a giant event. It was a one-day outdoor festival and concert in a big city. It was a lot of work and a lot of money on the part of the organizers and, well, to make a long story short, it rained all day. Not just drizzle; […]
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It’s Finally Time to STFU.
Start to think of yourself as narrator, stage manager, and prop assistant. Recently, I’ve been thinking a lot about the future of interpretation in the rapidly-expanding world of experiential tourism. What is experiential tourism? It’s the future. Actually, it’s the present—the world of tourism began moving to an experiential model at least fifteen years ago. Where once it was enough to see Florence, to see Old […]
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What makes an experience memorable?
It’s a fairly simple formula, actually. Take a moment to think back to one of your most cherished travel experiences—something that goes back, say, more than five years. Close your eyes and let the images and feelings of that trip surround you. It’s a nice feeling, isn’t it? What were the images and feelings that came back to you first? What were the strongest among […]
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Interpretive Capital and the VE Cycle
How are you spending yours? I just spent a week working with interpreters at three different national historic sites in Alberta, and what a blast it was. Is there anything more energizing than workshopping programs with passionate, engaged people? I would like to share an insight I had while working through a script about the history of a particular discovery. We were at a point in […]
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Do you need a new interpretive plan?
If you’re a manager at a park, historic site or other heritage attraction, I’m guessing you know where your old interpretive plans are. Almost every site has them, gathering dust in a cabinet or stacked up on a shelf like geological strata going back decades. Is it time to get a new one done? Here are a few things to consider. Two terrible reasons to commission a new interpretive […]
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Branding Your Attraction: It Ain’t About The Logo
There’s no such thing as not having a brand. You have one, even as you read this. Branding is a vague and distasteful term. Particularly in the ecotourism and heritage sectors: nobody really wants to think of your cherished resource as a brand. So I’d like to establish what I mean by branding from the start: it isn’t your logo; it isn’t the look and […]
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The World’s Worst Interpretive Themes
Writing great interpretive themes is not rocket science. Why do we make it so hard? In the world of interpretation, we refer to messages as themes. The word ‘theme’ has different connotations and meanings. Sometimes I wish we didn’t use the term at all; it’s confusing, and this is one area that we really need to get right. Let’s see what the dictionary has to […]
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Learning And The New Visitor Experience Paradigm
Let us talk less about learning, and more about connecting with essence of place, about the forging of links, the fostering of emotions and the long-term making of meaning. This is the conclusion of my series on the Visitor Experience (VE) Revolution. You might want to start with the first chapter, here. I consider myself both a champion and a casualty of the new visitor experience […]
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High Horses, Ivory Towers and the M-Word
This is the third instalment in a series, The Visitor Experience Revolution. You should probably start at part one, here. I will be presenting this topic at the National Association for Interpretation’s big workshop coming up next week in Virginia Beach. I hope to see you there. As interpreters, we identify ourselves as educators first and foremost. That is not a bad thing. But with that lofty self-image sometimes comes a sense of superiority […]
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Visitor Experience: Out With The Old
This is part two of a series; I suggest you start with the first instalment, here. Understanding our visitors’ needs and desires and trying to facilitate their experiences—both internal and external—very quickly become more important than creating didactic panels and programs. Organizations have started creating departments of Visitor Experience and hiring directors of Visitor Experience, and we are suddenly left to figure out where our old interpretive […]
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