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What’s selling a Rolls Royce got to do with promoting your small business?

I’ll explain in a moment.

I’ve no idea whether this story is true or not, but it’s a great illustration that could help you show potential visitors that you offer exceptional value for money - whether you charge a little or a lot. 

The story goes that Rolls Royce decided to stop exhibiting at car shows and to take a stand at private jet shows instead. As advertising supremo, Rory Sutherland said, “when you’ve been look…

This year has been a strange one for the tourism industry. Some incredibly busy periods, followed by gaps in demand. Strong bookings for times that are usually less popular, and yet empty weeks at peak season. Flurries of advance bookings, and then many very last minute bookings. 

It's unsettling and leading to a lot of concern: a roller-coaster ride of optimism and pessimism. 

So what can you do? 

It's tempting to simply discount and hope for the best. After all, many people are struggling a…

How much patience do you have? How busy are you? Do you have a lot of free time? 

If your answers to those questions were 'not much, very and no', join the club. It's how most people will answer. 

So if we want to help people book or visit our businesses, we need to make it very easy for them.

I often make suggestions for the kind of information and inspiration you should ideally have on your website. But there's a caveat: you can't just keep adding to your website without removing something,…

This week I've been judging the VisitEngland Awards for Excellence (accommodation) and noticed some positive trends: 

1. Good businesses really are memorable, with stand-out appeal: independents manage to do this well, and some chains are trying to find better ways to differentiate individual properties. Some businesses have made significant investments in their properties, but it's not just about cash - creativity and guest-focus really count.

2. Since last year's judging panel, it seems that…

I've recently spent a LOT of time looking at tourism business websites. I'm one of the judges for the VIsitEngland Awards for Excellence and have been sifting through countless application forms and then double-checking the look, feel and contents of websites. 

Considering these are some of the best tourism businesses in the country, it's been frustrating to see how many websites are not as good as they need to be to impress potential visitors.

The best websites aren't necessarily the most ex…

We want people to scroll - to find our posts and information. But then we want them to stop. We need visitors to stop scrolling long enough to take in the reasons why our areas and businesses are worth visiting. We need them to stop scrolling so they can choose us.

We need visitors to absorb essential information on our websites, and visitors don't always have the patience to scroll all the way down your pages to find what they're looking for. 

The answer: use really compelling information and…

Have you noticed the letters TLDR or TL;DR on social media recently? If you haven't, now I've pointed it out you probably will. It's everywhere!

TLDR means Too Long - Don't Read.

It's an abbreviation used just before a quick summary of a longer post or article. The idea is that we're all so busy we like to find shortcuts. So the TLDR is for anyone in a hurry. Some people will read the full version, but only if they think it's worth it - the summary gives the rough gist, and can entice further …

This is something you can quickly do to raise the profile of your business.

It's easier and quicker than you think so if you're been putting it off... do it now!

It's important. It's free. It's optimising your Google Business Profile - the new name for Google My Business. Don't worry about the 'optimise bit' - I'll explain. 

92% of search engine searches are on Google so it's incredibly powerful. You want your business to show up as high in the results pages as possible. You don't need any te…

"Location, location, location" are said to be the three things that most affect property values. Location's also crucial to the success of tourism businesses.

I'm not sure we recognise and use location enough, or in the right way. 

Of course, every tourism business gives their address. They might add a map, or include a mention of their 'fantastic location' on the home page of their website. All fine, but you can use your location in many other ways to attract visitors and enhance your search …