• by Shankar Gupta , June 5, 2006

To promote tourism to Holland, the Netherlands Board of Tourism and Conventions has struck a deal with CondeNet for an online film festival minisite that features video shot by consumers.

Five filmmakers' clips are currently running on a CondeNet-produced microsite, "Discover Your Holland." The festival and the microsite will be live through July on CondeNet properties around the Web; the prize is a four-night trip for two to Amsterdam. One of the five featured filmmakers is the daughter of actor Billy Crystal, Lindsay. She filmed a story involving a backpacker chasing a biker through Amsterdam because the backpacker's airplane ticket got caught in the bicycle's wheel.

Charel van Dam, project manager for the Netherlands tourism board, said the board has committed to consumer-generated content as a way to promote Holland. "We're big believers in consumer-generated media," he said. "This gives a more reliable and objective message to consumers that are interested in going to Holland. It also creates more of an experience and gets consumers more engaged with the product."

Prior to the Discover Your Holland promotion, the Netherlands tourism board partnered with BlogAds to send a group of 25 bloggers to Amsterdam, to write about their experiences there. The tickets to Amsterdam were given to the bloggers in exchange for advertising space on their respective sites, which included Slice NY, Jossip, and CityRag.

Van Dam said that consumer-generated media will continue to be a major part of their campaigns. "We are also trying to step away from the traditional tourism promotions and trying to be more innovative in how we promote our client Holland," he said. "Competition amongst destinations is fierce, and you need to be more creative if you want to get your message across."