Increase Your Tourism Web Traffic Amp Sales Guaranteed

Writen by Tim Warren

Web sites are a major part of the tourism marketing success strategy used by international tourism promoters in the new millennium: tourism boards, Associations, lodging, tour operators, etc. If your tourism web site does not have these four primary elements clearly and quickly represented, you are missing opportunities and losing sales.

1. Creates a desire to use your tourism services, visit your destination or participate in your unique tourism option

2. Clearly informs prospects of travel and service benefits, options, sites, nature/environment, activities

3. Answer questions and concerns a typical visitor may have

4. Motivates prospects to contact you quickly (not your competitor) for more information, travel options and dates, answer questions and address concerns

If your site achieves all these goals, then the prospects that have visited your site will be more excited, motivated, qualified, informed and much closer to giving you a booking or visiting your country. This article is not about web design and layout theory, but why the written word and consumer psychology is a prime factor in influencing arrivals and sales.

Create a desire to Visit your destination or travel with your company

Prospective travelers may or may not choose to visit your destination based on what they read on your web site – usually just your home page.

Read the article Tourist Safety and Security on Adventure Business Consultants, then you'll know how crucial it is to first communicate to prospective travelers that your destination and/or tour is a safe, secure and fun place to visit. With so many global destination choices online and so much international turmoil, you MUST communicate clearly it is a safe and fun destination quickly.

The best place to first communicate safety, security and fun is on your home page, not buried deep in your site. When someone first comes to your web site, you literally have five to twenty seconds to grab their interest and compel them to want to know more about your destination, tours, etc. If you don't grab them on your home page, they are gone. Those prospective tourists are back to surfing the web, seeking out a more interesting, compelling tourism web site and vacation destination.

If you look at your log report, (the statistical report that your internet service provider should make accessible to you) that monitors your web visitors activity, i.e. pages visited, length of time on your site, key words used to find your site, etc., you may notice that the majority of visitors may stay less then a minute. On a poorly written and designed web site, maybe less then fifteen seconds. So grabbing their attention and motivating them to want to know more is the first obstacle and opportunity. Testimonials and photos of happy tourist are perfect for communicating safety and experience quickly. Use them liberally.

Tourism Web Site Must Clearly inform

One of the prime reasons people travel is to experience "something different" from their ordinary life and location. Active and ecotourists want to learn about new cultures, see different houses, hear and speak a different language, reflect on ancient religions and buildings, marvel at unbroken vistas, or try a new activity. This is exactly what most ecotourism operator and destinations are selling and what you must communicate to your web visitors.

Too many web sites that give web visitors unknown destinations instead of activities or types of regions. Most people surfing your web site are not going to know, for example, what they'll find in Hosgol, Khenti, or the Gobi – which are major regions of Mongolia I discovered during two consulting projects I did there for their tourism Association and ministry. You be better off to define what type of regions they are and what they have to offer. Use descriptive words that everyone will understand. For example:

Hosgol –Mountains • Lakes • Fishing • Horseback Riding • Hiking

Khenti – Steppes • Rivers • Fishing • Horseback & Mt. Biking • Religious Sites

Gobi – Desert • Camel Riding • Trekking • Archeology

You must use descriptive text and compelling words that paint a desirable mental picture.

Summarize your trips in bullets and short headlines and sub- headlines

Use descriptive verbs and compelling words in the body of the text to give substance and details to the headlines and sub-heads.

Effective Tourism Marketing Web Sites -Answer Questions and Concerns

When a prospective tourist is considering a destination, in addition to types of regions and activities, they have additional questions and concerns that must be addressed to earn their visit or booking. The same holds true with Out Bound Booking Agents, but even more so.

Some of these travelers questions and concerns include:

Safety precautions and procedures • How you are going to protect their safety? • Length of vacation • Costs • Difficulty of trip • Travel options to Ulaan Bataar • Lodging – hotel, camping or Ger • Food– vegetarian or special restrictions • Water – Is it safe? • Medical emergency/1st aide resources • Qualifications of staff • Experience level of company • Exchange rates & procedures • Times of year to visit • Group discounts • Children – minimum age/experience • Insurance needs/options • Cancellation policy/minimums for departure • In-country transportation & equipment • Visa requirements • Inoculations/disease precautions • language

One of the best ways to deal with all the typical questions you'll get from prospective clients is a Frequently Asked Questions and Answers page – FAQ's. You should also create a pre-written response E-mail that responds to these questions and more. Testimonials and pictures that address these questions are great too.

Successful Tourism Marketing - Motivates prospects to Buy

Remember that: Marketing is the actions and steps to getting prospective and qualified visitors/clients to call or e-mail you.

Selling is the transference of enthusiasm from you to the prospect.

Sales is getting those prospective visitors/clients to feel comfortable and excited enough about your destination/or trip, to give your money and book a trip.

Your tourism web site quickly communicates that region and your tours:

Are fun, safe and secure on the home and subsequent pages

Effectively answer questions and concerns

Uses a blend of testimonials and images of happy visitors (especially celebrities and/or recognized media)

When prospects call or e-mail, they will far more motivated and excited. If you are excited in your spoken and written words too, then making a sale is ten times easier. If you or a staff member can effectively speak the foreign language of your prospect, can be excited about what you are selling and can ask for the booking, it would be better to schedule a phone call with serious prospects at your expense whenever possible. This will radically increase your odds of converting that web site visitor into a paying client.

Web site Samples and Resources

See the following web sites for good use of testimonials, compelling headlines, layout, photos and descriptive text that clearly informs prospects of travel options, sites, nature, activities, etc. How a site looks is important, but it is the words and how they are expressed, that is most important.

www.BajaTravelVacations.com/ www.AdventureBizSuccess.com www.Alaskadogsledding.com www.Anotherland.com www.california-river-rafting.com www.tightlinesfishing.com

How-to Create Tourism Web Sites that Sell – Guaranteed

Here is one of the best resources to help you define and communicate your most important information to prospective visitors and guests. This will motivate them to call, e-mail and give you a booking: Tourism Marketing Success©2005. http:// www.AdventureBizSuccess.com/tourismmarketingbook.php

This special print or E-book will take you step by step through the process and helps you create effective and profitable Tourism marketing communications for brochures web sites, tradeshow booths, advertising, videos and more.

Tourism Web Site Check List for Success

Web sites are a major part of the marketing success strategy used by international tourism promoters.

Prospective travelers may or may not choose to visit your region or use your tour, based on what they read on your web site – usually just your home page.

Your web site quickly communicates that your destinations and tours are fun, safe and secure.

Your web site effectively answers questions and concerns.

The best place to first communicate safety, security and fun is on your home page, not buried deep in your site.

You must use descriptive text and compelling words that paint a desirable mental picture.

Summarize your trips in bullets and short headlines and sub-headlines

Use descriptive verbs and compelling words in the body of the text to give substance and details to the headlines and sub-heads.

One of the best ways to deal with all the typical questions you'll get from prospective clients is a Frequently Asked Questions and Answers page – FAQ's.

Don't forget that your web site must show up in the top 1 –20 positions of directories and search engines from a relevant key word search. Without this, no matter how well written and laid out your web site is, you will loose out on the majority of prospective clients. See www.AdventureBizSuccess.com for articles on search engine success and more E-marketing strategies for tourism professionals.

Since 1994, Tim Warren and Adventure Business Consultants, has helped dozen's of ecotourism, adventure travel, nature and cultural tour operators, travel agents, destinations, tourism associations and boards with training, consulting and creating exceptional marketing material. Click Here For Free Bimonthly E-zine – Outdoor Tourism Marketing Business Success - http://www.AdventureBizSuccess.com">http:// http://www.AdventureBizSuccess.com

News, tips, tools and specials that you can use to increase your tourism marketing and business success. 800-707-7570.

Link Exchange A Better Way For 2006

Writen by John Schwartz

While traditional link exchanges still hold some value, it may be time to add a different tactic to your link-building arsenal. Why? Because it appears that swapping links doesn't provide quite as much 'oomph!' for moving up in the search engine rankings that it used to, at least not for sites in highly competitive niches. Many sites that were on the first page of results and relied heavily on exchanging links have lost those coveted positions after recent search engine updates (especially the 'Jagger' update at Google).

Disclaimer: Only employees who are in the know at the search engines can say with certainty which factors determine rankings. The decrease in link exchange benefit is speculation based on testing and some consensus among 'experts' outside of the engines.

Build More One-Way Links

Assuming that it's true about link exchanges becoming an obsolete way to get higher search engine rankings, it's wise to find ways to build one-way inbound links. At the very least, no web site owner should rely completely on one form of link gathering. It's never smart to put all of one's eggs in the same basket, after all.

The rub here is that most site owners still pursue link swaps as their 'bread-and-butter' means of building links. That can play against you in your own link strategy if you don't continue to offer exchanges. What to do?

What you need is a sort of hybrid approach. That is, find a way to appeal to the barter mindset of exchanging something of value for something else of value that most web site owners have ingrained in their modes of thinking. Along those lines, here's a great way to continue building links without swapping them: offer original, unique content in exchange for a one-way link.

Trade Content for Links Instead

Here's how it works...

Instead of offering to exchange links on your links page, write a short notice that you will write a few hundred words of original, exclusive content (300-500 is plenty) that the other site owner may use on his or her site. In exchange, they must post a link to your site on either their home page or another important page that is linked directly from the home page. Make it clear that your link must not appear on their links page, where it would just share space with many others. For the value to be equal, your link should get special handling in exchange for that great page of new content.

Now, expect not to get too many takers at this stage. The link exchange notion is pretty ingrained in most site owners. That being the case, there's another part of this strategy you should definitely pursue.

Be proactive! Seek out related sites from which you'd love to have a link, and approach the site owner or webmaster with an offer to write a page of high quality content in exchange for a return link. We've been following this strategy for months with our network of sites and the results are impressive! You can expect a much higher rate of agreement from this approach than the tired old "I love your site! let's exchange links!" routine, which is increasingly too time consuming to be worth the effort.

Some Important Points

First, follow through and write truly excellent content. Don't just dash off a quick article that doesn't convey useful and interesting information. Savvy web site owners will quickly refuse to post your link if you abuse the situation in this way.

Second, make the content you give away original and exclusive. This is your 'hook' – your best selling point. If you try to give a site owner the same content that appears somewhere else, you'll lose a wonderful opportunity to get a great one-way link.

Perhaps the most important point of all is to use this strategy only with closely related sites that have high quality content. Be picky! Start by checking out the top ranked sites in your niche. Search Google or another major search engine to get a list of the top sites, then visit each one and, if you deem it worthy, find their contact information and send a short, polite inquiry to see if they are interested in an exchange of content for a link back to your site.

When other site owners approach you from the notice on your links page - again, be picky. You'll be spending some of your valuable time to write them a page of high quality content. You will want a high quality link in return. If a site does not meet your high standards, take a pass. In all cases, if you agree to the content-for-link exchange, always request a link from their home page. It's the best possible place for your link and, at worst, the other site owner will refuse and suggest a different page. It can't hurt to ask!

Ultimately, the real long-term value in following this link-building strategy is the return on your investment of time. The relatively short amount of time you invest in writing the content you give away may produce dividends in traffic and higher search engine rankings that last for years. Viewed from that perspective, doesn't this make good sense?

© John Schwartz http://www.web-article-writer.com (all rights reserved)

John Schwartz is a professional writer and web site publisher. If you need higher search engine rankings to increase web site traffic, you must have lots of original content and links. Find out how to get more of both - visit http://www.web-article-writer.com today.

My Top 12 Web Site Marketing Strategies Part 2

Writen by Herman Drost

Part 2

7. Ezine Ads - create an ad for your product and find ezines that cater to your target market. Write several ads and track them until you find one that pulls well.

8. Signature file - include this all your online and offline correspondence. Set up your email client so that it does this automatically each time you send out an email. Include your name, who you are, what your business is about, a way to subscribe to your newsletter, your web site address and your email.

Link strategies

9. Write articles - ezine publishers are always looking for original content. You can include a link back to your web site in your signature file. If several ezine publishers (that may have thousands of subscribers) publish your article, you can get hundreds of links pointing back to your web site.

10. Reciprocal linking - get links from other sites that compliment yours. ie if you just offer web design and someone else offers search engine optimization you could exchange links with each other, thus adding to the quality of each of your sites.

11. Forums - offer your help to other forum participants then leave a link back to your site in your signature file. Popular forums are spidered regularly by the search engines, thus giving your site a link boost.

12. Offline marketing

Not all your customers are online. Market offline by including your web site information on all stationary ie letterhead, and business cards. Place ads in newspapers, trade publications, send out postcards, fliers and get involved in local organizations such as the Chamber of Commerce. You can even set up your own local club or be a guest speaker for others.

Continuously evaluate, test and refine your web site marketing strategies so that you can apply them to any product. These are the keys to building a successful online business.

Here are the 6 Web Site Marketing Strategies discussed in Part 1 of this article.

Herman Drost is the author of the popular ebook: 101 Highly Effective Strategies to Promote Your Web Site Subscribe to his "Marketing Tips" newsletter for more original articles at: subscribe@isitebuild.com. You can read more of his in-depth articles at: http://www.isitebuild.com/articles

Increase Your Website Traffic And Get Sales

Writen by Rick Hendershot

No matter what you sell or are trying to promote online, you want visitors to your website -- traffic. And you want to turn that traffic into sales. To turn your website and other online activities into a powerful traffic and sales generating system, the simple fact is you need an aggressive website promotion program that is ongoing and relentless.

Website promotion is not brain surgery, but it must be done correctly. Here are six of the main components that should be emphasized in a good website promotion program:

1. Know Your Product, Define it Clearly
2. Use Powerful Copy in Your Website, and Sales Materials
3. Create an Aggressive Link Program
4. Write Articles and Submit Them Everywhere
5. Turn Site Visitors into Leads
6. Get Instant Traffic with PPC Advertising

**1. Know your product and define it clearly

Many of us have difficulty telling other people exactly what we do. Imagine you're at a party, a meeting, or on the golf course and you get asked the inevitable question, "So, what does your company do?" What happens? Do you stumble around trying to remember what you told the last guy who asked that question? Or do you have a clear, precise and memorable answer that you can recite back to them in one or two sentences.

It goes without saying that your clarity or confusion will be reflected in your website promotion. Make it one of your primary objectives to develop a clear explanation of your product or service, and your website promotion will fall nicely into place as a result.

**2. Promote your product with powerful copy

If you want your website to create sales, then the job of your most important pages is to get your primary selling message across quickly and powerfully before your impatient visitors click on to another site.

For your people audience you must get to the point quickly and precisely, and with sufficient emphasis to impress your visitors that you know what you are talking about.

The search engines also demand a clear product definition and clear product descriptions. But in this case the result should be search engine optimized copy. This is because the search engines do not read between the lines. They look for clear indications of what your pages are about. And they make their decisions on the basis of "keywords".

If the task of "optimizing" your website seems too daunting, then look for a website promotion expert who can bundle this service with other promotional services.

**3. Create an aggressive link program

Getting links from "relevant" sites serves two important purposes. First, relevant links create an important source of direct traffic. A visitor to a related site will see the link to yours, click on it, and become your visitor. Some estimates put the percentage of internet traffic resulting from this kind of link as high as 21% of total traffic.

The other important purpose of your linking strategy is to impress the search engines. Links to and from other sites indicate other site owners in your area of interest consider your site worth looking at. That is why Google and the other major search engines give a much better ranking to sites with incoming links from relevant high traffic sites.

The bad news is a productive link building program takes quite a bit of time and effort, and will take up to six months or more to do properly.

The good news is there are website promotion professionals who will plan and execute a link building program for you as part of a package of promotion services. This makes it very economical. But it will still not happen overnight. Link building is an ongoing long term project.

**4. Write Articles in your field of expertise, and distribute them wherever you can

Publishing articles in online publications, directories and ezines is one of the most effective and least expensive kinds of website promotion. It is a perfect way to generate interest in your site, and create traffic.

Well written articles can be used to highlight various aspects of your products or services. At the same time you will establish yourself as an authority in your field. And the articles you write and publish today will continue to be available on the web for years to come.

Distributing articles is also an important way to create incoming links. Other websites and ezines publish your articles and in the process create links pointing back to your website. Why? Because when you write your article you make sure to embed a link or two pointing back to your site. Often this is done in what is called the "Resource Box" -- a short bio of the author that contains a low key pitch for your products or services.

But writing and distributing articles is not for everyone. It is a very time-consuming activity, and if you are not much of a writer it will cost some money to have someone write articles for you.

One interesting alternative is our own program in which we embed sponsor links in relevant articles. This is probably the easiest and least expensive way to get the benefits of article distribution without the pain and aggravation of actually having to write original articles.

**5. Turn visitors into leads

The online sales process starts with traffic — visitors to your site. But traffic is not enough. You want to turn some of these visitors into leads. A "lead" is a visitor who expresses an interest by contacting you. This puts them in "most-likely-to-buy" category, and gives you a clearly defined group of people you can target with more specific sales messages.

To capture leads you need a carefully planned strategy. You need to get beyond the usual "send us an email for more information" approach.

Simple online forms backed up with autoresponders are perfect for this task. Normally this involves offering some tip or free information course, or possibly a free piece of software.

In order to receive the free gift the website visitor must fill in a short form giving you their name and email address. Then the autoresponder automatically sends out a message containing or pointing to the free gift, along with a presentation of your product. You can also program the autoresponder to send out a series of messages so your promotional pitch is placed in front of them a number of times.

**6. Use Pay-Per-Click Advertising for instant traffic

Pay-Per-Click advertising — especially Google Adwords — can be an amazingly powerful tool to reach your exact target market and generate pre-qualified, targeted leads almost instantly.

But this service is also becoming increasingly expensive. And when you make mistakes they can be very costly. There are ways of maximizing your Google Adwords results. These techniques can save you thousands of dollars, and greatly increase the effectiveness of your Adwords campaigns.

The best website promotion program is one that combines all six of these techniques into an organized program. If you are too busy getting your business started, or too busy servicing your clients, then your best bet is to look for a website promotion professional who can prepare and maintain a program for you.

Rick Hendershot publishes Linknet News | Link Aufbau - Pagerank-Optimierung durch Aufbau von Links | Web Reviews and Product Reviews and Promotions.