Anyone who is tasked with marketing a tourist destination knows that it can be tough to create a winning marketing strategy. It’s even more difficult to know that you’re targeting the right potential visitors.

There are many opportunities since, according to Google; “most consumers aren’t brand-committed in these moments. For example, 78% of leisure travelers haven’t decided what airline they will travel with, and 82% haven’t chosen the accommodation provider they will book with when they first start thinking about a trip.” (source)

Creating a Tourism Marketing Plan for Your Destination

You might be thinking that this is not a creative marketing idea, but it comes in at number one because it’s the base for the rest of your marketing activities. Without an effective marketing plan you’re driving blind. Creating a tourism marketing plan may be the most important thing you do for your internet marketing. Without a plan in place you’ll have a difficult time achieving your goals, have a hard time keeping track of what you’re doing, why you’re doing it and if it’s even being effective!

Create a Guide About Your Area

Travelers are the lifeblood of the tourism industry. Therefore, your tourism marketing needs to be focused around their wants and needs. Most of them won’t know your area as well as a local would (yes, you), and a fun, informative guide is something that they would consider extremely valuable.

Make the guide easy to read and understand. Make it skimmable. No matter how good it is, very few people will read it word for word. Include lots of ideas for things to do and places to see, as well as all of the other information you feel is important to know about your area.

Create Destination Videos

Videos convey a huge amount of information in very little time, so it’s a great way to showcase who you are and what you do. But don’t go out and make a video that is just all about your business. Instead, show people your destination and help them out at the same time.

Create helpful videos that showcase things to do in your area, helpful tips about getting around, fun facts, and locals-only secrets. Share these videos on your website and social media.

Create Challenges

A challenge is when you challenge a group of people—this could be your email subscribers or Facebook fans—to do something for a certain amount of days.

Create a fun challenge related to your niche and get your existing customers to help spread the word via email, social media, etc.

For example, as a hotel, trying to get people excited and thinking about your location you could challenge your Facebook fans to share what they would do on a trip to your location.

Gather User-Generated Content and Promote It

Challenges like the one described above can be used to create tons of awesome user-generated content. People love real-life examples of others using your product or visiting your destination.

The trust generated from a positive review or even a challenge photo will be highly influential and help others get to know your brand. People buy from brands they like and trust!

You don’t need a challenge to find user-generated content though. People love to share and someone has probably already shared about your brand in one way or another.

Use tools like Social Mention. If someone shares a photo on Instagram or includes your business in a glowing YouTube video of their trip, ask permission and share it with your network. Regardless of your current marketing strategy, it’s never too late to gain more insight into your past visitors as well as strengthen your approach to acquiring new visitors.