I spend a lot of time working in the tourism industry so I think about it a lot. But for the past couple weeks my wife and I have been traveling throughout northern Spain and I’ve been living tourism as well.

Because travel is such a normal part of our everyday lives, we seldom stop to think about how significant an industry, and what a world-changer, tourism has become.

It’s not just the fault of our casual thoughts about travel, though. Rather it’s because the industry has never figured out how to demonstrate to the world at large how much commerce it is responsible for. After all, the categories that are included in tourism’s official revenue totals usually include transportation, lodging, and some services (tour guides, for example) but often don’t include most dining, professional services or retail sales. Omitting this last category is especially foolish when you consider that shopping is now recognized as travelers’ number one activity worldwide.

Think back to the last place of interest you traveled to. Maybe it had been a famous battlefield (Gettysburg, say, or Pearl Harbor) or an important maritime community (Barcelona or San Francisco) back in the day. Regardless of its previous claim to fame, now the area probably supports its citizens by attracting tourists. Today its former glory (or infamy) has been replaced by hordes of world citizens in brightly colored tee shirts pulling over-packed wheeled suitcases. But despite the crowds, travel is still so underrated as a source of revenue and taxes that until very recently even the United States government didn’t have an office specifically dedicated to attracting tourism to the country.

That is particularly surprising when you consider that unemployment is one of the most pressing problems the world over, with the US unemployment rate at 9.1% and Spain’s count almost reaching 21%. Not only do travel related businesses create a significant number of jobs, but travel is one of the few industries where a worker can enter reasonably unskilled and emerge a short five or 10 years later as an assistant manager, for example, with a real career path and significant opportunity to responsibly support their family. At home, we call this rags to riches story the American Dream, but it’s actually the dream of aspiring populations all over the world. And thanks to the tourism industry, it can come true.

Tourism is also a relatively “clean” industry. Sure there’s the carbon impact of moving bodies from place to place and the development issues of providing lodging for all those bodies. Compared to mining or manufacturing, however, tourism’s ecological costs are negligible.

But there’s an even more important service that the sector provides in today’s world. Because when we travel to other places around the world, and when people from other countries visit us, the world becomes a smaller, and a friendlier, place. More than 140 years ago, in his classic travelogue Innocents Abroad, Mark Twain explained it this way:

“Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one’s lifetime.”

I couldn’t have said it better myself. Truth be told, I wouldn’t try.

After almost every punch line, a googly-eyed, sweating Rodney Dangerfield would tug at his tie and utter his famous line, “Awww, I don’t get no respect.”

Seems to me the entire travel and tourism industry could do the same thing. Tourism is a trade that encompasses so many different business sectors but has no single defining industry designation, and therefore, has no real way of demonstrating its value to the greater community.

Check the Dictionary of Occupational Titles (DOT) and you’ll find listings for Air Transportation; Aircraft-Aerospace Manufacturing; Amusement and Recreation; Fishing, Hunting, and Trapping; Food Preparations and Food Specialties; Hotel and Restaurant; Museums, Art Galleries, and Botanical and Zoological Gardens; and the Railroad Transportation Industries – all listed as separate sectors. And that list doesn’t even include limousines, cruise lines, sporting events, nor all of tourism’s supporting industries such as Legal, Accounting, HR, Real Estate, Retail, etc., etc., etc. Yet every one of those businesses owes some or all of its success to tourism.

Funny how things change in times of trouble, though. Now that BP is dolling out money to companies whose businesses have suffered due to the Deepwater Horizon disaster, it seems every business that might have ever received a dollar from a tourist’s wallet has its hand out for relief. Watching the evening news the other day, I saw a gas station owner from Palatka complaining that BP owed him money because tourists have stopped driving down to Florida. Even the Brass Monkey Lounge in Marathon filed a lawsuit against BP for diminished business.

As Judy Sorenson, owner of the bar, said in The Miami Herald, “It‘s still beautiful here, but people aren’t coming because they think the oil is here, even though it isn’t here. That’s killing the Keys.”

Maybe so, Judy; but it ain’t killing bars. The last thing people in the Keys are going to give up is booze. In fact, I’d bet that the worse the situation gets, the more they’ll drink.

Regardless of the economic realities, our tourism industry will keep stoking the economy – providing jobs, generating taxes and showing people the best parts of the United States, all without getting the respect it deserves. It’s so bad that even Rodney Dangerfield used to diss our industry: “Boy, what a hotel that was, why they stole MY towel! Then I asked the bellhop to handle my bag and he fondled my wife.”

I’m tellin’ you, we don’t get no respect.

So many gulf coast beach destinations are telling consumers that their beaches AREN’T fouled that I can’t help but wonder how robust their businesses must have been before the oil spill.

As I recall, a prolonged recession, increased competition, reduced consumer confidence and many other reasons had already softened most of the destinations’ business. Why is it then that they feel that by just announcing “We don’t have greasy beaches yet” the consumers will arrive in droves? Since when was telling people the reasons why they shouldn’t not come considered good marketing?

Eat here, our restaurant isn’t dirty.

Drive our car, it’s not unsafe.

Wear our jeans, they don’t make you look fat.

Thanks to Richard Nixon and Bill Clinton, even most politicians have learned that defending a negative doesn’t work:

“I am not a crook.”

“I did not have sex with that woman.”

Saying “we don’t have oil” or the positive version – issuing “clean-beach guarantees” – is more of the same – telling people why they shouldn’t not come. Instead, thoughtful messaging for the near future (and for the next several months) is critical, particularly in markets that were hurting before anyone ever heard of the Deepwater Horizon.

The good news is that an opportunity actually exists in this crisis that shouldn’t be missed. Resort areas should seize the opportunity to highlight their strongest selling points and not just make the beaches look inviting. Negative perceptions have already been developed even if there isn’t oil on the coast of Florida, yet many tourists pick their destinations for reasons beyond the beach. And with all eyes on the region, now is the perfect time to show those eyes what they’re missing. At least the positive parts.

Since the tragic oil spill began I’ve been inundated by reporters wanting to know how much money various gulf coast communities will have to spend to repair their tourism industries. Paradoxically, I believe the question is not how much should be spent but what happens if we don’t spend?

Traditionally the knee-jerk response of large organizations such as the Federal Government and BP is to throw big money at big problems. So figuring out how much to spend might be as irrelevant as it is incalculable. Instead, let’s look at the reasons why this money has to be spent.

The tourism industry has done such a bad job of promoting its business benefits that most people do not understand the impact of tourism. Travelers spend money in more than just hotels and attractions; they are directly responsible for enormous purchases of entertainment, retail, real estate, professional services and most every other industry’s products. But because there is no one SKU number that covers the impact of tourism, as you would find in health care or chemicals say, no one really knows the value of the industry.

Besides the immediate purchase power of tourism, the industry also has an enormous influence on a community’s business growth. Most forward thinking cities and regions have their own economic development offices charged with bringing new business, investment and ultimately jobs to their communities. If you talk to the people charged with attracting business to their area, they’ll tell you that tourism is the front door of economic development. After all, no one moves their business to a community they haven’t visited.

But perhaps most vital, tourism helps create our positive views of people and countries in faraway places. Tourism also helps people who visit us go home with improved visions of America and Americans. According to a 2006 survey by RT Strategies, people who have visited the U.S. are 74 percent more likely to have a favorable opinion of our country. Or, as Mark Twain wrote over 140 years ago in Innocents Abroad: “Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts alone. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one’s lifetime.”

Think about the cost of peace of mind. How much was that feeling worth on September 10^th, 2001, the day before 9/11? How much would you pay to get it back now? Translated into today’s terms, what was the value of an unsoiled coast before BP’s deepwater pipe began spewing thousands of barrels of poison into the Gulf?

More importantly, how much should they pay to fix the damage?

I just read an article that outlined Florida congressman Meek’s plan to raise marketing dollars to promote tourism to Florida in the wake of the tragic BP oil spill:

“U.S. Rep. Kendrick Meek, a candidate in the Democratic primary for the U.S. Senate, said $25 million set aside for advertising to lure tourists to Florida in the wake of the recent disastrous oil spill is not enough.”

“Meek told reporters Thursday that he sent a letter to BP CEO Tony Hayward, asking for $75 million more to address efforts to encourage tourism.”

Like politics, money is the lifeblood of marketing. Without the budget to get your message out to as many people as possible, even a cogent, compelling marketing strategy can fall flat. And so I applaud Representative Meek for raising as much money for our state’s tourism industry as possible.

But once we have the money, it’s important to remember that we still need to have something to say. Simply telling consumers that Florida’s beaches are oil free won’t work. First of all, thanks to the economy and the competition, consumers had to be convinced to visit BEFORE the oil spill. Second, few consumers are going to believe anything the government or Visitor Industry tells them about the condition of our waters. And third, thanks to an appalling lack of knowledge of geography, once it’s announced that oil has made landfall anywhere in Florida (most likely in the Panhandle) many consumers will assume our entire almost 1,200 miles of coastline is fouled.

Let’s hope that as much time, effort and passion is put into building a cohesive marketing and creative strategy as is invested in raising money. After all, as Sun-Tzu wrote in the time of Confucius: “Strategy without tactics is the slowest route to victory. Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat.”