Practicing Leadership

Rick Medlin. President & CEO, Fruit of the Loom, Inc.
Maybe there are born leaders. For most people, though, leadership is a learned skill.  Like all learned skills, leadership emerges from practice - doing it.  This session, presented by the leader of a Kentucky-based, multi-national company with over 30,000 employees, speaks powerfully to practicing leadership and to the practice of leadership.  

Crucial Conversations

David Nelson, Master Trainer, VitalSmarts
A New York Times business bestseller, Crucial Conversations, has transformed organizations and changed the way millions of people communicate. With more than 2 million copies sold, this book—now in its second edition—gives you the tools to prepare for high-stakes conversations, transform anger and hurt feelings into powerful dialogue, and make it safe to talk about almost anything. David Brown, a certified Crucial Conversations trainer and speaker will present a general session and breakout providing the principles and strategies that will help us succeed with our crucial conversations.

Assessing Your Sports Tourism Potential

Don Schumacher, CSEE, Executive Director, National Association of Sports Commissions
Sports tourism has drawn a great deal of attention from destination and event marketers, particularly in Kentucky. Is a community properly positioned to pursue this market? If so, what types of events are best suited for that community, and what are the best strategies for pursuing or creating those events?  These and other key questions will be answered during a session presented by one of America’s foremost sports tourism experts.

Telling Your Story Through Video

Arthur Rouse, Senior Producer/Director, The Media Collaboratory
Any list of effective tourism marketing tools has video at or near the top.  Whether its video done with your iPhone or that created by a production company, there are elements that are essential to a success. Among those are targeting your audience and objective, identifying a compelling story, designing a program, shooting and editing with the final program in mind, and budgeting for use of personal tools or professional services.  If you want can’t miss videos, then this is a can’t miss session.

State My Path: Delivering Messages That Are Candid and Respectful

David Nelson, Master Trainer, VitalSmarts
When delivering a tough message to someone, we typically face an internal dilemma of whether to be 100% candid or to be 100% respectful. Along those lines, we choose to sugarcoat our message to manage respect or we speak harshly in an attempt to maintain candor. The trouble is that these goals don’t have to be mutually exclusive. In this breakout session that includes group discussion, video examples, and deliberate practice with others, you’ll learn simple steps for being candid and respectful.

Online Review Sites: Making Them Work For You

Jay Salyers, Vice President, Miles Partnership
We all know that word of mouth has a powerful influence on visitor decisions about destinations, hotels, restaurants, attractions and events. For better – and for worse – sites like Trip Advisor and Yelp have exponentially increased the reach and impact of word of mouth. There are techniques for maximizing these sites’ value and minimizing possible negatives. This session will help you learn and manage both sides of these digital double-edged swords.

Thou Shalt…Basic Commandments for Buying Media

Melissa Bowman, Media Director, Scoppechio
Tourism marketers can be overwhelmed by the myriad of media buying decisions, options and deals that confront them. Whether its print, broadcast or digital, there an onslaught of questions and issues that accompany each. This session will offer bedrock advice to use in analyzing opportunities and arriving at media buying decisions that will work best for you.

Hosting Travel Journalists

Susan Dallas, Senior Communications Manager, Louisville Visitors & Convention Bureau
There are few greater thrills for a tourism professional than opening a magazine, newspaper or website and reading a story that resulted from your efforts with the story’s author. Within the media relations process, no aspect is more important to getting editorial coverage than successfully hosting writers. Just like hosting someone in your home, there are ways to enhance or diminish the experience for the guest.  This session will help you achieve the former and avoid the latter.