What people don’t tell you about digital marketing

What people don’t tell you about digital marketing

For decades, traditional marketing materials were all that you needed to promote your tour and activity company. You could distribute flyers, purchase advertisements in print magazines and send brochures to retail travel agents who would subsequently sell your tours.

Today’s marketing landscape is vastly different. Traditional marketing materials are a thing of the past, and digital marketing is the key to success. It’s necessary for tour and activity operators to understand the importance of digital marketing.

New to the digital marketing game? Here’s a few questions you need to ask yourself:

• Do I know my audience?
• Do I have a digital marketing strategy?
• Do I have a metric that proves I am successful?

After you have considered your current digital marketing finesse, you’ll want to better understand the importance of digital marketing. These are the elements that must be included in your digital marketing strategy:

1. Social media

Social media is perhaps the most powerful player in the digital marketing game. While many platforms offer you the opportunity to create a page or profile for free, the real exposure lies in paid advertising campaigns that allow you to target specific demographics. You need a dynamic, engaging presence on all of the best social platforms.

2. Content marketing

Content marketing allows you to provide your website visitors with high-quality, accurate content that is also designed to increase online visibility. Content marketing includes both text content as well as photographs. Fresh content is necessary to stay relevant in the search results.

3. Digital channel strategy

Your digital marketing strategy needs to take into consideration the digital channels that will bring in the most bookings for your business. You will want to design promotions that will motivate digital channels, such as OTAs, to resell your tours and activities.

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4. Optimization

Your website needs to be optimized in order to drive conversions. This means that you need to frequently publish fresh content that utilizes targeted keywords, and that you need to have technology in place that makes it easy for travelers to book directly with you. Don’t forget to implement a responsive website design that adapts instantly to mobile or desktop devices.

5. Branding

Before you begin a digital marketing campaign, you need to create a brand identity that will remain consistent throughout all marketing materials. This includes a brand logo and colors as well as a brand voice that should be used for all content.

6. Targeting an audience

With digital marketing, you have the ability to target specific groups of travelers. You can design adaptive marketing strategies that will personalize promotions based on the audience you are targeting. This is the key to reach a variety of travelers and growing your brand across the globe.

Now that you understand the importance of digital marketing in the age of online travel bookings, it’s time to implement the technology that will make it easy to launch your new digital marketing strategy. Rezdy is the premier online booking system for tour and activity operators, and it allows you to seamlessly create and implement a marketing plan designed to drive bookings.

If you enjoyed this article – What people don’t tell you about digital marketing – then follow the Rezdy blog. There are a lot of marketing tools and resources designed with businesses like yours in mind.

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Want to learn more? 

Get your hand on the latest Ebook on the Intro to Digital Marketing here.

Read our blog on ‘5 ways to attract tourists to your tour or experience business’ here.

Image credit: Lauren Mancke