Steering through the intricate world of public relations in the cruise industry is much like navigating a ship through unpredictable waters. It’s a field brimming with opportunities to craft unforgettable experiences, but it’s also one where challenges loom around every corner. In this episode, Negin Kamali, Senior Director of Public Relations at Princess Cruises, takes us behind the scenes and shares her expertise on how she charts the course for successful travel PR.
imPRessions Season 2 Episode #18 Transcript
Jenn: Hey, Kalli.
Kalli: Hey, Jenn.
Jenn: So, when was the last vacation you took?
Kalli: The last vacation I took was last year. I am not that exciting.
Jenn: Well, by any chance, is there a potential cruise vacation in your future?
Kalli: There could be. We’re actually trying to figure out where to go next. And I know that there is a hallmark cruise that’s coming up, and I am not opposed to being on it.
Jenn: That’s right up your alley.
Kalli: It is traveling hallmark stars.
Jenn: Chad Michael Murray?
Kalli: If he’s on the cruise, I’ll be there.
Jenn: Oh, forget it. Is it Christmas-themed?
Kalli: I think it is. Actually, I do think it is.
Jenn: I am shocked that you haven’t booked it at this point in time.
Kalli: Actually, it’s because it’s in August. I think it’s in August. It’s not in December. It’s not at Christmas season. I have to look more into it. But I saw like an advertisement for it recently.
Jenn: Well, I don’t know if our guest today knows anything about the Hallmark cruise line, but she is coming on to talk about her experiences as the Director of public relations at Princess Cruises. So she’s going to talk to us a little bit about PR in the travel industry, especially regarding cruises, because it is very, very popular these days for people to kind of book their vacation on a cruise line. I personally have never been on a cruise. I know they’re very popular people. My family go on them and I, you know, understand that they’re pretty cost-effective way of, you know, getting a vacation, which is great, but I’m kind of intrigued to see what she has to say about how the travel industry, especially from a PR perspective, you know, where it’s moving forward.
Kalli: Oh, that sounds great. I mean, it really does sound probably very different than traditional travel. There’s a lot more consideration. So I am excited to hear what she has to say.
Jenn: Awesome. Well, let’s get on board.
Kalli: Navigating the world of public relations within the cruise industry is almost like steering a ship through unpredictable waters. The cruise industry is unique, filled with opportunities to create unforgettable experiences, but also filled with challenges that require the magic touch and a strategic mind. From sudden itinerary changes due to weather conditions to managing the impact of onboard incidents, handling a PR crisis in this niche requires a unique blend of skills. Today’s guest, Negin Kamali, director of public relations at Princess Cruises, will shed light on her approach to managing the waves of travel PR. Hi Negin, thanks so much for joining us today.
Negin: Thanks so much for having me.
Jenn: I love this topic because who doesn’t love to talk about travel, especially in the summer months and going on a nice cruise? I’m really excited to hear a little bit more about how you dive into the PR strategy behind what you do, but before we get into that, can you share a little bit about your background for our listeners? Maybe tell us what drew you to the communications and PR world?
Negin: Yeah. For sure. Have you guys ever cruised before? I guess that’ll give me some good context, too.
Kalli: I actually have not.
Jenn: I haven’t either, although my family absolutely loves cruises and they go all the time and I know it’s very popular. I just haven’t been on one yet myself. But, you know, if you want to give us that discount code, I, you know, maybe we could do a little, you know, imPRessions on a cruise.
I mean, or you know, maybe after we talk a little bit more about some of the exciting things, it’ll motivate you to want to experience it at some point because we’ll talk a little bit about different demographics and which cruise offerings might be good for all of them. But I actually didn’t start off, you know, focused on the cruise industry. I got my master’s in public relations from Boston University and, after obviously going to undergrad and started my PR career out in Boston, working for a midsize agency doing consumer marketing work with some travel, opening up new hotels, working with the Boston Pops on the Esplanade, also doing regional work with McDonald’s and Starbucks. And then I wanted to venture out into broader and larger campaigns and accounts, and left to begin work at Golin out in Los Angeles and spent 16 years of my career at Golin. So I started over at Golin as a senior account executive, and ended up leaving 16 years later as an executive director and had a really amazing experience growing my career there, working across consumer marketing brands, working with clients like Mattel, launching, you know, over a dozen new products for that company within the toy space, working on things like Hot Wheels and Tyco RC and WWE celebrated Hot Wheels 40th Anniversary. I also ran the Saint Michel Wine Estates business, which is the largest producer of wine out of Washington state, and worked to drive awareness and organic growth for luxury and different wine brands within that portfolio, introducing new brands and keeping sustaining activity for brands that people have at their dinner tables or at their wine nights. And then we did at Golin, begin work on Princess Cruises and Cunard Line as an introduction to my cruise experience. And that account actually was divided internally at the agency, and I actually ran the Cunard business for probably nearly six years. Cunard is a premium luxury brand based out of the UK that has several ships and is very famous for its transatlantic crossings. So, crossing from New York to Europe. The VP of marketing and PR at the time at Cunard moved over to Princess to be the VP of Public Relations at Princess, and an opening came up to be the director of PR over at Princess during that time.
So I was lucky enough to, you know, have had a good relationship with him and had this exciting opportunity presented to me to come in-house and work for Princess. And I will say that, you know, having the knowledge of the cruise industry from the agency side definitely helped coming in to begin working within the cruise industry internally. But there’s things on the agency side that you don’t get your, get visibility into. And that definitely happened as I was in-house.
Kalli: That’s so interesting. And I know, like even for us, we’re obviously working an agency and there’s so many people that we connect with that are, you know, the in-house PR teams that there’s so much that goes on that behind the scenes, even for us. So it’s very interesting to have that unique view into things. And it sounds like you also, you know, in addition to seeing for crews on both sides, you have a lot of wide breadth of experience, like it wasn’t just in cruises or travel, but, you know, hearing some of the other campaigns you worked on. So what are some of the key strategies that you use to effectively promote a travel destination or brand, kind of compared to how you would, you know, do for a different type of product and how do you kind of approach the content creation that highlights the diverse experiences that are offered by your cruises, because you know it is different than a regular product? Like you said, different cruises are, you know, appeal to different people.
Negin: Yeah, for sure. I mean, it’s not unlike any consumer brand that you purchase. In terms of developing the strategy, I think there’s probably only one element that might be a bit different, but it could get categorized in experiencing the product. Right? So when working with, you know, consumer brands that are sold in a grocery store, and you’re trying to promote those. You clearly want journalists to be able to try them, right? Whether that’s coffee toothpaste, or a hairdryer. And that’s the same thing within the cruise business, right? You want your journalists that are going to be writing about various cruises to be able to experience those ships and those itineraries and be able to talk about them. So that’s like experiential, I would say, is like one of the strategies of how to get people to be able to write about and do segments or stories about cruising. And again, unlike other I think, areas, other strategies include, you know, creating a newsworthy event, what’s going to drive the news of the day? Right before the pandemic, we broke the Guinness Book of World Records for the largest multi-location vow renewal.
So Princess Cruises is the Love Boat we are. We were the co-stars on that show from the late 1970s and early 80s. That was all filmed on our ship. So we lean into Love. That is one of our strategic pillars. And in doing so, obviously, vow renewals and weddings and honeymoons and celebrations of love are an important kind of strategic pillar for us. So, we now have the world record for the largest vow renewal and multi-location. We did that on three ships in different locations around the globe. But like that is a strategy of generating coverage for our brand by generating something newsworthy. We, you know, we tie in to research for many, many years. We had what was called a relaxation report, and we generated a report on strategies of how people relax and how things have changed over the years, and what do they do to relax. And that was another tactic that we utilize to generate, you know, media coverage really outside of the traditional travel space, right? And then I would probably say that the other kind of strategy is tying into news of the moment. Many brands can do this in a variety of different ways, whether it’s like the Super Bowl or the Olympics or, in our case, it was the solar eclipse. Right. So we planned in advance to have a cruise along the line of totality in Mexico, and it actually sold out one cruise. Then we moved a ship to be able to be in that same space and then sold that ship out, and we had people on board our ships experiencing the solar eclipse that recently happened for one of the most unique times, to be able to be on a ship, to be able to experience that. We then had a travel journalist on board that ship and went live to about 12 stations around the country reporting from our ship during the solar eclipse. So that’s just another example of what we’ve done to generate coverage for Princess, how we introduce content in a unique way.
Jenn: I’m getting the travel bug now. Ironically, Kalli and I are actually traveling to Vegas next week. It is the absolute opposite of a cruise.
Negin: Yeah.
Jenn: So we will be thinking about you while we’re on the plane. Going to the desert, that’s for sure. So now I want to ask a little bit about some of the more difficult aspects of PR when it comes to the travel industry, and that is a PR crisis. You just said a lot of really wonderful things that the company does, and the people that come on board get to have this wide array of, you know, wonderful experiences. But in a situation like Covid, you know, what do you do if you’re all of a sudden immersed in some type of crisis? What is kind of your strategy and go-to plan?
Negin: Yeah, I mean, again, I don’t want to sound like a broken record, but a crisis in the travel industry is unlike any other crises that you have in other businesses. And the key to that is being prepared. Whether it’s you work for a cruise line or you work for Starbucks. That means having a plan that starts with it could be anything, starting with crisis scenarios. What could potentially happen when you are within your environment or your company’s environment? And we have decades of various scenarios that have happened on board our ships that we have messaging for and have prepared for. And I think it’s maybe more unique to what I would say are transportation companies, airlines, ships, you know, maybe trains is, you know, we also have a dedicated fleet operations center. This is a place where we are managed by a US Coast Guard captain who has the knowledge and understanding of maritime to be able to identify various scenarios and be the lead in situations such as weather or something potentially worse.
You know, we are basically we have 16 ships on the Princess fleet. That’s really 16 floating cities, right? You have food, beverage, uh, you know, waste disposal, various other things happening there. So, whatever might happen in a city might also happen on a ship. And, it is through this fleet operation center, through scenario planning, through various times where we actually train every year. So we have a practice scenario every year where not just us as communicators, but also every operations sector of the company is trained on what they would do if something happened, as well as those people on our ships and our shipboard teams are doing various scenarios outside of what we do. So, you know, that’s just an example of, like, how enormous of an operation it is to assist with anything as, as small as an evacuation of somebody who has a medical emergency on board to something much larger. So, we have a guest comms team that deals specifically with guest communications. That is everything from an itinerary change to something that’s happening on board the ship, as well as help using them to help communicate with the captain when he’s speaking with people on board. So, like my previous example of somebody who is evacuated because of an emergency, and if it happens at a time when people are aware that a helicopter or something is coming down, the captain just clearly communicates to the ship that, like, we just had a medical emergency, had to evacuate a passenger, and they’re on their way off to X location. We also then obviously have the external communications team, which I oversee, that deals with the media who then get that potential inquiry on what happened. And then we also have what happens on social, right? So we also then now, in this case, also have people on board that may have taken pictures of the helicopter, and then that is pushed out on social. And then we also issue our kind of reactive statements on social media.
Kalli: That makes a lot of sense. And, it’s good to have eyes on all different types of communication and everything that’s going on these days. Because, even though you’re out at sea, people are still connected. So, it is important to have everything communicated clearly.
Negin: Yeah. I mean, in the past, you weren’t actually connected. People ten years ago were taking cruises to disconnect. There was there was really there was emergency internet. But so now with the various satellite systems, you actually are connected, which is what people nowadays want to do. They want to share their vacation experiences.
Kalli: Yeah, actually, that brings me to my next question. So, you know, obviously the internet probably plays a part in this and the accessibility on, on a cruise ship. But what are some of the biggest changes you’ve seen in travel PR over the past few years?
Negin: Yeah, I mean, clearly, we can’t forgo and not talk about the pandemic, right? That wasn’t that really hit the travel in general pretty significantly. But it’s been almost three years since we returned to service with literally an act of Congress allowing cruise ships to return to Alaska in July of 2021. The Alaska delegation proposed a bill that allowed President Biden to sign for us to basically sail to Alaska to be able to create economic improvement within that state. And so, for cruising, that was 2021. That was just three years ago, right? Almost exactly. And so 2022 was really a rebuilding year for the industry as ships began returning to service, and 2023 was a bit more normal, with which, like, it’s crazy to think that the W.H.O. just ended the pandemic in May of 2023, which was exactly a year ago. And so travel PR, I think, dealt with or has been dealing with the impact of the pandemic in terms of reduction in capacity.
How do you bring back travel? And so, for this industry, the PR is kind of dealing with various things that perhaps some other industries hadn’t. And then now with inflation, you know, I think that you can sail on a seven-day Princess cruise from Los Angeles to Mexico for about the cost, and that includes food and entertainment, for about the cost of what it would be to stay in a major metropolitan hotel room for two nights. Just stay. And so, the value is also a tremendous opportunity for the cruise. And so that’s a kind of from message standpoint, something that we’ve been speaking about. But then also I believe that, like other travel hospitality groups, have had to deal with inflation as it relates to higher costs of ticket prices and hotel rooms and whatnot. So, I think that the changes are more in the dynamic of what’s happening in the industry as opposed to the communications element specifically, if that makes any sense.
Travel pages have decreased. Sections have decreased from a specifically public relations standpoint. And then obviously in relation to other multimedia kind of depreciation, we’re just seeing less and less opportunities for places to be placed as within travel. So, I kind of go back to my previous point from the beginning of the podcast. That’s why we look for other newsworthy opportunities outside of the travel spaces to be able to tell our story.
Jenn: Right. I know you mentioned earlier that you work with journalists who review the experience and the cruise ship. Based on what you just said, though, I think this is a good segue way. What about influencers? Do you work with influencers that maybe you work out a deal, whether they get a free trip and they do some content? How do you approach collaborations with potential travel influencers? Because it’s such an important part of marketing these days.
Negin: Yeah, I mean, I think that probably every industry is working with influencers. It’s more of a must-have now than you know, a potential option. So yes, we work with influencers both in the organic space and in the paid space. And it’s definitely part of our marketing mix. I think for us, we look at cost-effective content reaching different types of audiences. And we can talk about that a little bit right now. You know, 3% of Americans cruise. 3%. That’s not a lot. So there’s a huge amount of opportunity. And, you know, and Princess Cruises as a premium cruise brand, our average cruiser because of our price point, because of the number of days that we sail, we don’t sail, we don’t have a lot of cruises less than seven days, and we have a good amount of cruises that are 10 to 14 days. You know, there’s a certain person that’s going to be sailing with us, and we see a lot of families that come sail with us over the holiday or summer time frame, which is obviously when people can get away, but otherwise, it’s a little bit older and aspirationally from a marketing perspective, you know, we really are trying we target kind of the boomer, the Gen X audience. We aren’t going after millennials and Gen Z For Princess, but are other brands within the Carnival Corporation portfolio like Carnival Cruises, you know, have three-day cruises where people can go and enjoy at a lower price point for that audience. And so for us, it’s all about getting people into the cruise experience so that maybe they start younger when they’re cruising, and then they’ll be able to then go into different types of cruises as they get as they get older.
Kalli: So you talked about, you know, the different target audiences. How do you identify, you know, which is the ideal target audience? And you know, how do you differentiate your PR strategies when you are promoting different trips?
Negin: Well, so we know what our target audience is. Our target audience is Gen X, right? That’s who it is. So, we have one from a consumer standpoint. That’s who we’re clearly targeting. We do have stakeholders. I’m not sure if you’re aware, but over 50 to 60% of cruises are sold by travel agents. So we have a dedicated team of people that handle our travel agency partners, giving them materials and information and doing webinars and doing familiarization trips with those travel agencies because they’re a key kind of conduit to selling cruises. Right. So, we have various kinds of stakeholders within that area. And then whether there’s also working with, you know, travel partners as well in our various host cities, we also utilize that as well. But again, as I was mentioning, the various cruise ships, they also have their own targets, right? So Seabourn is another brand within the Carnival Corporation portfolio. They are much more of a luxurious offering. That’s about a 400-person ship. And they’re, you know, pricing for their ships and their cruises are much more.
Jenn: So we, Kalli and I, and our agency work with some travel brands, and sustainability has been just at the forefront of the conversation in PR and marketing when it comes to travel. So I’m curious: how do you communicate the sustainability efforts and factors and the eco-friendly practices of cruise lines to your audiences?
Negin: Yeah, for sure. So again, I kind of mentioned this throughout the podcast, but Princess Cruises is one of nine cruise brands within the Carnival Corporation family. Carnival Corporation as a whole has put out a sustainability report, and I’m happy to say that within that report and our actions for our 2030 goals, we’ve already achieved like 50% reduction in absolute particular matter air emissions. We’ve increased our fleet shore power connection to 60%, and we have multiple other 2030 goals within our air quality systems, within expanding our liquefied natural gas program, and also have a 2050 aspiration to achieve net zero emissions from our ships. For those that aren’t aware of what fleet shore power is and some of those other words that I used, fleet shore power is when a ship comes into a port and plugs into the city’s electrical system, turning off the power on the ship to be able to not utilize the gas or the whatever is used to run the ship. So you’re actually using less emissions. That’s just that’s one example. And so that sustainability report is out through the corporation and is available for people to review. And then, particularly within Princess, we have recently been doing environmental tours in various cities that are important to us. We’ve invited professors and hospitality managing directors and area leaders to be able to come on board our ships to really understand what we’re doing from a recycling waste management system and other areas. And they really have all walked away from not knowing much about what cruise ships do to being very impressed.
Jenn: I love that. That’s such a great idea.
Kalli: So speaking of, you know, all these great things that cruises are doing, you know, what are your predictions for the future of travel communications and PR, especially within the cruise industry?
Negin: Well, if I had a crystal ball into what we would predict, I think I would be a very wealthy woman. But it’s not earth-shattering to think that content is the future. Right? And brands need to be operating as content creators and distribution channels for themselves and to be able to communicate their messages, because at some point, you know, where will the outlets that we pitch be? We’re already seeing such a significant decrease. And really, you know, I think it’s important to think about what our world will look like if we have less and less media outlets from an editorial perspective. We are already within Princess, leveraging paid editorial opportunities as part of the mix within what we’re doing. And I think that will be the, you know, a potential future for us. And also, you know, really just working as an integrated marketing function with our marketing colleagues to be able to maximize all, all that we do.
So, I’m not sure if I gave too many predictions, but I think content is really the biggest one for me.
Kalli: Yeah, that’s really helpful. And this is all really great. So, thank you so much for joining us today to share your experience. You know, we really appreciate it and have a lot to think about, especially as Jenn mentioned, as we travel next week.
Negin: Great. Thank you so much for having me.
Kalli: Of course. And to all of our listeners, be sure to tune in every other Wednesday for new episodes which are available on your favorite podcast platforms. We’d love to hear from you, so please drop us a line if you have any suggestions for guests or topics, and you can reach out via social media or email us at imPRessions@pollackgroup.com. We’d love to hear from you!
