10 Attraction and Experiences Reopening Best Practices

Our friends at Redeam have created a helpful info-graphic for those reopening to the public. These are excellent suggestions and a great reminder that reassuring your customers is an essential task in the coming months.

Share Your Safety Measures with Travellers

74% of surveyed travellers said a checklist of safety measures on Tripadvisor listings would be very or extremely helpful.* To help rebuild traveller confidence, we’re launching our new Travel Safe initiative, which allows partners to share a checklist of their safety measures and their overall response to COVID-19. Businesses that activate the checklist will benefit from:

Listing Page Updates Capture traveller attention with a notification at the top of your listing page that links to your safety measures and COVID-19 response Enhanced Traveller Reviews Gather information from recent visitors about their safety experience at your hotel with an enhanced review questionnaire COVID-19 Search Filter [launching 23 June] Increase your visibility and drive bookings by ensuring that travellers find you when they search for hotels that have added their safety precautions

You can add your safety measures in your Management Center beginning on 16th June. If you activate them by 19th June, you’ll be included in the launch of the overall COVID-19 search filter for travellers. In the meantime, you can check out our recent webinar for more information about traveller safety. https://goto.webcasts.com/viewer/event.jsp?ei=1324248&tp_key=3e335a6257

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Hospitality Health Check - How to Make the Best of Your Brand Website

Despite the unprecedented challenges we currently face, some hoteliers have used this quiet period as an opportunity to review their current sales, marketing and operational strategies. Get advice from hotel tech experts and plan for your recovery.

IDeaS has collaborated with a few industry partners to deliver a series of Hospitality Health Check webinars to provide professional insights and suggestions on how to stay competitive and refine your business strategies.

Please join us for the next 15-minute webinar in partnership with D-EDGE: “Revenue by Direct Booking – How to Make the Best of Your Brand Website.” Click here to view the details.

More health check videos are coming with different topics covering Competitive Intelligence, Channel Management, and Distribution & Optimisation.

Enjoy the videos and stay healthy!

IDeaS partnered with D-EDGE, the industry leader in hotel digital marketing and distribution technology, to help hoteliers review their current digital marketing and brand website strategies, and to optimise revenue by direct booking.

Watch the video for information on:

• Making the best of your online storefront
• Building an effective hotel brand website (7 tips)
• Tracking the success of brand website marketing initiatives
• Driving revenue by direct booking
• What to do differently for building a website in China

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Where Will Your Bookings Be in 12 Months?

Greetings to our friends and colleagues around the world.    From all of the Travel & Adventure Show Team – to all of you, we hope you and your families are well and we can not wait to see you in person, face-to-face – with a little distance mixed in.   Over the past 16 years we have produced the Travel & Adventure Shows through three recessions, including the “Great Recession,” and now this most sudden COVID-19 economic downturn.  Along the way, I have learned a few things and thought now might be a good time to share them: First – this current downturn is different.  It was sudden and not financially or economically induced. It was Government generated in response to a worldwide pandemic and simultaneously supported with massive stimulus and liquidity. Second – It resulted in a massive and extremely quick increase in unemployment. Third – It mandated travel restrictions. Fourth – It may be a quicker recovery than anyone predicts. Unlike other recessions, this one has hit the travel and tourism industry hard and swift.  Yet I see signs that the industry will also enjoy a rapid recovery.  Let’s look at three very important recent data points:   Contrary to what most expected, U.S. personal consumer income SURGED by over 10.5% in April – thank you stimulus.

Personal Consumption retracted 13.6% in April.  If you are like me you were at home and stores, restaruants and entertainment are all closed there’snothing to spend on.

Most importantly, the consumer U.S. Savings Rate skyrocketed to 33% in April. Let’s sum it up – income is up, spending down. The result - high savings.

Consumers are flush with cash tired of being at home and have massive pent up demand.   We already see airlines are increasing capacity and resuming schedules as consumer bookings begin to rise. Businesses are reopening and we are seeing a decline in jobless claims.   Consumer Sentiment turned the corner and rose in May from April lows – compare that to the Great Recession that began in 1998 – Consumer sentiment was much lower and took over four years to regain traction.

By the way, if you missed ATTF click here for a replay.  Over 1,000 travel and tourism executives joined us for a three-hour virtual conference chocked full of economic, industry and demographic information on the state of the American Traveler.   American Traveler Sentiment continues to rapidly increase. In the first week of June, Destination Analysts saw over 50% of travelers are ready to travel for the first time since the pandemic lockdown.

The fact is the American Consumer is resilient and is getting ready to spend.   The Question is: Will they Spend with you? So back to lessons learned from past recessions.   During tough times MARKETING is more important than ever! There’s an adage that captures this well:   “If sales are your problem today, marketing was your problem 12 months ago.”  The problem here is that when finances are tight, executives have a hard time thinking long-term. It seems simple to cut back on efforts that won’t pay dividends immediately, so it’s common for marketing to be the first to go.   Resist the urge to go this route. All you’re doing with this strategy is giving yourself a bigger revenue problem down the line. In six months, eight months, or a year, you’ll be wondering where all of your customers went—and the answer will stem from your marketing cuts.   Think of your marketing costs as the costs of acquiring and maintaining your customer base.   Marketing is the cost of generating revenue. Why would you cut back on those efforts?   Is there a pent-up demand for travel?  Of course.   Are consumers ready to travel?  Getting there.   Will where and how they travel change?  YES.   Many tourism boards and tour operators are already adjusting how to offer exciting vacation options in a COVID-19 world.  There is quite optimistic information growing on multiple effective vaccines being available in Q4 2020, and infection rates are rapidly declining.   One thing is for sure - travelers will put added emphasis on their PROCESS OF TRAVEL as a decision point in booking vacations.   So, for travel marketers and tourism organizations the time is now to put into motion marketing and communications to build confidence and inspire travelers to plan their trips.   The main takeaway is that companies that invest in marketing during a recession achieve greater gains in market share (both during and after the downturn) than companies that cut back.    We know that Travel Enthusiasts will be the first to travel and the first to book both domestically AND internationally.    It’s why the Travel & Adventure Shows are AMERICA’S TRAVEL RECOVERY SHOWs and the ONLY Major Shows in 2021.   What’s more, we are actively increasing our digital reach to our attendees and delivering new marketing vehicles for you to get your message to Travel Advisors & Consumers.  Look for our announcements soon for both TravelShows.TV and our new TAS Virtual Trade Exhibit Hall / Directory.   We are here to help you every step of the way.    The Dallas Travel & Adventure Show is on in August and we still have booths available to help you capture bookings.  Our 2021 schedule is published at TravelShows.com and our Recovery Rate Special has been extended to June 15th to help you stretch your budget.   Call us today and let us maximize your marketing spend reaching the Americans who ARE TRAVELING.   Till next time… the Adventure Continues.

John Golicz CEO, Travel & Adventure Show Series

http://e-campaign.travelshows.com/from-the-ceo-travel-adventure-show-update-4

Investment Readiness for Green Finance Mechanisms initiative

GREEN INVESTMENTS FOR SUSTAINABLE TOURISM

• ALL REGIONS

Registration

Under the new Investment Readiness for Green Finance Mechanisms initiative, the UNWTO will work alongside the IFC, which is a member of the World Bank Group and the largest global development institution focused exclusively on the private sector in developing countries, on a series of training programmes. One of the main focuses of the new initiative will be working with private sector partners to promote green finance and share experience in resourcing sustainable buildings. The initial cooperation will consist in a series of trainings to promote green investments for a long term the recovery of the tourism sector. The first training is planned to start on 4 June, 2020 at 15:00 CET (Madrid time) in a webinar format, and it will culminate with an accreditation training provided by the EDGE Experts.

PURPOSE

UNWTO is partnering with the IFC for a series of technical training programmes aimed at promoting green finance and unlocking its potential to accelerate tourism’s recovery and stimulate sustainable growth.