The Importance of Good PR & Storytelling | with Jessica Gillingham

The Modern Hotelier #45: The Importance of Good PR and Storytelling | with Jessica Gillingham === David Millili: [00:00:00] Welcome to The Modern Hotelier. I'm your host, David Mully. Steve Carran: And I am your co-host, Steve Karen. Jon Bumhoffer: And I'm the producer, John Boomer. David Millili: Steve, who do we have on the program today? Steve Carran: Yes, David. Today we have on Jessica Gillingham, founder and c e O of Abode Worldwide. Abode Worldwide is a global public relations agency on a mission to supercharge the authority of the tech pioneers and enterprise operators transforming the way they work. Rest and play. Jessica was also named on LO's 2023 list of top 48 inspiring women in the vacation rental industry. Welcome to the show, Jessica. Jessica Gillingham: Thank you, Steve. Really pleased to be here and excited for our conversation. Thanks for having me. Steve Carran: Absolutely. David Millili: Jessica, we're start out we're Gonna go go through three sections. We're gonna get to know you a little bit better. We're gonna talk about your career, and then we're gonna jump into some ministry topics. Sound good? Jessica Gillingham: Sounds perfect. David Millili: Okay. What was the worst job you ever had? Jessica Gillingham: ah, really good question. So I worked in the [00:01:00] marketing department of a conservatory blind company, so a company that made blinds for conservatories. I'm not actually sure what you call conservatories in the us, but sort of basically like awnings and things like that. And I was the marketing manager and it was a very dull, boring job trying to get people interested. In this very sort of boring product, so that was one of my worst jobs. David Millili: Are you a morning or a night person? Jessica Gillingham: I'm a morning person, so I get up early, so I get up at about six and I do exercise and different things there, and I like to start work early. I'm usually asleep by about half nine. David Millili: Okay. All right, good. So if you had to delete all the apps on your phone, except for three, what three apps would you keep on your phone? Jessica Gillingham: So I, my family would say I'm completely addicted to LinkedIn, so I would, I would keep LinkedIn. I would keep. My, bank app, you know, my, my banking [00:02:00] app. I'm afraid I would keep a very sharp eye on that one. And then I would also keep my YouTube channel probably just for looking at things. And anytime I wanna, just to chill out and check out a bit, just get on a bit of YouTube, David Millili: Yeah, I might, I might pick the same three. What's the most used emoji you use? Jessica Gillingham: uh, thumbs up. Seconded by muscles. David Millili: Do have a favorite singer? Jessica Gillingham: So do I have a favorite singer? I do, and it's Van Morrison. I have loved Van Morrison since I was about 16, and I was introduced to him by my first boyfriend. So Van Morrison probably would be my absolute favorite, and I have been lucky enough to see him live, in Cornwall, in a place called The Eden Project, which was, which was really lovely. David Millili: That's great. Do you have a favorite restaurant? Jessica Gillingham: So, do I have a favorite restaurant? I, oh, oh. I might have to, um, think about that [00:03:00] one. I'm not sure if I've got an answer to David Millili: Favorite type of food? Jessica Gillingham: so favorite type of food. Vegetables are my favorite type of food, whether and however they're cooked. David Millili: All right, good. So if you had your own talk show, who would your first guest be? Jessica Gillingham: So the first name that came to mind would be Oprah Winfrey, because I would love to interview the queen of interviewing to find out a little bit more about her have her on the other side probably. David Millili: that's a good answer. So if you had a time machine and you could go to the future or to the past? Which way are you going and what year are you going to. Jessica Gillingham: So it's interesting when we were just talking about Portugal, I often think if I'm in a, a fairly historic, City or town, which is obviously I live in England, that we have them all over the place. I often wonder what it would be like to be walking around these streets a hundred years ago and you know, before we had cars, [00:04:00] before we had so much busyness. So I think probably I would probably go, I live in a city called Bath. Which, um, is a, a beautiful Roman Georgian city in the southwest of England. So I would probably go to Bath about a hundred years ago and see what it was actually like with people walking around without the cars, without all the traffic, without all the, change shops that we have or, or whatever. And see what, what a city was like back then. David Millili: have been about, that's even beautiful today. I think Peter Gabriel lives on the outskirts of, Jessica Gillingham: He Morrison actually to live. David Millili: Okay, cool. Steve Carran: Very cool. Well, that was great. Now we'll kind of get to a little bit of your backstory. What makes you take a little bit, so you mentioned you're currently living in baths right now, and you went to an independent day in boarding school for girls in baths. Did you grow up in baths or Jessica Gillingham: So, so you've done research. I background [00:05:00] my very English accent. I'm Canadian as well as British. David Millili: Hmm. Jessica Gillingham: I have legs in kind of both camps and Steve, you and I met in Toronto at Hightech and that was kind of, it's my second home in a way, Toronto, but I am very, sort of settled here. I lived in Hong Kong till I was eight as well, and then I moved to, Bath when I was about maybe 10, somewhere, somewhere like that. And I did actually go to an independent girl school. I got a free place to an independent girl school. So, I was very lucky to get a very good secondary education. So, yeah, so I am from birth, I moved back about 10 years ago. In between that I had lived in Canada on and off in different places in London, of course, and various other places in the uk. But I came home, if you like, about, 11 years ago. Steve Carran: Very nice. How did growing up in, you know, Hong Kong, Canada, and baths, kind of like all those different cultures, how did that shape you into who you are today? Jessica Gillingham: [00:06:00] So I think it really gave me an interest in travel. It gave me an interest in seeing things beyond the horizon as well. And growing up in Hong Kong in the seventies was very in interesting. It was still a colony of. Of the United Kingdom. It was very multicultural. It was a very interesting beginning. so I think it just gave me a real taste for, differences, but also for just seeing things that that are different really. And the Canadian part of it very much was, Integral. You know, I spent summers over there and it was always, you know, I I absolutely loved the Canadian summers and the Canadian vacation experience compared to the UK one. but as you can see, I now live in the uk 'cause ultimately I chose here. David Millili: So you got your bachelor's at Nottingham Trent University, of diploma in public relations. What got you interested in pr? I. Jessica Gillingham: I love pr. Absolutely love it. But I started my career [00:07:00] working in travel and I worked in tour operating in the beginning and that love of Canada, that I, that I've talked about and that sort of crossover that I have between UK and Canada, I very intentionally, I. Went into Canadian tourism and I worked for a tour operator specializing in Canada. And I'm very entrepreneurial by nature. When I was a child, I had always had little businesses, you know, selling cookies or, or making things and selling them on street corners, you know, and I had jobs from the age of 14, so, so that's always been very much part of my background. But when I left university, I decided I wanted to live in both places, so I went. I thought, well, I might as well. Start and travel and, and do that. And I wanted to start a travel business that was sending people to vacation rentals, holiday cottages on Canadian Lake. So I thought, right, what do I need to do? I, I need to get some experience and I need to learn how to do that. So that is, how I [00:08:00] started. Firstly in, I started in marketing and then I moved into pr and I just found that I was actually very good at pr. I was good at storytelling, I was good at relationships. I was good at business strategy, but translating that into you, you know, storytelling, and I love a challenge as well, and PR is a very challenging, thing to do. You know, you, it is challenging to try and find and connect dots and, and and, and get a company out there and things like that, but I just found that I was very good at it and, and I loved it as well. So just like anything, I kind of found my niche, if you like. Steve Carran: I love that. And, and you actually wrote your thesis in grad school, about Canada, a destination for a family holiday, did that kind of inspire you to start this company? I. Was that kind of the groundwork you laid? Jessica Gillingham: So actually that was my diploma in public relations. I did my thesis at university was a feminist lens of international relations. So that was what my, my, [00:09:00] and was very interesting. But this was my. Diploma in in pr. That is a postgrad and I actually, I did it just as social media was coming out. So we were looking at the impact of influencers and the impact of social media on destinations and in particular, I was looking at Canada, but it feels like quite a long time ago that Steve Carran: Time goes fast. We all agree. Jessica Gillingham: I'm very impressed. Steve Carran: Thank you. Thank you. So now we'll dive into your, your career a little bit. So, after college you were, you were in a few marketing and p PR roles, then in 2013, you founded Trip Toast Canada. You know, what really caused you to start your own company? Jessica Gillingham: So, as I said, I wanted to do something that meant I could spend time in Canada but live here. So it seemed like a natural thing to do would be to start a travel company that I'd have to go over there regularly, but I could still have a base here. But [00:10:00] actually, what I also really saw, and this was. Just after Airbnb had launched, you know, it was, it was just at that kind of time. And because of my experience of growing up in Canada and or, or grow going every summer to Canada, I knew what it was like to go on an Ontario cottage. Vacation and stay in a, what Canadians call a cottage on a lake. You know, a beautiful cabin on a lake, a home on a lake. And in my view, it was the most wonderful vacation that anybody could ever have. Beautiful. You know, everything about it was perfect, but it was a, it was a type of vacation or holiday that was not available to anyone outside of Canada really? And definitely not British people, 'cause they just didn't know about it. You There just wasn't the awareness that this was a possibility. Plus there wasn't really a way to book it. So even though Airbnb was in cities and it was still very much doing just the, you know, the rooms in homes, they had no presence in Canadian Cottage [00:11:00] country at that time. So I thought I would bring Canada, particularly the Canadian cottage. experience to British people. So I started trip and we actually expanded it to other kinds of family holidays, so canoe trips, motor homes, anything that was specifically good for a family. Steve Carran: Awesome. Growing up, we would do the same thing, go to cottages on the lake, so that type of vacation really, uh, Brings back good memories for me. So, you know, trip TOS Canada actually did so well. It was named the Guardian Startup of the Year in 2014, a year after you founded it and then won the Travel Mode Best accommodation website in 2014 as well. What was the secret of building up your website and getting traction So quickly? Jessica Gillingham: I think it was my PR skills and brand. You know, we had a really good, strong brand. We had a really good idea, a really good niche as well. You know, very much focused on one destination and one type of [00:12:00] traveler. We weren't trying to do all things for all people, and one type of product as well. So I think that was all, very good in terms of why we were a guardian startup of the year and why we won the Travel Mole. We also did, you know, we did have a fantastic brand plus good PR as well. David Millili: That's great. So in 2017 is when you founded Abode pr? Correct. And then Abode Worldwide, which now is called Abode Worldwide. With vision of bringing innovative technology into the short-term rental space, what made you passionate about the whole idea of technology and making sure that that was brought into that space? Jessica Gillingham: So it was a natural follow on from what I was doing at Trip tos. And what I realized and why I went initially into the short term rental space is I saw that there was a, it was a burgeoning. sector, it was, you know, not long after Airbnb and I started to sort of really see that there [00:13:00] was so much opportunity. There were loads of tech companies that were coming into the space. Ones that now were big names, but at the time were just little startups. So I saw that there was opportunity. I mean, I am entrepreneurial by nature. I can spot, gaps and, and things. I started it with that sector very much in mind, and actually originally we also did operators, but it was actually the tech companies that needed the PR support. They needed that help to differentiate themselves within the marketplace. I. So that the property managers and the operators would pick them over their competitors or, or pick nothing at all. So a lot of the early work that I did with clients was actually educating the market as well on, what the technology could do for their businesses. Now, I'm not a technical person at all, so you know, when you ask me what are my three apps, I have to really think about it and they're not exactly. David Millili: Right. Jessica Gillingham: However, what I can see and what I. Have got [00:14:00] the ability to do is to see how technology can just help simplify things and make things better. So whether that's for the guest or the hotel manager operator or whatever, and translate it into. words, stories, coverage, whatever it might be that is makes sense for the end user, makes sense for the readers and the audience, rather than just be very much about the technical aspect. David Millili: Almost four years ago you started pillow talk media. Can you tell us more, share more about that. Jessica Gillingham: Yeah, so Pillow Talk Media is, it's really a newsletter where I share, ideas and musings about all the lodging sectors. So the sectors that I'm interested in is around how they're converging. So for instance, short term rentals and hotels and extended stay apart hotels. How that is all kind of blending and, changing is particularly, over the last three years, but also how multifamily [00:15:00] and extended stay and the hotel experience are all kind of converging and, and merging. So, pillow talk is a bit of a pun on, you know, basically it's where we lay our head, you know, whether that is a hotel room, a short term rental, or a living sector accommodation, or a multifamily. It's really about where property and hospitality meet. So it's insights, around the convergence of all those sectors. Steve Carran: Very nice. So now is the part where we. Kinda shift more into industry thoughts and your thoughts on certain trends right now. so the first thing I want to talk to you about is, you know, the impact of storytelling. We hear storytelling a buzzword right now, but really how can storytelling impact the short-term rental space? Jessica Gillingham: so really it can impact any space. So whether it's short term rental or it's hotel, or it's car buying or whatever it is. Is, it's about making sense of what it is that you want to get across and making that connection. So it might be around data [00:16:00] storytelling, so it might be around, this is what we are seeing in the market. So rather than just giving facts and figures and percentages or ADRs or whatever it is, it's actually translating into something that somebody's actually gonna read and engage with. And find useful. So it might also be around storytellers telling around customers, you know, even just case studies or success stories or, or challenges, that kind of thing. So it's around being able to, or also get a brand and be able to translate it in a way that makes sense and, and others who are, who are maybe reading something or watching something or whatever, can connect to. David Millili: And so what, what can short term rentals do? To really stand out and and why do you think people choose short-term rentals over just traditional accommodations? Jessica Gillingham: That is a, a really quite complex, question really, I I, in many ways, because some [00:17:00] people would say that they still don't, you know, that it, that, you know, the hotel market is. An extremely buoyant, strong, strong market or, or wherever else anyone might choose to stay. But you know, technically if you are a visitor, you. there was a real boom in, in the short term rental, or vacation rental or whatever you want to call it. And that was because it was perceived to be more safe to be in your own accommodation and not be in shared, you know, any shared, spaces or anything. So that was a boost. However, short term rentals in terms of their market share was growing before that. That just accelerated. And before that, really what it is, is that there, there was more, opportunity for guests to choose it. So with the advent of Airbnb, that's a whole marketplace that, you know, 10, 12 years ago was not there. So there was no way to choose. A vacation rental, short-term rental. Without that, then other OTAs, such [00:18:00] as booking.com, put short-term rentals and hotels within the same, you know, the same search functions. So, if you think about even brands like Skit now, they're really. and you know, a media brand like Skiff is really pushing short-term rentals. They now have a short-term rental newsletter, they have an own summit, things like that. So I think it's also that travelers are looking for things differently. you know, there might be what we call those, you know, the digital nomads or the pleasure trends. Anyone wants to stay in a hotel really for longer than maybe three days or three nights. So it's giving that choice. David Millili: so you said you and Steve met at High Tech in Toronto. I was there. Whether it be high tech or somewhere else, is there one kind of piece of technology that you are excited about that's, that's coming out in, in just the hospitality space in general. Jessica Gillingham: So, that's a really good question and I should probably really think about that one. So I guess there are two, there are two things that, pique my interest, if you like. it's, of course [00:19:00] anything that makes the guest experience smoother, more streamlined, more user friendly, more intuitive. So anything that does that for the guest and there's lots of different, you know, types of technology that, does that. But the other side of it is what technology actually works for owners. So particularly in the short term rental space, is there any, 'cause owners are often the biggest pain for managers, but also really the customer they want. 'cause they're the ones that own the asset. And I guess that might be the case also for hotels or other kinds of lodging, particularly, you know, smaller hotels. Anything that help owners understand the value that they're getting from their manager, their operator is also really interesting and a much more overlooked part of technology. David Millili: one of the big talks in hospitality is about, you know, robotics and things that are replacing people in, in short term Reynolds, Is there any talk of that right now or not? Not yet.[00:20:00] Jessica Gillingham: So not yet. And I, obviously was at High Tech and saw the robotic stuff and, and you know, it's all really interesting and all really exciting and stuff. You know, there's a, I work in pr, I know that also there's probably very good PR behind the robots. I think with hotels and short term rentals and any other of the lodgings. Spaces, any technology that can create efficiencies and reduce costs and deal with friction and deal with issues such as, you know, everywhere across the world is dealing with staffing problems. It's not just hospitality, but anything that can reduce those problems and create opportunity efficiencies, et cetera, then absolutely it'll go one with one to the other. Not seeing it at the big short term rental conferences, I've yet to see a David Millili: Hmm. Okay. That's interesting. That's good to know. Steve Carran: So you said, uh, the Gold Rush is over in the short-term rental space. what did you kind of mean by that [00:21:00] and what is next for the short-term rental space? Jessica Gillingham: I think that the short term rental space did incredibly well over covid because as for those reasons that we said, plus, there was huge amounts of investment coming into the space. You know, before we've had our financial. issues and you know, that, that every kind of country is facing in the investment and the capital. There was huge amounts of capital coming into the short term rental space. So on one level, that was all happening. That has now eased off somewhat. and then also guests. aren't just all sticking with short-term rentals. They are happy to go back to hotels and, and, and things like that. And hotels are coming out very strong. You know, they're, some hotel brands are, doing their own extended stay or, or, or apartments, you know, moving more towards that way. But actually what I also meant is that owners, the asset owners who during Covid times, were quite happy to buy a second home and give it to a manager. To rent out. They were getting really high [00:22:00] returns on their investment. They are no longer seeing those returns partially because of, you know, mortgage costs are going up. And, and things like that. But also because the, the revenues that short term rentals attracted is definitely lessened. so for the owners, they're no longer seeing it, you know, they're, they're contracting from the market as well. So I think that there was a bit of a false sense of short term rentals were, you know, really going somewhere. But we are seeing collapses of company cassai, which was a big. South American, vacation rental company with lots of funding, lots of, kind of looked fantastic. All of that just recently, has closed its doors. You know, with, I think that it was like the golden, you know, the golden whatever it is, nothing could go wrong. Then actually things are plus. The big issue also is regulation as well. And you know, everywhere across all countries, regulation and [00:23:00] governments are, really looking at how short-term rentals are, are, how they are existing and, and what, how they can kind of control and manage that. So, yeah. Steve Carran: and since that gold rush is over, you know, we are specifically talking about lake houses in Canada. how do those owners differentiate themselves from, other lake houses that might be in Canada? Jessica Gillingham: So really owners typically will use a manager who will do all of that. And for, particular destinations like say Lakeside ones in Ontario for a long time they didn't need, really need to do anything to differentiate themselves. They would get a guest no matter what, because there's a limited. Try, however people can also travel more than we could. Even two years ago, remember we couldn't really go anywhere, for a while either. So we were, many of us were going into our domestic markets and things like that. So today, you know, I read a headline today that said, I think we're a bit worried about US domestic tourism. 'cause you are all over here. You're in Portugal, you're in my city. You know, [00:24:00] you're not traveling locally so much. So, how they differentiate themselves? I think with, owners of properties, really what they do is they go through a manager, and a manager has to be very good at certain things. So they have to be very efficient in the way that they're running a property. They need to market it really well through whichever O T A or direct, and they have to get everything right. They have to have really good guest reviews, really good guest experience. it is a difficult market increasingly to succeed in. Steve Carran: Absolutely. and one of the final questions here, what's your advice? What's your PR advice put on your PR hat for, you know, those hospital hospitality technology companies out there? I. Jessica Gillingham: So my, big advice would be do it. You know, invest in your story. Invest in your awareness. Invest in your brand, and invest in making sure that your front of mind when potential customers are thinking about. switching P M Ss or switching, you know, guest experience or [00:25:00] whatever it is. So it's making sure that your front of mind, and it's also remembering that your job is to educate your customers. You know, when we are talking about technology, we are talking about new ways of doing things as well, sometimes. So it's a way of educating the customers and educating. So for instance, you know, at High Tech, I talked to lots of tech companies who basically said is sometimes we can sell. We can sell our product to whoever it is that's buying it, but actually getting ground staff to implement it and actually getting the take up to happen is really difficult. 'cause the education piece isn't there. using anything new takes a lot of time. There's a lot of change management, et cetera that needs to go on. So it's remembering that. It's also about educating, as well as that awareness piece. Steve Carran: Absolutely. That's great. Well, now we, uh, I'm gonna turn it over to John here. He's been listening this whole time, So he's gonna, he's got one final question for you. Jon Bumhoffer: So like [00:26:00] Steve, I grew. Grew up in the Midwest and you know, going on vacations a as a kid, we always went to the lake house or to the lake or something like that. And that's a huge thing in the Midwest for Steven, Wisconsin. I grew up in Michigan. And I'm curious, what is like the one thing that drew you to that kind of experience? Why did you like it? And my second question would be, how do you, you know, you, you started doing PR for things like that. How would you communicate the value or the experience that you loved to other people? Jessica Gillingham: Yeah. Okay. So firstly, why, I came to that was because I had experienced it as a child, and I think our early experiences are often the ones that are most profound. You know, I remember swimming in a lake listening to the loom. Seeing the stars in the sky, you know, completely unlettered. And actually last summer I spent six weeks with my family in, in Canada and we were at Lake for the Summer and things like that. I mean we work with tech companies, so really, you know, [00:27:00] I'm used to kind of, how do I translate passion to a tech company, to a P M Ss rather than, you know, in many ways it's dead easy. How do you. How do you instill passion to a beautiful lakeside cottage? You talk about what it feels like to be there. You talk about what the experience is like to be there. you instill, that sort of wannabe thing. so I think in, in many ways that's what you do. It's kind of easy and, and if it's a property, what you do is you invite a travel journalist or an influencer to. Come and experience it and then tell, you know, show pictures, all of those things. I think it's much harder, which is why I like it 'cause it's a challenge, is how do you do that? Same thing for a guest experience app or a channel manager. Or a payment solution or a smart lock, you know, how do you then instill that kind of, passion about or interest in those other things? And that's really [00:28:00] what interests me today. I think pring, a lake eye cottage is table stakes really. It's, that's a pretty easy thing to do. Who doesn't wanna go and stay there, you know? Steve Carran: Team Lake a hundred percent. David Millili: Yeah. I ended up being the sure kid. Sorry about that. Uh, so that does it for another episode of The Modern Hotelier. is the point where Jessica, you can let know how like people can connect with you directly, connect with your company. So plug away. away. Jessica Gillingham: Okay, great. Thank you David. And Steve and John, firstly, I just wanna say thank you so much for having me. I really appreciate it and I've very much enjoyed it. But if anyone wants to get hold of me, they can do it on LinkedIn. I am, very open to connections or whatever, or they want to find out a little bit more about what we do at Abode Worldwide. Our website is abode worldwide.com. Pretty easy. Or my email is jessica@abodeworldwide.com and, so we've talked quite a lot about vacation rentals here, but we [00:29:00] also work with hotel tech, so, very interested in speaking with anyone if they're interested in finding out more. David Millili: Thank you so much. So that does it for another episode of the Modern Hotelier. Thank you so much for joining us. We appreciate it. it. Jessica Gillingham: Thank you.