The tourism industry took quite a heavy blow from the outbreak of COVID-19 slowing down to a grinding halt at the height of the pandemic. Fortunately, these days it looks like the global crisis is slowly coming to a close and people are definitely using the opportunity to make up for lost time and once more start exploring the globe in person.
However, everyone should be clear about the fact that the world we got at the end of the pandemic is not the same as the one we left two years ago. Different habits, work models, travel policies, and other small wrinkles we picked up along the way will make their mark on the tourism industry as well.
Let us take a look then at a couple of innovative ideas that should help you tap into these trends and put your company on the map.
Flexible travel arrangements
Over the last two years, countless people were forced to cancel their trips and vacations due to the restriction measures caused by COVID-19 with only a fraction of them getting their money back. Such a practice dragged down the reputation of the entire industry and, in some cases, destroyed the confidence the consumers had in their companies. On the other hand, this situation opens up the possibility for you to win some of this confidence back and set yourself apart from the competitors. Do that by writing off fees for late changes, offering flexible dates, and making sure you are working in the client’s best interest.
Marrying work and vacation
The idea of the so-called ‘workcations’ is not entirely new. Ever since the fast internet became widely available, the world became a number to a growing number of digital nomads who decided to make a living hopping around the globe, without a permanent residence. Well, during the pandemic the number of remote workers scored exponential growth, and the tribe of these nomads can easily turn into a flood. You can exploit this trend by offering retreats that will be built around the needs of this workforce and designed to encourage high productivity. Marketing such accommodations should also be very easy.
Hobbyist vacations
As we said in the introduction, now that the pandemic is slowing down people are doing their best to make up for the lost time so they often try to cover as many things in one run as possible. With that in mind, offering them an option to enjoy their vacation while at the same time indulging in some of their hobbies does like a good way to register on the travelers’ radars. Let’s take for example Fishing Charters in Narooma are a very popular entertainment option for all people visiting Australia and New South Wales. So check your native location and see if you can offer some added value to people paying a visit.
Offering safer and more streamlined travels
If there is one good thing we can say about the outbreak of COVID-19 that would be growing public health awareness. These days, people do pay much more attention to their health and well-being. So here lies an opportunity for you to score some easy points by offering your visitors accommodations that will meet the high standards we have set during the pandemic. Also, numerous countries across the world are still enforcing the COVID-19 policies like obligatory PCR tests for entrance and so on. You can do a lot to help your visitors and raise your company profile by sorting out the logistics for these procedures.
Ramping up the ‘staycation’ offer
If you are unfamiliar with the term, staycation is described as taking a vacation in your native country or even city and giving it the same treatment you would in some exotic foreign locations. Obviously, this type of vacation was one of the rare options you had during the pandemic but it demonstrated that people don't need to travel half a globe away to have fun and discover new awesome stuff at a fraction of the money. So, we can expect this trend to sustain even as the pandemic slows down. Tweaking your marketing approach to tap into this trend is also very easy – you only need a bit of focused SEO and content effort.
Allowing people to spend quality ‘me time’
Last but not least, we would like to remind you that months of lockdowns and strained social relations caused countless people to look out for some quality ‘me-time’ and go traveling the globe alone. This is yet another opportunity for you to push your company forward by offering something different. While most tourist programs and accommodations are organized around the needs of families and couples you can easily bring in an entirely new audience by aiming for single travelers looking for a bit of relaxation, and introspection. You can even point these people to each other and forge new bonds in the process.
So, these were the top six ideas that should help you to use the renewed post-pandemic interest in tourism to set your company apart from the competition and, hopefully, push it into the major league. The last two years were very rough for all of us. It is only natural that people are looking for some fun way to blow off some steam. Be sure then to understand what they actually need and use these insights to help your business grow.