• SME Market Access Program
• SME Access to Finance
• Clean Energy Solutions
• Training and Facilitation
• Project Design and Strategy

SGCF - Travel Writer

For more detailed descripion of the position and instructions how to apply, please send by email before 11th December 2009 to  eet-sa@whlconsulting.com.

The assignment is expected to take approx 3-4 months in the field, beginning at the end of January 2010. There are two more positions similar to this but for different part of Kwazulu-Natal and Mpumalanga provinces.

OBJECTIVES

The overall objective is to improve market access for MSME accommodation and activity providers through a cluster marketing strategy.  The WHL will help them to more effectively market to the growing independent traveler (FIT) market. The proprietary tool to assess the SMEs, Sustainable Market Readiness Assessment (SMRA), has the objective to identify accommodation products ready to participate in marketing directly to a global audience via e-commerce channels, as well as those nearly ready or not ready at all.

It is one thing to have a nice guesthouse or local homestay but it is entirely another thing to have the professional and high quality digital content (photos and story) needed to sell the product. One of the biggest needs for SMEs throughout the developing world is this content, without which it will be impossible to reach a global audience. It is the minimum entry requirement for building market access. The content needs to be high quality, in the correct format (e.g. digital images in both high and low resolution formats), and also placed in the hands of the accommodation owners so that they can use the material to leverage the multitude of distribution channels available to them. The WHL Consulting Content Collection Exercise (CCE) is designed specifically to address this need. The CCE consists of two parts (two separate consultants): A Travel Writer and A Professional Photographer.

This RFP is for the Travel Writer position. For each tourism product a travel writer is needed who has experience in writing copy for MSME tourism products. WHL has a particular interest in sustainable tourism and has developed a new measure called Caring for the Destination. One of the key components in this assignment will be for the travel writer to extract valuable stories to be relevant to this branding opportunity for the MSME.

The CCE Travel Writing portion is essentially an interview and site visit that is conducted at the MSMEs premises with the MSME owner or manager. Each CCE can take approximately 45 minutes to 1.5 hours, thereafter the content needs to be written as per the scope of work below . The Consultant will need to manage the travel and interview schedule, calling ahead to confirm appointment time so that at least 3 (average of 4.5) interviews can be conducted per day.

The Consultant will be assigned to interview approximately 150 MSMEs in total and it is expected this target can be reached in 3 months time. Every two weeks the Consultant will need to report to the project coordinating office with status updates and to coordinate the next two weeks of the travel and interview schedules. If the Consultant is able to interview more than 150 MSMEs and if there are more MSMEs to interview once the 150 target is reached, the consultant and the project coordinating office may agree upon a rate and time frame for the Consultant to conduct the additional SMRAs.

The consultant will be required to undergo 2 days of training at the start of the assignment.

SCOPE OF WORK

Working closely with the appointed WHLC task team leader, tasks the consultant will undertake, will include:

• Write two versions of quality English language copy for each product. Each product will require approximately 600 words of original content and another version of slightly re-written content (so it is approximately 30% different wording). WHL will provide the Consultant with a questionnaire form for each section/topic of writing per SME (i.e. General Introduction text, room descriptions)
• Create a blog outlining your visits to the various establishments.
• Write two (2) destination articles for the destination – one focused on an aspect of the destination, one on sustainable tourism related aspect of the destination; each approximately 400-750 words and each in English.

The consultant will then be responsible for:

• Loading all the accommodation content into a WHL software application.
• Generating a DVD of all of the written material for the destination (1 DVD, 4 copies of each) to be submitted to WHLC.

The work done by the consultant will be performed at the consultant’s home base and in the field in KwaZulu-Natal and Mpumalanga.  The Consultant will need to provide all there own equipment. When the consultant is uploading the accommodation content to the WHL software application, he/he will be required to have internet access.