15 Digital Marketing Strategy Mistakes Travel Companies Should Avoid in 2021
Estimated reading time: 12 minutes
There’s never been a more important time for businesses in the travel and tourism industry to develop their digital marketing strategy.
Millions of eager tourists are rearing to get back overseas. Border restrictions are easing in some areas. Vaccines are rolling out.
It’s absolutely crucial for tour companies, travel agencies, travel apps, and travel gear manufacturers to nail their 2021 digital marketing strategy and get ahead of the curve.
This article will look at 15 of the biggest marketing mistakes travel and tourism companies make and include one actionable tip for each.
By the end of it, you’ll have all the tools you need to ensure your 2021 digital marketing strategy starts off on the right foot.
Ready? Let’s dive in.
Contents:
Why digital marketing is important for travel companies in 2021
Who can benefit from digital travel marketing
How to tell if you’ve got a toxic digital marketing strategy
15 digital marketing mistakes travel companies should avoid in 2021
Digital Marketing for Travel Companies in 2021: Why It Matters
Before we begin, you need to know why marketing for travel and tourism is so important to get right.
People are desperate to get back out into the world. Businesses are longing for the days of seminars and meetings that didn’t involve laptop screens and cold cups of coffee. Tourism in the 21st century has never been so low.
All across the globe, the once nomadic tribe of travellers cross their fingers as they book trips for 2022 and even later this year with hopeful hearts.
You can’t afford to get left behind because of a poorly strategised digital marketing campaign. This major error could make or break your travel company.
And in case you think your business is somehow exempt from needing to be proactive in this tumultuous time, you may need to think again…
Who Should Care About Digital Travel Marketing in 2021?
If you’re part of a marketing team or the owner of a travel company that doesn’t have a marketing team yet, this article is for you.
Travel and tourism is an industry with a broad spectrum of sub-niches. And all of these businesses under the umbrella term “travel” need a good marketing strategy to be successful – especially in 2021.
Here are just a few of the types of businesses in the travel and tourism sector for whom good digital marketing practices are essential:
Tour operators
Airlines
Luxury cruise ship operators
Travel gear manufacturers
Travel gear retailers
Travel websites
Travel agents
Hotels, motels, and hostels
SaaS travel platforms
Hiking gear suppliers
…the list goes on.
If any part of your business relates to travel and tourism in some way, you need to keep reading.
How To Tell If Your Digital Marketing Strategy SUCKS
If you’ve made one or more of the common travel marketing mistakes listed below, there’s a good chance your travel company’s digital marketing strategy has room for improvement.
Luckily for you, that’s exactly why I made this list.
For every common digital marketing mistake listed below, we will break down how it can harm your travel company and ultimately destroy your reputation as a trusted brand.
Then I’ll provide one helpful “Pro Tip” that you’ll be able to action straight away, beginning your journey towards digital travel marketing success.
Sound good?
Let’s check them out.
The 15 Common Marketing Strategy Mistakes Travel Companies Make
The first step to take when it comes to business development is to make a plan. Without one, you’ll be doggy paddling in the middle of the Atlantic with no lifeboat in sight.
In order to stay afloat in the fickle seas of travel and tourism, you’ll need to make sure your business is prepared for what lies ahead.
Here are some of the dangerous pitfalls to watch out for when building your digital marketing strategy:
1) No solid marketing strategy in place
The number one biggest mistake travel companies can make in 2021 when it comes to their digital marketing strategy is…
…not having one.
If you’re a travel start-up or are new to the industry, there’s a chance you might think a digital marketing strategy is not that important.
But it doesn’t matter how amazing and useful your product or service is; if people don’t hear about it or understand how it might benefit them, they’re not going to buy.
Before you even consider marketing your business to the world, make sure you have a solid digital marketing strategy in place so you know exactly where you’re going and how to get there.
Pro Tip: “Book a consultation with an experienced travel marketing specialist to begin developing your ideal digital marketing strategy.”
2) Targeting the wrong demographic
Countless marketing campaigns have failed to produce results because of tone-deaf advertising that doesn’t connect with the right audience.
Travel and Tourism is an expensive industry. Guessing what your prospect is thinking simply won’t cut it if you haven’t put the research in. People don’t want to pay for something that isn’t tailored to their specific desires.
In fact, by going after the wrong group or not properly understanding your customer’s wants and needs you’re breaking the number one rule in digital marketing: Know Your Prospect.
Once you’re equipped with a firm grasp of who you’re selling to, it will be much easier to market your product or service.
Pro Tip: “Find out where your prospects are hanging out online and check out what they have to say. Familiarise yourself with their language, their desires, and their objections. Position your product to be the perfect solution to their unique problems.”
3) Not having any digital marketing goals in place
It’s difficult to measure marketing success without first laying down a set of goals and objectives.
Travel companies, especially those who are brand new to the business, frequently attempt to dive headfirst into marketing without any real idea of where they want it to take them.
This is a huge mistake.
By failing to visualise and record specific business milestones you wish to reach, you’ll throw away a great opportunity to double down on motivation every time one of these goals is met.
And with nowhere to aim your digital marketing bow, the arrow is likely to plummet tip-first into a giant pool of quicksand.
Pro Tip: “Set realistic monthly, quarterly, and yearly goals for each element of your marketing strategies. I.e. one for paid advertisements, one for email marketing, one for social media, etc.”
4) Having a too-small (or non-existent) budget for digital marketing
Another classic marketing flaw is believing that simply having a great product or service is enough to build a sustainable business.
By neglecting to set aside a reasonable amount of funds for digital marketing purposes you limit your capacity for growth.
Digital Marketing = Business Development
Without the right amount of time, money, and thoughtfulness put into marketing your travel company online, there is very little chance you’ll ever make any money from it.
Pro Tip: “Determine exactly how much you can afford to spend on marketing and set it aside at the beginning of every month. As your business scales and you begin to see your ROI, increase that marketing budget accordingly.”
5) Not using analytics to your advantage
Analysing customer data has never been easier thanks to modern technologies.
Businesses are now able to measure the success of nearly every individual element of their digital marketing campaigns.
Unfortunately, many never do this.
Instead, they focus purely on the results of a campaign as a whole and deem it a success or a failure based on the entire outcome.
In the ever-shifting world of travel and tourism, this can be more costly than business owners realise.
Alongside the usual affectors for such statistics – word choice, positioning, targeted demographic, type of offer – the travel marketer must take into account the season, region, and present travel climate when studying their sales data.
Remember: The marketer that measures their own success is the one who is able to double it.
Pro Tip: “Keep and compare data from every travel marketing campaign you run and make a list of all the different factors that might affect each campaign. Use A/B testing to determine which efforts are most auspicious.”
6) Too much focus on the competition
Money is a big deal in the travel industry.
People want to save money wherever they can, so many travel companies wrongly think that by beating their competitors on price, they’ll steal all their customers.
This is almost never how it works.
By telling customers that you have the lowest prices, you’re also telling them you have the least valuable product or service.
When people compare your products to your competitors, they’re only going to care about price if that’s the only thing that sets you apart. They’d much rather pay more for a better product.
NOTE: This fact (sadly) does not apply to air travel companies. For some reason, cheap flights are about all that matters to airline passengers – even the rich ones.
Pro Tip: “Instead of trying to be cheaper than your competitors, focus on making your product or service the best it can possibly be.”
7) Failing to research the competition
This might sound counterintuitive to the advice in the previous section, but failing to research your competitors can be just as detrimental to your business as focusing on them too much.
Successful competitors in your industry offer a blueprint for what travel marketing strategies work and what don’t.
From their websites, ads, and newsletters, you can discover:
The voice that appeals to your target market
The colours, power words, and formatting that meshes well with your niche
What and how frequently to post when it comes to new content
Pay attention (but not too much) to what the other brands in your industry are doing, and do it better.
Pro Tip: “Set aside time to study your competitors. Subscribe to their newsletters; explore their websites. Check out what kind of promotions and content they’re using and consider how you might be able to produce similar marketing efforts to a higher standard.”
8) Lowering prices instead of promoting value
As you already know, people want to save money when they’re booking flights, purchasing travel equipment, or planning a tour.
But that doesn’t mean they want to spend less.
They just want to know that they’re saving money somehow, which is why you have to show them the value of buying from you.
Even though the travel industry is having a lull in 2021, you shouldn’t go dropping your prices to make up for lost sales. There are much more effective and beneficial methods out there for boosting your conversion rates during these tough times.
Pro Tip: ”Rather than lowering your prices to be the cheapest on the market, create personalised package options and unmissable deals that drive the customer to buy more from you.”
9) Not enough ways to pay
Imagine you’ve just about fully convinced a potential customer that they need to invest in what you’re offering.
Then imagine they decide to look elsewhere because they:
A) Couldn’t afford to buy from you right now,
B) Don’t own a credit card, or
C) Your offer doesn’t come with 100% of the features they were looking for.
This happens a lot to businesses that don’t optimise their payment methods.
All customers are unique; they have different needs and want different things. You need to be prepared to help as many of them overcome their personal struggles as reasonably possible.
Pro Tip: “Allow customers to personalise their purchases as much as possible through custom-made deals. Include a tier-based payment system like Afterpay at your checkout screen.”
10) Selling services and features instead of benefits and experiences
Travellers don’t want to hear about your numbers. They don’t want boring lists of every country you can take them to or every product you can sell them.
They want to imagine themselves on holiday. They want to feel like they’re using your product or service to live the travel lifestyle, right now.
Digital travel marketing strategies that don’t make their viewership picture themselves having the time of their lives, even while they shop, are doing themselves a huge disservice.
No customer in the whole world window-shops quite as hard as the antsy tourist.
Pro Tip: ”Instead of telling them what you’re selling, show your customers what their lives would be like after they’ve bought your product (much improved).”
11) Only having a single digital marketing channel
The world of travel incorporates one of the broadest-reaching consumer demographics of any industry.
People of all ages, ethnicities, job titles, and backgrounds partake in various activities relating to travel and tourism.
Single-channel marketing, or deploying only one form of digital marketing at a time, means ignoring a huge part of your potential audience.
Just think of all the seniors that have no interest in social media, all the youth that will never see a newspaper ad; are they going to be interested in your current marketing campaign?
Pro Tip: ”Determine your 3 largest demographics and create separate marketing campaigns specifically targeting these groups. Better yet, try to cover as many different marketing approaches as your budget allows.”
12) Inconsistency
Ah yes, the big “I”.
No, I’m not talking about your local village-bothering cyclops.
I’m talking about one of the biggest digital marketing mistakes that I see all the time…
…Failure to stay consistent.
Often when I’m checking out travel websites for new ideas and potential prospects, I’ll notice their blog hasn’t been updated since 2018 or that they’re switching between first-person and third-person halfway down the page.
This is a big no-no.
If you’re not consistent with your brand voice, article publishing, promotional content, and social media management, your business will struggle to stay afloat.
Inconsistency can affect:
SEO score
Customer retention
Trustability
Conversion rates
Longevity
Don’t let your digital marketing efforts fall to the wayside in lieu of some shiny distractions that aren’t going to help you stay on top for the long term.
Pro Tip: ”Use content automation programs such as Hootsuite and Constant Contact to run a lower risk of having inconsistent marketing.”
13) Not enough specialist positions (too many hats)
A lot of the mistakes mentioned in this blog can often be attributed to the same root cause: Not hiring dedicated people to manage specific parts of your digital marketing strategy.
When you’re just starting out, it’s common for employees to wear a few different hats in order to cover all the ground for maintaining your business.
But as you grow, it’s super important that you redistribute tasks to those who are most well-equipped for the job.
In 2021, the digital world is dominant. Social Media Manager is no longer a laughable title, it’s an executive role.
Give your Creative Director free rein to employ new recruits as they see fit. Hire a freelancer to handle all your direct response marketing. In every facet of your business, you need to be sure you’ve got the right person for the job.
When one person is forced to do six different jobs, there’s a good chance that none of them will be done with the amount of focus and quality that’s needed.
Pro Tip: ”Start by assessing which forms of marketing (Social Media, Email, Content, etc.) are currently yielding the best results for your business and dedicate a single person to taking care of that. This will free up more time for your Marketing Director to start focussing more on other areas that need work.”
14) Being time-deaf (not season-specific)
Here’s another one that can seriously hurt your public image.
Nobody wants to go on a ski trip to the Austrian slopes in the middle of July when there isn’t any snow. Nor do they want to book a family vacation in the sun somewhere, only to arrive in the middle of monsoon season.
This applies to travel companies selling clothes and equipment, tour operators, travel agents, and even businesses in the travel industry that don’t have products or services affected by the weather.
If you’re pumping out marketing content related to the travel industry, it needs to be time-appropriate.
Pro Tip: “Stay one step ahead of the times with your blogs and promotional content. Publish articles and advertise products using messages like ‘Be prepared for this winter with…’ or ‘10 Destinations to Visit in 2022’.”
15) Not keeping up with current trends
Keeping up with social trends is just as important as publishing content relevant to the time of year. And for the same reasons.
If your prospects don’t think you’ve got a good grasp of what’s going on in the world at any given time, they’re going to have difficulty believing you’re legit and trusting you with their money.
In the current climate with travel being affected by the coronavirus and global unemployment, failing to speak up about hot topics such as these can have devastating results for your brand image.
People want to know that you see their struggles and that you’re with them all the way.
Pro Tip: ”Always be realistic yet optimistic when it comes to current events. Present your take as ‘We know this sucks, but here’s the silver lining.’ You’ll get your customers excited even when times are tough, and they’ll associate that positive experience with your company.”
Wrapping Things Up
Now that you understand some of the common mistakes travel and tourism companies make when it comes to digital marketing strategies, you should feel confident in preparing your business for 2021 and beyond.
If you’re still confused or have any concerns regarding your digital marketing strategy, it might be time to look at hiring a professional.
You can book your first digital marketing consultation for free, here, and in no time you’ll have a solid marketing strategy in place and your business growth will be on the rise.
Until then, stay safe and good luck!
