{"id":281922,"date":"2021-06-23T19:18:34","date_gmt":"2021-06-23T16:18:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/en.buradabiliyorum.com\/florida-beach-town-writes-amazon-tv-series-to-lure-tourists\/"},"modified":"2021-06-23T19:18:34","modified_gmt":"2021-06-23T16:18:34","slug":"florida-beach-town-writes-amazon-tv-series-to-lure-tourists","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/florida-beach-town-writes-amazon-tv-series-to-lure-tourists\/","title":{"rendered":"#Florida beach town writes Amazon TV series to lure tourists"},"content":{"rendered":"

“#Florida beach town writes Amazon TV series<\/a> to lure tourists<\/strong>”<\/p>\n

\n

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. \u2014 Remember that longing you felt after an episode of \u201cSex and the City\u201d to shop at the characters\u2019 favorite New York haunts and drink cosmopolitans at the same bars? Or that sense of wanderlust for the seaside cliffs of Ireland after watching \u201cGame<\/a> of Thrones?\u201d<\/p>\n

Hollywood\u2019s flattering spotlight has put small towns on the map, like Wilmington, North Carolina, from \u201cDawson\u2019s Creek\u201d and the woods of Senoia, Georgia, from \u201cThe Walking Dead.\u201d And that\u2019s exactly what travel<\/a> marketers in St. Petersburg and Clearwater, Florida, were hoping to capitalize on when they commissioned an original, script<\/a>ed TV series, seeking to draw quarantine-weary tourists to the area\u2019s sugar sand beaches.<\/p>\n

\u201cLife\u2019s Rewards\u201d aired on Amazon Prime last month. The eight-episode show is based on a charming yet cavalier wealth manager who loses his money and uses travel rewards points to stay at the posh, pink Don CeSar hotel while rebuilding his life.<\/p>\n

\"Jared
Jared Wofford poses for photos at the Don Cesar hotel Thursday, June 17, 2021, in St. Petersburg, Fla. <\/figcaption>
AP<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Each episode is only eight to 14 minutes long, and was filmed using a local production company, director and actors. The series cost roughly a million dollars to create, with contributions from the city and the state\u2019s tourism arm.<\/p>\n

Some of the \u201cad\u201d spots woven throughout the dialogue are obvious, like the random episode about the Tampa Bay Watch Discovery Center. But the characters quickly pivot back to plot-forwarding dialogue. It\u2019s a quick-hit ad versus the sustained 15- to 30-second hard sell of conventional commercials.<\/p>\n

At other times, the settings feel natural, like the gay nightclub Blur or a tour of the colorful WhimzeyLand \u201cbowling ball house\u201d in an episode featuring a scavenger hunt. Even the countless gratuitous beach shots mostly feel believable.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m watching something and I\u2019m drawn into the show because of the story line, but also the places I\u2019m seeing in front of me,\u201d said Steve Hayes, president of Visit St. Pete Clearwater, who noted that he and his wife frequently talked about visiting Wyoming while watching their favorite show, \u201cYellowstone.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Jared
\u201cLife\u2019s Rewards\u201d aired on Amazon Prime last month.<\/figcaption>
AP<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

While sometimes awkward, the characters in \u201cLife\u2019s Rewards\u201d refer to every destination in the scene by name. There were no fake dive bars or coffee shops.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou start to build, \u2018Hey, this looks like a really cool place I want to visit,\u2019 and it\u2019s in the background,\u201d said Hayes. \u201cIt\u2019s not in the front where you want to go through and hit the fast-forward button.\u201d<\/p>\n

It\u2019s too soon to gauge whether the series has impacted tourism, or even how widely it was viewed.<\/p>\n

The hospitality industry was hit hard by the pandemic, and tourist towns are eager to seize on the new willingness to travel. That\u2019s put more pressure on destinations to market outside the box.<\/p>\n

\"Jared
The show is based on a charming yet cavalier wealth manager who loses his money and uses travel rewards points to stay at the posh, pink Don CeSar hotel while rebuilding his life.<\/figcaption>
AP<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cEvery single destination in the world is now looking for that tourism boom. I think it\u2019s more important than it ever has been,\u201d said Alexandra Delf, executive vice president for London-based Grifco, a travel marketing firm.<\/p>\n

Movie- and TV-inspired travel is so popular that the firm is using pandemic binge shows to promote its biggest clients. Promotional ads note that scenes from Netflix\u2019s \u201cBridgerton\u201d were filmed near The Gainsborough Bath Spa. \u201cGame of Thrones\u201d packages at Slieve Donard Resort and Spa tout tours where notable scenes were filmed nearby, including Robb Stark\u2019s battle camp and \u201cRed Wedding.\u201d<\/p>\n

With travel halted during the pandemic, scenic destinations felt even more aspirational.<\/p>\n

\u201cA lot of what we do in travel marketing is selling that dream of relaxation,\u201d said Delf. \u201cIt gives them something to look forward to.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"The
The legendary Don CeSar Hotel, often called the Pink Palace, was built in 1924 on the beach in St. Petersburg, FL.<\/figcaption>
Alamy Stock Photo<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The production company behind the Florida show said scripted shows are a new genre for travel marketing, and that they\u2019re already in talks to shoot some for other cities in the state.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe don\u2019t want people to feel marketed to. We want them to feel lost in the story line and get invested in the characters like any other show on streaming or TV, but we\u2019re providing a positive context for our destination,\u201d said Brianne Maciejowski, director of film and video for Odyssey Studios.<\/p>\n

Consumers retain far more from branded content compared to traditional advertising, she said. The Florida TV series ended with a cliffhanger, so a sequel is still possible.<\/p>\n

\u201cPart of our business model is to help destinations find a voice in this entertainment-first world,\u201d said Maciejowski. \u201cThere\u2019s a lot more in our future.\u201d\n <\/p><\/div>\n

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Source<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“#Florida beach town writes Amazon TV series to lure tourists” FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. \u2014 Remember that longing you felt after an episode of \u201cSex and the City\u201d to shop at the characters\u2019 favorite New York haunts and drink cosmopolitans at the same bars? Or that sense of wanderlust for the seaside cliffs of Ireland after…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":281923,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/nypost.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2021\/06\/florida-tourism-show-08.jpg?quality=90&strip=all&w=1200","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[70897],"tags":[110108,2758,70275,1545,6642,71470],"class_list":["post-281922","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-6-23-21","tag-amazon","tag-beaches","tag-coronavirus","tag-florida","tag-tourism"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/281922","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=281922"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/281922\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/281923"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=281922"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=281922"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=281922"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}