In a flood of information and the invasion of new technological developments, it’s not easy to recognize what will have the most impact on business. With this in mind, we’ve compiled our top 5 predictions of what we think will impact the tourism marketing field most in 2017.
- Content Content Content: Content receives special emphasis. Not just any content, but quality and relevant content. This refers to the different content you create for your customers – potential guests and visitors, which can be in the form of a blog, and article, an eBook, a picture or a video. It is important to keep in mind that most people first investigate before making a decision on the selection of a travel destination, the hotel they will stay in or a restaurant in which to eat during the holidays. The focus should be on the needs of visitors or guests. Your main questions in this case should be to firstly determine who your guests are and find out what interests them. Creating content is a long-run game, which is incidentally also a goal – to have guests who trust you, who will come again and who will recommend you.
- Social Networks: It’s the little things that count when it comes to tourism. The small things you provide along with the expected service can go a long way. In person, that can be a smile at the reception, commenting of forecasts over breakfast or sharing tips for sightseeing. In the digital world, the same effects are achieved with the likes, comments or shares.
Facebook is still top of the list. This remains the most used social network and because of its wide use it allows relatively easy communication with guests. In addition to fluid communication, Facebook is an important platform to promote your content, photos and ads. Go a step further and post a video, you’ll be surprised how strong an effect a video has on social networks.
Facebook’s sister platform Instagram is also widely used. As much as we refuse to believe it, even grown people love picture books – a visually attractive picture or a fun video are enough to grab attention, and through captions we direct the consumers towards more information.
- Open Doors day is every day: After the user discovers that your services are among the highest rated on Facebook, TripAdvisor or Foursquare, reviews your photos on Instagram and assesses that your hotel is an ideal place for a holiday, they will contact you with specific queries – either privately via email and phone, or in public through comments on the social networks.Your role is to be available, active and accessible in real time. Talk to them, ask them for their opinion and listen to their thoughts because they are the ones that bring life into your tourism business
- Mobile accessibility: Mobile traffic is overtaking desktop. Why? Because the busy and dynamic lives we lead make us use smart devices constantly.It is estimated that the average person checks their phone about 150 times a day. They check their social networks, e-mails and possibly look at the time. A notification on Facebook? Check it immediately – via smartphone of course. Want to know the best hostel in the city? Search the Internet, usually TripAdvisor, immediately when the thought occurs – via smartphone. Most of the time users spend on social networks takes place – on smartphones. It is super important that you must adjust all your content, social and web pages to mobile users.
- Be where everyone’s at: Due to the fact that users first get informed and investigate before they decide, it is important to stand out from the competition.You made effort to make good content, your services are remarkable and you maintain cordial communication with customers – then there’s the inevitable need to push your quality and reach more users. To draw attention to yourself, you need to be where your (future) customers are, and that’s in the digital world.Advertising on social networks like Facebook and Instagram takes place in a relatively subtle way, in the form of sponsored posts that look identical to other posts. This kind of advertising is efficient, but also cost-effective. Promoting on Google search engine is also not negligible – about 90% of users click on the first 3 things that they are shown after the search. Positioning in search is also affected by the quality of your content. A good blog works wonders for SEO.Whatever you do, be consistent, be creative and be accessible – because that’s what guarantees the satisfaction of your guests.
Focus on the smaller things that will trump quantity with quality. After all, the technological novelties are not what we should be concerned about, but people and our clients.