Thank you so much for all of the over 80 bloggers who participated in our first larger #IGTravelThursday event at the Klaus K hotel in Helsinki, Finland last Thursday. First we held a closed event for Finnish bloggers, lead by Satu who has been heading the #IGTravelThursday project in Finland. Later on international bloggers from around the world joined us, and it was great to see so many familiar faces, and new travel bloggers who want to be part of Instagram Travel Thursday. Big thanks also goes for everyone who participated last week via Instagram – we had a big screen where everyone’s photos were displayed during our party. It was great to see familiar faces “participating” the party via the posted photos! Thank you for Klaus K Hotel for sponsoring the gorgeous venue for the event.
Photo by Sannasmag.
We started #IGTravelThursday to unite travel bloggers, travelers, travel industry people and destinations with each others via Instagram. In my book I give plenty of advice how to use Instagram as your travel guide, but the entire purpose of #IGtravelThursday, IGTT, is to bring people together and help each others to travel in a more authentic way.
It is absolutely incredible to be heading to a new location on the other side of the world and know that you already have friends there who are giving you the best tips what to see and where to go. I hope you join us by sharing your travel photos and if you are a travel blogger, by writing about Instagram travel also on your site.
IGTT Weekly Top 5 News
1. Featured new App complimenting/competing with Instagram
I know, I know, we all love Instagram, but if you were looking for some new places where to publish your photos, I recommend Momentage. Momentage allows you to publish photos and short videos, but instead of one at the time, you can create a story with multiple pieces of content and publish at once. You can also later on go and edit the individual stories and add more content. Do you remember the Whrrl app from years back…? Momentage sort of makes me think of a hybrid between Instagram and Whrrl, where you also could create stories with multiple pieces of content, but visually Momentage is minimalistic like Instagram. (Note: Whrrl simply doesn’t exist today because the company was bought out and the app was shut down, sadly.)
What I did on Momentage I created a collection of short stories using my Instagram photos and I think it’s great especially for travel bloggers. You can make destination picture stories easily from the photos you already have. My first story (above) was from my trip to Copenhagen.
I really like the discovery tab in the Momentage and how their community team picks interesting/beautiful/artistic stories. I like the personal touch better than Instagram’s “popular page”, where I hardly ever go anymore, because there are rarely any people I truly want to connect with.
If you join – find me on Momentage, my username is skimbaco.
2. Instagram is the fastest growing social media network
There might be new apps and social media networks be popping up like mushrooms on a rainy day, but Instagram goes stronger than ever. In fact, the strongest. According to a report by GlobalWeb Index Instagram’s active user base increased by 23% in the last six months.
Although the oldies like Facebook, YouTube and Twitter still have far more users than Instagram, Instagram surpassed even Pinterest in the amount of users and active users.
Above anything – Instagram is where your friends, frenemies and favorite brands most likely already are, and so should you.
3. Featured IGTT Instagrammer
I would like you to meet Francydipi, Francesca from Italy.
Francesca writes a travel blog called Che ti Porto? in Italian. She travels around the world, but I also love when she shares pictures – and video – from back home in Rome.
4. Featured IGTT blog post from last week
In case you missed last week… a great photo journal from Chicago. Cheryl shares her trip to Chicago in photos that reflect the city perfectly. I hope you’ll enjoy visiting Chicago via Cheryl’s Instagram photos as much as I did.5. Featured Instagram Destination
I hope you followed the gorgeous snow-filled photos from Finland last week with the #nbefinland hashtag. This week I am mesmerized by the photos coming from my old home, New York. My favorite department stores, designers, style icons and bloggers from New York City have posted gorgeous photos of the city this week. NYC is always magical, but snow just takes it to the new level of omg, I need to buy flights to NYC, now. The weather conditions in New York City are not the best for travelers though, I heard many incoming flights were cancelled on Wednesday, and most schools were also closed. Hopefully many of the weather related problems have been solved by today, and locals and visitors alike can enjoy the snow. A few of the hashtags to follow the snow in NYC is #nycsnow and #nycsnowstorm2014. Here are some gorgeous photos posted on Wednesday.IGTT Traveling Linky
Read more Instagram Travel posts from these new blog posts this week and add your own blog post.
Not a blogger? Not a problem. Join us at Instagram by using hashtag #igtravelthursday and share your travel photos.
Bloggers! Join the Instagram Travel Thursday and Host the Linky!
Bloggers, join us! Write a blog post about topic "Instagram travel" - anything where travel and Instagram intersect. Add your blog post link to the Linky above. You can also take the Linky code and add the Linky widget in your blog! get the InLinkz code Copy and paste the following rules and the banner image when you host the Linky widget: Join us for Instagram Travel Thursday! Instagram Travel Thursday is a weekly blog post collection with a purpose to promote the great travel experts on Instagram and Instagram as a source for travel inspiration. Add your Instagram Travel-related post to the Linky. Here are the Linky rules: Link to a new Instagram travel post and use the permalink of your post, not the homepage URL. Only new posts from the week of the linky and no giveaways, other linkys or sales pitches. No links to your Instagram profile, only links to your blog. Link back to one of the Instagram Travel Thursday Linky hosts. Visit a few other posts in the linky and show them some love (comment, tweet, Pin etc.). Links that do not follow the guidelines will be removed. More information at Skimbaco Lifestyle's Instagram Travel Thursday page. Get email sent to you when the Instagram Travel Thursday linky post is up (subscribe it here).
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My mission is to inspire you to live life to the fullest and find your own "skimbaco," how you enjoy life where ever you are in the moment. For ideas for travel, home, food and fashion, subscribe to weekly Skimbaco Lifestyle feed on Mondays and I hope you get my newsletter as well that I sent out sometimes on Fridays. 