See Alaska as others see Alaska; travel writer shares promise of the Alaska Media Road Show.

• Author: Groene, Janet

Tourism today is a global sea of travel products ranging from llama treks to tropical cruises, from 500-year-old cathedrals to the Great Wall of China. How can Alaska stand out in a marketplace that becomes more crowded and competitive each year?

Thanks to the Alaska Travel Industry Association's annual Alaska Media Road Show, the state's tourism industry is harvesting the power of "free ink," another name for editorial coverage that can't be bought at any price. Here's how it works. Once a year, about 40 select journalists are flown to a resort/conference center for an intense schedule of wining, dining and a fast-paced day of one-on one interviews with members of ATIA.

Once sold on Alaska by their brief appointments at the Road Show, journalists schedule trips to the Great Land. They write firsthand feature articles about their experiences, sending a personal "I've been there" message to their readers. The articles appear in newspapers and magazines worldwide and, because writers are paid by their publishers, there is no cost to destinations for this coverage (although destinations may pay the travel expenses of writers whose publishers don't provide them with expense accounts).

What's not to love about this win-win scenario? Editorial coverage has clout, credibility and inestimable residual value. Readers believe what they read, clip it, save it, pass it along. Feedback from newspaper features may come in for weeks; from magazines for months. A mention in a guidebook can benefit a destination for years.

$9.2 MILLION RETURN

The three-year return on investment from the Road Show is $9.2 million, estimates Jennifer Thompson, vice president for public relations at Bernholz and Graham in Anchorage. Although editorial attention can be fickle and it may be up to a year before a feature makes its way through the editorial pipeline, tourism professionals find press relations to be one of the most inexpensive marketing mallets in their toolbox.

Participating as partners (i.e. ATIA members who paid $2,750 plus their personal expenses to attend AMR) this year for the first time were Jan and Jim Thurston of the Alaska Center for Creative Renewal in Halibut Cove. "I'll be back next year to build on this year's experiences," says Jan. "I know these things take time."

John Quinley, assistant regional director for the National Park Service, remembered, "In 2004, I talked to managing editor Tim Woody about the upcoming 25th anniversary of the Alaska Lands Act, which established 10 new national park units in Alaska. He liked the idea, assigned a writer, and the story ran in the December/January (2005/2006) issue of Alaska magazine.

"Another story that was developed at Road Show 2003 was with Stan Patty,"...