An Introduction to a 10-Part Series on Promoting NZ Tourism Businesses
Tourism marketing is often made to be extremely complex and out of reach for most operators. In fact, pulling only a few marketing “levers” can yield impressive results. In this series of tourism marketing guides, I, Robin Censure of NZ Pocket Guide, will go through my best tips to improve the marketing strategy of your New Zealand tourism business. Using my own experience from the eight different tourism websites I have operated in New Zealand over the years, as well as insights obtained from the tens of tourism operators I have worked with, these guides aim to get you started the right way to promote your New Zealand tourism business.
As you know, the tourism industry is quite broad so while some articles and points may not be relevant to your particular tourism business, all of them feature useful tips that will help maximise your marketing spend and get known by travellers planning a trip in New Zealand. So let’s get to how you can promote your New Zealand tourism business.
The Down-to-Earth Guide to Tourism Marketing in New Zealand
Here’s just a bit about the tone of this series of tourism marketing guides. To be honest with you, I thought about wording this whole series of articles in a politically correct way but the genesis behind it was something similar to: “What if my mate came to me and asked me how to promote his existing or new tourism business?” These guides are what I would say in the way I would say it. Honestly, these tips were supposed to be only a one-pager but I ended up writing over 14,000 words in one day. Nope, this is neither a joke nor an exaggeration. However, right here on one of my most successful platforms for marketing New Zealand tourism, NZ Pocket Guide, seemed like the right place to share my knowledge where you have the opportunity to read at your own pace.
I admit, these tips on how to promote your New Zealand travel business include way too much information sometimes. Sometimes, some opinions are a bit too strong, but it is pretty much how I deal with everything in life. I also include a ton of real-life examples both from some of my previous tourism businesses, current businesses, or businesses that I consult for. Of course, I changed a few things so their secrets are kept well… secret.
© NZPocketGuide.comAbout the Author
Before we begin any kind of business advice, there is a mandatory step in which the author ought to brag about his or her own accomplishment so you know they are the real deal. After all, why should you listen to this particular guy rambling about SEO and social media on the internet?! Here is my story in only a few words…
My name is Robin, I was born in France and worked and travelled my way around the world until I landed in New Zealand where I managed a few high-end retail stores in Auckland for about a year. I then saw an opportunity to start my first tourism business that grew enough to allow me to invest and spearhead the launch of the largest travel guide to New Zealand, NZ Pocket Guide. It grew to become the second-most popular tourism website in the country behind the government-run NewZealand.com in only a few years. We now have a collection of industry-leading guides for New Zealand, as well as Fiji, Tonga, Niue and more. You can read more about the NZ Pocket Guide story in the next part of our series, Tourism Marketing #1: Know What You are Selling.
Needless to say, throughout this journey, I have taken a deep dive into what feels like every corner of the internet to find out what really works in promoting New Zealand tourism businesses. Friends in the industry have also recognised this and somehow I have been persuaded to consult tens of small and large tourism businesses to help find their footing when it comes to getting their business discovered, especially in the online world. Friends in the industry will also tell you that I am known for speaking too fast and for my honesty to a fault as I am often too outspoken about my opinions. This is only because I care deeply about this industry and have a hard time containing both my passion and analytical mind.
© NZPocketGuide.comThe 4-Step Process to Marketing Your Tourism Business
Here you go, that is kind of a candid intro to who I am. Of course, these guides are very much an opinion piece in which I cover a wide range of subjects, so feel free to take it all with a grain of salt and sieve through it all to find what applies to your business in order to create that perfect tourism virtuous circle:
- Get online
- Get sales
- Get referrals
- Rinse and repeat…
But most importantly, I will try to keep things super simple with plenty of examples so you see the real application to what I am talking about. This is a “real world” guide, not one of the thousands of generic online marketing guides out there.
© NZPocketGuide.comStart Marketing Your Tourism Business
Now that the mandatory introduction and the author background is out of the way, let’s get started with my 10 tips to best market your New Zealand tourism business:
- Know what you are selling
- Build a simple website
- Get striking imagery for your website
- List your product on NewZealand.com and more
- Expand your sales channels
- Have a well-thought social media presence
- Google yourself, your offering, your competition, your region and improve your SEO
- Know how to approach influencers and publishers
- Create your marketing budget and know where to spend it
- Build recommendations to get more clients.
Continue Reading the Tourism Marketing Guides…
To keep going with this article series, check out Tourism Marketing #1: Know What You Are Selling.
