5 Steps To Building A Successful Brand For Your Online Travel Business

Establishing yourself as a viable and credible consumer option online requires a lot of work upfront. Especially in an industry that is as competitive as travel, with so quite a few mega online travel agencies that have already established themselves as the go-to consumer online travel options. To get clients to be comfortable booking their travel plans on your website, you have to present yourself as a professional and reputable business that provides great value and a brand that consumers can trust. How exactly do you go about doing this? Here are the 5 recommended steps you should consider.

1. Identify An Underserved Niche Market

Unless you have a lot of money to pump into marketing, it will be extremely hard to compete online selling generic and traditional travel packages. This space is already dominated by a few 1000 pound gorillas that will be pretty hard for you to take down. However, you can create consumer value in many areas where they can't. There are many people out there that are looking for more than just the best packaged deal to an all inclusive resort in the Dominican Republic. Pick a product or market segment that you can provide expertise in and you will have fun marketing. Whether that is rainforest tours in Costa Rica or Yoga Retreats in India, find some unique travel experience that you love and want to share with others.

2. Create A Professional Online Presence

Customers shopping online do not care where you live, what car you drive or what you look like, all they see and care about is what your website looks like. If you expect customers to spend thousands of dollars purchasing a vacation package through you, your online presence must look as if you invested thousands of dollars to set it up. Take the time to setup a beautiful website with content that provides useful information around your niche offering. Not having the money to pay for a beautiful website is no longer an excuse. With platforms like The TravelNet that provides all the tools you need to build and host your own professional travel website for a very low monthly cost, all that is left for you to do is invest the time. Build the type of travel website that you will be proud to share with your friends and potential clients.

3. Locate And Promote To Your Target Market

Know who your potential buyers are and promote your business to them. If you do not properly identify who will buy your travel product, you will waste a lot of time and resources trying to promote your service everywhere and to everyone with a low conversion rate. Not only will this kill your business, it is also very discouraging for you. Before you jump on every social media website and start distributing marketing material everywhere, find out the outlets where you target customers congregate the most and focus your marketing in those areas.

4. Provide High Quality Customer Service

The fastest way to kill your brand is by not meeting customers expectations when it comes to customer service. Make yourself available to customers for questions through a visible toll free number or contact page on your website. Get back to submitted inquiries in less than 24 hours, and always come back with a little bit more information than what was requested. That extra mile is what will make you stand out over your competitors. Personalized and high quality customer service is the advantage you have over the major online travel agencies. Not only will this bring you a lot of repeat business, but every happy customer will send you a referral or two.

5. Solicit And Share Customer Reviews

When you have a satisfied customer, let everyone know about it. Actively solicit testimonials and reviews from the clients you serve and ask their permission to share it on your website and on your social media pages. When new visitors to your website see the type of experiences you have created for your past clients, they will have more confidence in doing business with you. Do your part in taking good care of every customer, and they will most likely be happy to post a good review about your service.