How Canva’s New Creative OS Transforms Content for Travel Marketers   Canva has officially unveiled the largest product launch in its history, an overhaul so big they’re calling it their new Creative Operating System. For travel marketers, this update represents a fundamental shift: Canva is no longer just a design tool. It’s now a mission-critical platform for planning, creating, distributing, and [...]

We talk a lot about culture, in part because culture always tells you where technology stands. Culture does this long before the analysts do, you just have to listen to the language people use. The term for this new language is a retronym: something added after the fact to differentiate the original from the new. Retronyms appear when culture needs new [...]

Google’s newest travel-focused AI features, Canvas, Flight Deals, and agentic booking, signal a shift in how travelers plan, build, and book trips. Instead of bouncing through dozens of tabs, travelers can now generate itineraries, compare options, and complete reservations inside Google Search’s AI Mode. For travel marketers and tourism professionals, this marks the beginning of a new competitive landscape: AI-first trip [...]

You’re investing time and budget into both upper-funnel inspiration and lower-funnel conversion—but how do you prove it’s working? The answer lies in moving beyond simple traffic numbers and focusing on the right data points. To effectively measure the success of your efforts, you need to prioritize dedicated data analysis using powerful tools like Google Analytics 4 (GA4) and Google Tag Manager (GTM).

In 1999, Seth Godin wrote "Permission Marketing," introducing a revolutionary approach to connecting with audiences. His insight was profound yet simple: a marketer's job isn't just to "get someone to move," it's to get them to care first, then guide them toward action. That permission-based thinking transformed how we all approach marketing. From Marketing Philosophy to AI Strategy Earlier this [...]

Drop the Beat How often do you think about rhythm? Or, put differently, how often are you and your team paying attention to pattern recognition? This time of year makes it obvious: the visual shift from green to amber to white, the cultural cadence from back-to-school to Halloween to Thanksgiving to Christmas, Kwanzaa, and Hanukkah. Spotting cultural patterns is the [...]

The Holidays Are Coming This month Coca-Cola debuted its holiday ad and reportedly used 70,000 AI prompts to bring it to life. That number is technically true, but deeply misleading. It wasn’t 70,000 prompts; it was 70,000 AI clips stitched together, generated through what was likely hundreds of thousands of prompts, refinements, reruns, and scene rebuilds. This is the second year [...]

There’s something poetic about packing a piece of your fandom. Whether it’s a first-edition comic book sealed in a case, a holographic Charizard card, or in the most delightfully absurd form  a piece of Heinz ketchup luggage. The new Heinz x Herschel Supply collaboration is more than a novelty drop. It’s a marker of how collectibles culture is bleeding into [...]

How DMOs Can Win Travelers in 2026 Destination marketing organizations are facing a new era in travel: empowered by technology, influenced by AI, and shaped by fast-evolving consumer expectations. On this episode of Field Notes, Eric Hultgren hosts Ben Knapp of Saffron Consultants to dissect the latest City Brand Barometer and share what DMOs should prioritize to rise above the competition [...]