Anyone sell photos for tourism marketing?

rokklym

I take alot of photos in my travels and I also pick up alot of tourism brochures and info from areas I visit, just so I know what the interesting places to visit are. I noticed in my local tourism brochures, the photos for the most part are pretty bad. There are a few great photos, but most are a joke. For instance, they may have a section on mountain biking and they will have a cheesy 15-20 year old photo, and anyone that is there to mountain bike is going to see that and think its a joke.

I have hundreds of pretty good photos from my area that I would love to see published in these brochures and magazines. I'm not looking to make alot of money off these, but it sure would help to get my name out there. How does someone market their photos to this type of industry? Is it all stock agencies, or is it a matter of emailing or calling local publishers?

Awais Yaqub

Hi

You can send your portfolio to concerned department with some written note highlighting necessity of the good imagery in field of advertisement. Also take time and visit them.

Or may be the are relying on the advertising agency in this case you can also talk to agency. But ofcourse if tourism company accepted your work agency will be using your photos :ivar

chuckinsocal

I've never done it but I think it's an excellent idea.

If I were going to do it, I'd start by e-mailing Chambers of Commerce, Convention Bureaus, Visitors Bureaus, and the like and attach a few well water marked sample photos for them to see along with some remarks telling them how beautiful their area is and how they might use some of your photos to show it off to potential visitors at it's best.

I'd also create some town or region specific galleries and fill them with well watermarked photos of their area and provide them with links to that gallery. Who knows? They might find something they like and want to license it.

You might also contact some local businesses in the area and show them some of what you have. They might be interested in buying something to put on their walls.

There are probably some other ideas but I think the plan would be to show show potential buyers the best of what you have and make them want it.

There's a rule in marketing that says it takes x number of contacts to get someone's attention ( I forget the number but I think it's 7 ) so you may want to make contact with some eye candy maybe once a month or so. Maybe once a week in the beginning.

This is all off the top of my head and may need some refinement and expansion but it may be a good starting point to a viable plan. And, heck, it doesn't cost a nickel to try and it might be a fun project.

Let us know what you think.

Bill_M

chuckinsocal wrote:

I've never done it but I think it's an excellent idea.

If I were going to do it, I'd start by e-mailing Chambers of Commerce, Convention Bureaus, Visitors Bureaus, and the like and attach a few well water marked sample photos for them to see along with some remarks telling them how beautiful their area is and how they might use some of your photos to show it off to potential visitors at it's best.

.

I do, locally, and it all started with a call to the Chamber of Commerce.

Good luck,
Bill