It can be a little daunting trying new destination marketing trends. As an Ontario Tourism provider taking advantage of evolving technology to boost visitors makes sense. This is especially true now that plans are in place to provide high speed internet to 90% of Canadians by 2021.
Trying new marketing techniques like inbound marketing doesn’t mean you’ll have to abandon your tried and true marketing methods (if they’re working for you).
And, knowing your target audience and your unique selling propositions remain the same regardless of how you market your business. That said, keeping up with how your competitors use destination marketing for rural tourism to reach your shared audience is essential to your marketing strategy.
In his article Here's What Google Thinks: Five 'Next Practices' In Destination Marketing (Forbes Magazine, January 2017) contributor Andrew Levine breaks down what experts at Google are anticipating are the destination marketing trends tourism operators need to embrace for success in the future.
Here’s a breakdown of Levine’s findings and how Ontario Tourism operators can seize these trends for successful destination marketing.
Using Technology To Attract Visitors To Ontario Tourism Destinations
Change can be difficult especially when it comes to technology. What’s hot changes rapidly so it can feel overwhelming to keep up. Read on to understand destination marketing trends. Here’s what Google thinks you should be doing to use technology to attract visitors to Ontario destinations:
- Build your content for smartphones first. Mobile is taking over traditional desktop website use. Traditionally websites were created for the larger format screen with great images and lots of language. Now your content plans should focus on how it’ll be displayed on a smartphone: short text, simply navigation, properly formatted images and video to fit the small screen.
- Cater to Intent a.k.a. reach the right person at the right time. Knowing your audience remains the foundation of any successful destination marketing. Use feedback from your clients, tap into local economic development trends and use your business experience to plan when to market your destination and to whom.
- Use You-Tube to sell your destination. You can promote your tourism experience through great video content. It’s worth your while to get at least one professional video produced that you can share over multiple platforms.
- Get comfortable with virtual reality. Ok, so depending on your budget you might not be able to jump into VR today. However, you should understand what it is and how it’s being used elsewhere so you know what’s what when VR does become accessible for all in the next five years.
- Use technology to help you create something new. People want new experiences to keep them coming back to your destination. So don’t simply market what you have, create new adventures to complement your existing draw. Have a remote ski hill? Add a stargazing component (using smartphone apps) to let visitors discover the night sky from your unique location.
The good thing is you don’t have to figure out how to use these destination marketing trends on your own. There’s experts close to you at Tangible Words who’ll help you understand these changing trends and show you how to incorporate them into your destination marketing.
Want to start shaking up your destination marketing for free?
All the money you’ve spent on your website is wasted if you don’t have the right content to help tourists choose your Ontario Region.
